The "rock-bottom" Forcing me to Face My Hand Tool Addiction

[allen long]

This post started out as a riff on the thread started by Derek on the Lee Valley cast spoke shave but has degenerate into a minor existential crisis for me. Please forgive the impossibly log post.

So . . . I checked my cast spokeshave from Lee Valley based on Derek’s post on the subject and sure enough, it had the small concave issue that Derek had with his. (It was a Christmas gift from my son).

A few passes with a file and, voilà! I had slightly crowned the surface. . .

To correct the crowning, I ran this bad boy a diamond stone and, boy was my wife mad. After I gave her ring back, I ran the spokeshave across a DMT diamond plate (heel to toe) over and it was smoother than the back of a Neander’s arm after sharpening a plane iron. Except . . . now it chatters like a shirtless galoot's teeth in a Minnesota winter. I then tried my full-size three year old Lee Valley curved spokeshave, and it chattered just as badly as the smaller cast spokeshave.

And yes, as a matter of fact, I am one of those who often buys a tool, sharpens it, takes a few test cuts, and puts it away . . .

In other words . . .

There is no tool that I need – but many tools I can’t live without!

One thing my hand tool addiction has led me to is hours of practicing and honing my uh . . . well . . . honing skills. In, fact, many of my tools sharp enough that just looking at a picture of them can cause you to bleed. To verify whether I was delusional about my sharpening ability I tried two other spokeshaves:

My flat Lee Valley spokeshave made shavings so fine you can even read the fine print through them.

An old Millers Falls cigar spokeshave easily removed the chatter marks left by both of the other Lee Valley curved spokeshaves. I figure if I can get a weird shaped cigar spokeshave iron sharpened and set to work well, it is probably not the sharpening that is at issue.

That said, I was trying the spokeshaves out on a leftover cutoff from an oak stair tread which is about 7/8 of an inch wide.

Much more fettling of both curved spokeshaves ensued (edited out).

So, did all my fettling make any difference?

Whoa! Let me tell you . . . very little . . . but some.

Even before I went through the flattening of the iron bed and cap, I could get the smaller spokeshave to work (on the pull stroke) on a more narrow piece of oak. This leads me to wonder: Should I be able use the smaller spokeshave for a full width shaving? I see that Derek was able to take a full width shaving (i.e., nearly the full width of the spokeshave).

Even so, this would not explain the chattering from the heavier curved spokeshave.

All of my fettling seemed to lead to just a bit of improvement . . . maybe. At this point I don’t know it if is because I have been working and testing (i.e., actually using) these confounded things for several hours over the last two days.

Finally, I flipped the blades over and they both worked like a dream!

This leads me to one most likely conclusion –The skill of this tool user is to blame.

OK, so I really didn’t flip the blades over.

Still, lots of frustration - to the point of wondering what have I done? (collecting and rehabbing on Neander woodworking tools over the last 4 or 5 years).

What started out as buying a few heirloom-quality hand tools for shaping wood for my sculptures has taken me down a rabbit-hole of hand-tool addiction.

I swear . . . (oops, sorry is that implied cursing?) . . . we need a Hand-Tools Anonymous (HTA) branch in the forum. But that would imply I want to stop collecting, wouldn’t it?

How do I go from a tool buyer, to a tool user?

Since the Neander forum is in no small part responsible for my hand tool addiction, (or perhaps "enabling" is a better term), I am looking to you guys you guys for some help?

Maybe we could start my therapy by helping me figure out why I cannot stop my spokeshaves from chattering? Is that too much for a fellow Neander to ask?

After all this, I have to pose a couple of questions to the group for discussion:

1. If you have to take shavings between 1 and 2 thousandths to prevent chattering (if even then) won’t it take you a beaucoup amount of time to actually shape something? (Beaucoup being a fancy term for boatload)

2. Why not use a rasp to make the initial shape and use a spokeshave to get the final finish?

Wouldn’t that mean I need to get an Auriou rasp or two? Please help me stop . . . . .

My addiction (or is it inspiration?) has even led me to make some tools of my own (as if I didn’t have enough already):




Many Kind Regards . . . Allen

[Jim Matthews]

The simple treatment for hand tool addiction is to become a maker of tools.

At that point, you inoculate yourself against further outbreaks,
at the expense of whoever picks up your particular strain of the disease.

There's nothing wrong with liking bright, shining objects.
You've got to spend your money on something.

What, you want to leave it to your kids?
How many years of "soap on a rope" did you endure for birthdays?

It's just payback time.

[Jessica Pierce-LaRose]

Actually, I mostly use spokeshaves for final smoothing, particularly when working with the round-bottom shaves. I find other tools, (drawknives, chisels, in-cannel gouges, rasps, and saws) much faster for actually making a shape.

The trick with a round bottom shave is keeping the blade engaged. Because the bottom is curved, it's very easy to get the blade to bite, the little bit of extra effort required pushes the tool out of the cut as you continue the motion - as you continue through the push, the blade re-engages, and the cycle starts again. If this happens in quick succession, it feels like chatter.

The other thing that can happen, is that if you're riding the back of the shave - that is, the sole behind the blade is the surface bearing on the wood - you end up not getting a cut much at all, because of the angle of the shave. You end up extending the blade much further than needed to get a cut. The same problems of engaging/disengaging present themselves, but are exacerbated by the blade projection (and thus support) being much too extreme.

The key point for me to mastering curved bottom shaves is learning to keep the front of the sole riding on the wood. This sort of relies a bit on applying a bit of twist to the handles, and a rolling motion as you move through the cut.

[Simon MacGowen]

I have a small shop and that helps me a lot in battling tool (power or hand) addiction. I don't buy a tool for use in a "future" project; everything I buy must be used for a specific project or technique. I have a large tool case and added another one that is much smaller. If I need to build one more (final?), it will have to be smaller because my shop space can't afford anymore or any larger one. I try to sell a less used tool before I get a new one. I sold three planes when I got two new ones.

Someone has pointed it out, too: I've made some of my own tools.

The final measure to control (not get rid of) addiction is that I try not to use money I don't earn from a woodworking job to buy a new tool. This may not be an option for those who don't build things to sell. If I, say, make $500, I may put aside $50 for future purchases -- tools, supplies, etc.

Addiction or no, I know I am a hand tool user and not a collector and I will find a way to use a tool that I have bought, if all of the above fail me. I have a couple Festool tools and I make good use of them for projects that could otherwise be built with some other tools.

Simon

[Jack Curtis]

"Rock bottom" is indeed the key to ending addictions. If you can't afford tools without sacrificing critical things like food and shelter, you'll probably come around on tool purchases, which means you'll either start using them to fill up all that extra time you now have given you're not spending time buying, or you'll sell them and pick another hobby.

[Stephen Cherry]

Since I'm a hermit, I don't shave too often, but when I do, I like to use my Lie-Nielsen Boggs spokeshaves. I use the flat one for my cheeks, the concave for my chin, and the curved works under my chin.

This is all very normal, right?

[Brian Thornock]

I have to both agree and disagree with Jim's suggestion. I have recently begun building infill planes, chisels, and other tools. While it is really fun, and you can get just about anything you want, it takes more time than buying, and in some cases, more money. Is it worth it? Sure, to me it is, but is it to you? That's the big question. But I build because I like to try things that are just a little (or a lot) different.

[Tony Zaffuto]

Tell me again why you wife was mad???

[Pat Barry]

It seems a simple deduction that chattering is a direct result of taking to big a bite. Back off the depth of cut and shave the wood. Repeat the mantra "shave the wood, shave the wood" to yourself as you go similar to the "wax on - wax off" mantra from the Karate Kid and you will reach a Zen like state for which we all aspire.

[george wilson]

I can't figure out the ring comment either. In fact,I can't seem to understand the whole,long post.

[Archie England]

perhaps a pun for diamond stone hones...?

Oh, and I loved the tongue-in-cheek humor!!!!!

[allen long]

Tell me again why you wife was mad???

Bad play on words referring to using wife's diamond ring before switching to a DMT diamond honing plate.

[Bill Houghton]

Funny. Not just because of the new Lee Valley shave (although that's been a lot of it), there've been a lot of recent threads on round-bottomed shaves, all of which get into chattering.

Quality of the tool is significant; I had a Kunz shave that chattered incurably - like a squirrel on espresso.

But, with a decent tool, I've learned that the two things that help me most to avoid chattering are (a) sharp iron (as always with hand tool problems, sharp cures many ailments), and (b) pulling the shave. Since we use round shaves on inside corners, our wrists will have to curve as the shave goes around the corner, and I've concluded that the human wrist is a LOT happier curling in than out. I feel I have better fine motor control with my wrists curling in, at any rate. (c) is proper grip: lightly pinching the shave's body between thumb and first finger on each side, with the other fingers resting naturally on the handles. My cheapo, though Sweetheart era, No. 63 is chatter-free when I adopt these techniques.

[george wilson]

Stay away from Kunz tools. They are miserable things.

[Eric Brown]

If you try to collect tools so that you have bragging rights, forget it. There are some other collectors that already have the rarest items. Check this out: http://www.flickr.com/photos/mark_firley/sets/72157639298284496/ On the other hand if you collect to preserve or learn, then it is a good investment. So if you buy, buy with a purpose, and enjoy.

[Roderick Gentry]

Addictions, or other mental problems, are normally only a problem when they have negative outcomes. I discovered this when talking to a psychologist that basically they didn't work from some concept of mental health but rather just concerned themselves with getting your back on track, which is practical if not all that elegant.

Don Juan discovered the strong validation he got seducing women, and tried to prolong that experience through repetition, apparently never feeling the need to hang onto one of them until she looked like an apple carving. Worked great until he was sucked into hell.

Same thing here. You buy a tool in this new hobby of woodworking, and the initial sense of well being is enormous, one has found one's life's work, how did I not know about these things called tools before. So you keep repeating the process without getting on with the thing that actually makes tools useful in life - making stuff. Of course that is post modernism, the stuff we do has no larger purpose, like going to cheer leading competitions, never having supported a team.

It's all fine for as long as it is. There are real tool collectors, and I really don't get them. Seems beside the point. But it is like any collecting, and can be profitable, and collecting is a recognized activity. What makes less sense is collecting endless crap that nobody will ever want. The collecting of counterfeit signatures seems to lag a great deal behind the autographs of historic figures, well maybe some day the counterfeits will also be valued as an example of a 20th century activity of some sort. Same thing with collecting woodworking tools of this period, that have few serious users; are designed with the needs of dilettantes in mind; at the behest of blogs that will probably vanish; and that go in and out of fashion every few years.

So I say carry on as long as it feels good, just so long as you don't overrun that point of embarrassment where you realize you have a ton of junk, signifying nothing. If you lean more to the practical end of the spectrum, you soon realize you are spending all your money, and all your time, shopping for and buying tools, or maintaining, and organizing them. 20 or more years ago one could be forgiven, as much of what was for sale was crap. One was in a constant cycle of upgrading, that possibly set the stage. But today, one really can buy a few good tools, find they all work, and just get on with it. That's really great.

[george wilson]

Roderick,you are an intelligent guy.

I have been at this since I was a young kid. I was lucky about finding a job in making things. For many,I suppose they finally have time for this venture now that they are retired. Marriage,houses,kids,etc.,all take a steady supply of money. That means staying in a job until the kids are grown and the house is paid for. Then,a person might finally have time to do something they actually enjoy. That probably explains the senior thing.

I spoke to a tool collecting group in Northern Va. a few months ago. Just about ever single one of them were seniors.

[allen long]

Roderick! Thanks for understanding my (hopefully temproary) existential crisis. While much of the post was toungue i-cheek, there was some real angst behind it after realizing that I had chatter on a fine tool I had owned for several years! I especially resonate with your "collecting to gloat" statement. I have a great and understanding wife who has given me the entire basement for a workshop. I have so many tools, I am honestly embarrased sometimes. You will only see me gloat over something I have made.

Still, I look at the several drawers full of chisels for instance, not to mention the literally many dozens of hours (probably maybe even in the 100s of hours ) in rehabbing and sharpening vintage chisels, and wonder "What have I done?" Finding that I cannot keep either of my Lee Valley Spoke shaves from chattering on wider material (even if adjusted to take a shaving between 1 and 2 thou,) I have to answer the question with . . . Not much.

I buy ever tool thinking of something specific to use it on. A friend of mine recently told me he has stopped the pretense about such things. Basically admitting that if he likes something and he can afford it, he doesn't even pretend to lie to himself anout having a need!

[Jim Koepke]

Addictions, or other mental problems, are normally only a problem when they have negative outcomes.

Is my wife wanting to build something for her a negative outcome?

What about some of the wild things my grandkids come up with for me to build? The big negative there is trying to explain to those who have been around for less than a decade why something can't be done even though there is a picture on the internet of one.

jtk

[allen long]

How many times have I heard from my wife . . . this shouldn't take you very long? (points to picture in a magazine or internet)