Chisel Handle Design ?

[Ray Selinger]

In my rust hunt I have noticed a number of wooden handle designs. In tracking down my Marples Shamrocks I came across a 1938 catalogue, it had four or five handle designs from a block of wood to a London pattern. Even the fairly standard Swedish and American designs have subtle or not so subtle variations. Since I have a wood lathe , bare tangs and empty or badly fitted sockets , I'll have to make some handles. What things work for you in a handle?

[Pat Barry]

If I were to make new handles for my paring chisels they would have a significantly larger diameter for the palm of my hand so as to spread the pressure over more area and increase user comfort

[Jim Koepke]

These are my Buck Brothers chisels:

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Half have original handles and half are replacements. This style works fairly well for me for paring chisels.

This is a group of various handles from different chisels, gouges and carving tools.

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Finally, this is the general form I have settled on for handles of my own making:

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The ring at the bottom allows for my hand to push the chisel. I have an old hand injury which causes discomfort and pain in my lower thumb area. This design helps to not aggravate it. It is also helpful when using a mallet as the ring can set between my fingers for a good grip which also keeps the top of my hand lower than the top and away from the mallet strike.

Making a comfortable handle is one consideration which is of importance to me. Making a strong handle is also important. Some of my early attempts didn't hold up very well.

jtk

[Joe A Faulkner]

For paring, you should experiment and find something that is customized to you. When you pare, do you on occasion strike the heel of the chisel with an open palm? If so you might want not want a pointy oval end. For chopping, I prefer a flat surface for the mallet to register against. For light taps, I'm not sure this matters as much.

[Pat Barry]

I meant more of the heel of the hand for pressing down the chisel into the work. Not pounding it with the palm of my hand

[Zach Dillinger]

For me, its hard to beat an 18th century tapered octagonal handle. Simple as heck to make and they just look... right.

[Stephen Clement]

I have made many chisel handles and used several others, so I'll let a few cents here. Below is a picture of the current handle designs I use. I consider there to be 3 different categories of chisel handles - general purpose, ones for pounding, and ones for parring. So the first question for you to figure out is, what type of chisels are you rehandling? There are some recurring themes though throughout. First, the bottom of the chisel needs to be larger than the outer diameter of the socket. Second, I like all styles to have a small throat right before the bottom - this gives you a comfortable stop for your hand.

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The top chisel in the photo is a firmer chisel which I use for mortising and occasionally really heavy stock removal. This style has a completely flat top so that the mallet firmly registers with it and a "striking" ring to prevent mushrooming. In reality, I don't want to strike the metal, I want to strike the wood; thus, the "striking ring is about 1/32-1/16" below the top of the handle. The handle is in general kinda beefy since I have large hands. The bottom of the handle is a sort of flattened ball, which gives a comfortable gripping place to hold the chisel a bit lower for medium control (the ball can go in the center of your hand as you grip the socket and neck). The handle is also a bit heavier than other styles so that the center of gravity of the chisel is shifted a little higher. Chen holding the chisel by the blade for precise mortising, the heavier (but not tool heavy) handle provides feedback to the hand if you are vertical (like why a tenon saw is very tall). These handles don't really vary in size by chisel width because they are all meant to take the same kind of force.

Next down the photo is a bench chisel. This handle needs to be general purpose, so it is flat for about ~half the radius of the top but then has a comfortable curve. The comfortable curve is a HUGE DEAL! Contrast my homemade handle with the Stanley 720 below it that I have not gotten around to making a matching handle. The Stanley 720 handle is completely flat which is ghastly, especially in a chisel that wide. I can't tell you how many times I leave the shop with bad hand blisters from paring with the 720. My bench chisels have leather striking rings. I used 4/5 layers of 7-8/5-6 oz tooling leather. The final thickness of leather is a bit over 1/4" but it started out thicker and was turned down. I turned a 1/2" tenon and glued a stack of leather rings on with tacky glue. I used a short pipe nipple in conjunction with a clamp to glue them down. A better view of the leather is below:

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These bench chisels vary in size according to the chisel size, as you can hopefully see in the below picture. My sizing went as follows: I used millimeters for this because I found somewhere a measurement in mm of the Lie Nielsen handles (way to small for my hands) and based mine off that. Also, the variations are small, so mm were convenient. Overall length is ~102mm from shoulder to top. The widest diameter below the neck is ~4mm larger than the diameter of the top of the socket. This diameter is ~18mm back from the shoulder and another 5mm from that to the neck. The neck is about the diameter of the top of the socket or up to ~2mm larger. The largest diameter is ~18 mm from the top and varies from ~32mm up to ~36mm. The bottom is just a hair larger than the top of the socket so that, with the shoulder to socket gap, it is a smooth transition.

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The last three chisels in the first photo are all paring chisels and all kind of similar. I rarely use these chisels/gouges so I don't have much opinion over octagonal vs round. Sometimes I do wish they had rounded ends like my bench chisels.

All my handles are pretty vanilla. I've never tried the more exotic styles like Jim's last photo - personally, the ends look too pointed for comfortable paring, but having never used them I can't pass judgement. The only weird thing I have done is below. These are the old handles for my skews and as you can see they have an integral off-hand pad for heavy paring (similar to a slick). I ditched them because they were clunky and skews never need that much force, but they may work well for special applications.

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Hope this helps. I've got lots of build along photos from chisel handling, so if you need any insight, I'd be glad to share.

[Ray Selinger]

Thx, you have given me something to think about. I understand the importance of the dome. Years ago I bought some Buck Bro. butt chisels, after the first use, they got a dose of belt sander. Not that they were much of a paring chisel. Does glued leather turn? The Swedish chisels when new had a dome then a steel ring, now my used ones that I have found just have the ring and a rough patch.

[Frank Drew]

If I were to make new handles for my paring chisels they would have a significantly larger diameter for the palm of my hand so as to spread the pressure over more area and increase user comfort

I agree with Pat; a larger diameter handle can be easier to grip with less effort. I find this particularly helpful with chisels meant to work hard or be driven with a hammer or mallet such as mortise chisels. Old time woodworking photos often show really fat mortise chisel handles, clearly made with no emphasis on appearance or finish, that look almost like tennis racquet handles (not quite, but you get the idea.)