My Three Favorite Bench Chisels

[kenneth hatch]

As posted in another thread my favorite bench chisels are pre-war (square tang v. round tang) Marples with Boxwood Carver's handles. There are two modern makers that make similar chisels, Ashley Iles and Sorby. All three use high carbon steel, I will not beat the A2 horse, and have tangs with carver style handles.

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From left to right: AI, Sorby, Marples.

The AI chisel is 240mm long and weights 137g, the Sorby is 280mm and 185g, the Marples 270mm and 150g.

This part is subjective. The AI chisel is small but when compared to the Marples is very slightly top heavy when held for pairing, bevel down is nice, the Sorby is just big and a little unbalanced in use, fitting my prejudices the Marples is ideal, it balances well for pairing as well as using bevel down. Bottom line the Marple chisel works for me. The others are good chisels and you can buy them new which can save a lot of work getting them ready to use, Of course YMMV.

ken

[Stew Denton]

Hi Ken,

All three are beauties.

My vintage wood handle chisels that I have used only some up to this point, but plan to use for paring and chopping for fine woodworking when I get the time, are all socket chisels. My carpentry chisels, all with synthetic handles, all Stanley, are not in the running for "favorites," but I like them for carpentry, and they are extremely useful for that.

If I had to pick favorites, they would be paring chisels in my Heinz 57 set.

My vintage socket chisels, are packed away until my shop to be is finally done, so I can't look at them to pick the actual favorites. That said, I like the ones that have the hand feel of the vintage Stanley chisels, both the paring 720s and bench chisel 760s. I think I may only have somewhere from 1 to 3 paring chisels that have the good hand feel.

Regards,

Stew

[kenneth hatch]

Hi Ken,

All three are beauties.

My vintage wood handle chisels that I have used only some up to this point, but plan to use for paring and chopping for fine woodworking when I get the time, are all socket chisels. My carpentry chisels, all with synthetic handles, all Stanley, are not in the running for "favorites," but I like them for carpentry, and they are extremely useful for that.

If I had to pick favorites, they would be paring chisels in my Heinz 57 set.

My vintage socket chisels, are packed away until my shop to be is finally done, so I can't look at them to pick the actual favorites. That said, I like the ones that have the hand feel of the vintage Stanley chisels, both the paring 720s and bench chisel 760s.

Regards,

Stew

Thanks Stew,

The post was mis-titled, it should have read: An example of my favorite bench chisels and two similar makes you can buy new. Don't wait too long on your shop.

Take care,

ken

[David Carroll]

In terms of favorites, I have several antique chisels that I have re-handled that I really like the feeling of. But among my favorites is an old K-Mart branded chisel, likely made by Buck or maybe Greenlee. It was among the first tools that I ever bought with my own money. This was back in the mid 1970s when you could still buy quality tools pretty much anywhere. Even K-Mart.

It's a good bit shorter now than it was, I treated it poorly at the beginning, it's hit nails and concrete floors, and rattled around in toolboxes. So it's been ground back a lot over the years. I "retired" it from active service when I bought a set of Marples Blue Chips, several years before Irwin bought them out. It lived in a utility drawer in the shop for a while, then one day I rehabbed it and sharpened it and its one off my favorite chisels for dovetailing. I have nicer ones, probably over a hundred, double that if you count carving tools, but none that I like more.

DC

[kenneth hatch]

David,

It's hard to write/talk about without getting touchy feely but it takes time to find what blows your skirt. After finding the one true one folks forget others might not feel the same way. A long way around to saying not everyone wants or needs the same tool.

I have the same tool problem. "Hello, my name is Ken and I'm a..."

ken

In terms of favorites, I have several antique chisels that I have re-handled that I really like the feeling of. But among my favorites is an old K-Mart branded chisel, likely made by Buck or maybe Greenlee. It was among the first tools that I ever bought with my own money. This was back in the mid 1970s when you could still buy quality tools pretty much anywhere. Even K-Mart.

It's a good bit shorter now than it was, I treated it poorly at the beginning, it's hit nails and concrete floors, and rattled around in toolboxes. So it's been ground back a lot over the years. I "retired" it from active service when I bought a set of Marples Blue Chips, several years before Irwin bought them out. It lived in a utility drawer in the shop for a while, then one day I rehabbed it and sharpened it and its one off my favorite chisels for dovetailing. I have nicer ones, probably over a hundred, double that if you count carving tools, but none that I like more.

DC

[Jim Koepke]

In my case it would be difficult to pick my three favorite chisels. So here are my three favorite groups of chisels.

For my larger chisels it is these three:

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From top to bottom is a 1" Witherby, a 1-1/4" Robert Duke and a 1-1/2" Union Hardware.

They are used to trim larger tenons and when doing half laps on 2X or larger lumber.

Next are three butt chisels:

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At the left is a Stanley 1-1/4" 4xx series chisel. The end is not mushroomed, it is made that way and knurled. These may be the least common of Stanley chisels.

In the middle is a 1" Karpenter chisel made by Winstead Edge Tool Company, the same company that made Witherby chisels.

On the right is a 7/8" Witherby chisel.

These three are used most often when installing hinges.

Last is are my favorite paring chisels, all are Buck Brothers:

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From the top is a 1", my favorite of all my chisels, a 1/2", a 3/8" and a 1/4". My set of Buck Brothers chisels is the only set to be complete from 1/8" to 1" by 1/8" increments.

My set of Witherby is second in being almost complete and includes a 5/16" sized chisel.

jtk

[Stew Denton]

Ken, thanks for the thought on the shop, I think it is good advise.

Happily I am working on that and currently working on the permitting process. It looks like we are going to have it built instead of me doing most of it, although in the past I wanted to do most of it myself. I will do some of it however, but just not most of it.

Stew

[kenneth hatch]

In my case it would be difficult to pick my three favorite chisels. So here are my three favorite groups of chisels.

For my larger chisels it is these three:

499941

From top to bottom is a 1" Witherby, a 1-1/4" Robert Duke and a 1-1/2" Union Hardware.

They are used to trim larger tenons and when doing half laps on 2X or larger lumber.

Next are three butt chisels:

499940

At the left is a Stanley 1-1/4" 4xx series chisel. The end is not mushroomed, it is made that way and knurled. These may be the least common of Stanley chisels.

In the middle is a 1" Karpenter chisel made by Winstead Edge Tool Company, the same company that made Witherby chisels.

On the right is a 7/8" Witherby chisel.

These three are used most often when installing hinges.

Last is are my favorite paring chisels, all are Buck Brothers:

499939

From the top is a 1", my favorite of all my chisels, a 1/2", a 3/8" and a 1/4". My set of Buck Brothers chisels is the only set to be complete from 1/8" to 1" by 1/8" increments.

My set of Witherby is second in being almost complete and includes a 5/16" sized chisel.

jtk

Jim,

5/16 bench chisels are rare and wonderful to have, perfect for cleaning up many of your mortises. One of the reasons I settled on pre-war Marples is you could still find 'em. I don't know if that is still the case because I haven't looked in several years but toward the end of my filling out my set useable square tang Marples chisels with minimum rust were getting hard to find.

ken