Carving tool brands

I mostly use chisels and gouges for building and inletting muzzleloading rifles, fowlers and pistols, but I've recently retired and would like to up my game by doing more relief carving on said guns and by possibly doing some relief carving on boards and what-not of animals or fish. I have a decent set of Stanley Sweetheart chisels and I'm pretty good at keeping them sharp, but I'm completely lost when it comes to gouges, veining tools and such, particularly when it relates to keeping them sharp.

I just made a deal on some carving tools sight unseen (I saw photos and they all appear to be in good/great condition and lightly used or new) for some English Addis tools, some German Boker tools, some German Frog tools and some English Record tools (new in box). I'm told by the guy that I'm trading with that they're all pretty decent quality tools and that I'll be happy with them and I am happy with the trade I made (I traded a curly maple gunstock blank for all of the above tools).

Can anyone tell me A) what sort of quality I might expect from these tools and B) if there's a simple sharpening system or device that I'll wish to invest in. For the chisels, I have some waterstones, some Arkansas stones and recently I've started to use float glass and 3M lapping paper with really impressive results, but I'm not as sure about how to keep the angle on the gouges and still sweep them to sharpen them properly. The veining/parting tools are another issue and I really don't have a clue.

Don't know anything about those brands. Likely acceptable, especially for they cost you. What's equally as important is what types of tools you get. Look at Mary Mays video on gouges. She give good recommendations on "essential" tools. There are certain tools that are nearly indispensable, like v-parting tools and some of the #3's, and at least one small skew. So if you are getting a variety of smaller (<20mm) 3's, 5's, 7', and 9's you did good. The bigger tools are for fast removal of a lot of wood, which are good to have, but not as essential as the smaller widths.

Also, I find the number of carvers on this site is pretty small. You might want to post on woodcarving-specific sites. You'll like get more responses.

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Originally Posted by Bill Ragosta

... and B) if there's a simple sharpening system or device that I'll wish to invest in. ...

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I feel like we just had this thread.

For sharpening, carvers seem to strop more than other woodworkers. Your stones will work for more significant sharpening of straight edges and outside bevels. For major work on inside bevels & edges you will probably want a slip stone of some sort.

I'll link to what I wrote about sharpening in the other thread:

https://sawmillcreek.org/showthread....48#post3085348

Also, everything I've seen by Mary May was outstanding. If you can find it, the episode of the Woodwright's Shop where she teaches Roy Underhill to carve & sharpen his gouges is hilarious. (She kindly & gently, as is her way, tells him he really needs to get his act together in storing his chisels & gouges and when she's showing him how to sharpen the outside bevel of a gouge tells him he needs to loosen up. :) )

Thanks very much for the replies. I'm not sure about the profile of the gouges yet, but in the photos they're primarily smaller ones, so I think they'll be useful for my purposes. As for the sharpening, I'll check out the link and continue my research.

And yes, I really, really need to figure out a storage system for my growing collection of chisels and gouges.

"Carving away with Mary May"

https://www.pbs.org/video/woodwright...away-mary-may/

Best,
Rick

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Originally Posted by Rick Dettinger

"Carving away with Mary May" ...

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Thanks! I didn't have any idea where to start looking (and was too lazy to search the whole Internet. :) )

Also, OP, I'd say other of her videos are better instruction (though less entertainment.) The bits of instruction she gives Roy will give you an idea of how sharpening is done and one method of safely storing the chisels & gouges. (Plus the show gives me a chuckle every time the local PBS station replays it.)