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Thread: Narex Chisels - Comments on use

  1. #31
    I own all old tools. Not one tool had the back flattened when i received it. I have wondered about this for many years and came to the conclusion it is the "Magazine Indoctrination Syndrome". If one of the mags says it is so, it becomes Gospel. I have flattened the backs of most of my tools, but I do not consider it to be a must in order to do good work.

  2. #32
    I recently restored a Stanley 750 chisel whose back was dead flat. Someone had worked it before, however, that same someone had honed a concave into the bevel that was up and down the bevel face, not across the width of it. Go figer.
    I buy mostly vintage tools, because I get more for my money. The only other tool I have bought that showed any signs of flattening was a blue jappaned #4, probably a Handyman series, though it is not marked as such anywhere. The sole was dead flat, the sides dead square, and the iron back flat for about an inch and a half. It performs every bit as good as my #5, although the feel in the hand is inferior.
    In contrast, that SweetHeart #5 required extensive work, as did most of the other old tools I have.
    When I start flattening chisel backs, it depends on the tool. That old 750, and some of the other vintage tools I own would get the full treatment, at least halfway up the back. My Aldi chisels? Hey, if I can get 1/8" up the back from the edge, that works for me.
    Having said that, some of the discussion here has piqued my interest, and if I ever run across a problem with edge retention, I'll definitely give a go at aggressively flattening the back. Can't hurt(very much).

  3. #33
    Quote Originally Posted by Mike Baker 2 View Post
    The only other tool I have bought that showed any signs of flattening was a blue jappaned #4, probably a Handyman series, though it is not marked as such anywhere. The sole was dead flat, the sides dead square, and the iron back flat for about an inch and a half. It performs every bit as good as my #5, although the feel in the hand is inferior.
    Mike - Shhhh... Don't tell anybody here that those cheap blue painted Handyman planes from the 70's are any good...

    Truth is - That's how they came from Stanley in the early 1970's.. The castings were great...

    I got mine from Dad. I know for a fact he bought it new in some hardware store and hung it up on a hook... And it sat there some 35 or so years till I found it... It was never worked over and the iron was never even sharpened.... Still had the factory lacquer on the iron...

    It's ugly as sin, the handle and tote are horrible, and the adjusters are sticky and awful.... but it's the most square and true Stanley Plane I own.. And it rivals LV/LN in regards to square and true..
    Last edited by John C Cox; 02-21-2018 at 1:29 PM.

  4. #34
    Yes, I don't care for the handles, they are very square and blocky. I could reshape them, but they work just fine. I reach for it more than my older #5; it's just the "right" size for most things I'm doing.

  5. #35
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    Quote Originally Posted by ken hatch View Post
    Also back in the day there were no diamond hones, plate or otherwise, all they had were natural stones that were not flat...
    I agree with the general argument that period woodworkers were too busy actually making things to obsess about flatness to the degree we do.

    I have to object to this repeated assertion that they didn't have the technology to produce a flat honing surface. The technique of using 3 stones to flatten each other has been known for literally centuries (a bit over two to be exact).

    One potential "gotcha" here is that the vast majority of used tools have likely never seen the hand of a competent user. As I've said before, the condition of old tools doesn't mean anything unless you can somehow establish their provenance (as with John's Witherby a few posts back).
    Last edited by Patrick Chase; 02-21-2018 at 2:38 PM.

  6. #36
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    Quote Originally Posted by ken hatch View Post
    ... all they had were natural stones that were not flat...
    It's hard to know what was done and how often and in what way. I think there is evidence that stones were flattened in the past, though maybe not as much and probably not as easily. (E.g. no diamond plates.)

    A specific example I know of is in "The Joiner and Cabinet Maker", by Anonymous, (as published by LAP with additions by Christopher Schwarz and Joel Moskowitz.) In the original text, "By use the rubstone grows hollow in the middle, and it is every man’s business to face it afresh when he has finished with it, so as to leave it always ready for use. This is done by rubbing it with another piece of stone which lies beside it, and there is also a straight edge of wood to try it by."

    My note: this section on flattening rubstones, it is a small part of the sharpening descriptions given. It is specifically discussing "rub stones", what I today would call a coarse stone or a flat grinding stone, in this flattening section. There are also grinding stones, large wheels, discussed as alternatives to rub stones used in bigger shops, and hones for improving or finishing the edge after grinding.

    BTW- In a footnote, Joel Moskowitz, (I think,) writes, "People have been sharpening things on grindstones and flat stones for millennia. It’s such a common operation in every trade that there is almost no mention of the practice of it anywhere. It was too obvious to waste space on in professional books. Joseph Moxon, who was writing for the amateur, does give a sort of description of grinding and honing in “Mechanick Exercises,” but in "The Joiner and Cabinet Maker" we have the first detailed look at early 19th-century English grinding practice."

  7. #37
    I'm an amateur/newbie, so I don't begin to present myself as any kind of authority, nor anyone with detailed knowledge, book or practical, and what I'm going to say is based on my own observations, in my very small part of the country, but...
    I spend inordinate amounts of time looking for old tools and stones. The sheer number of old and heavily dished Black and Translucent Arkansas stones I have come across, many of which were among old tools that people wanted way too much money for, IMO, leads me to believe that while you might read in instructional books of the time about the use of flat stones, I bet a ton of the average wood workers used convex bevels, and just honed until they got a sharp edge. I bet a lot of those old guys didn't buy the books; they found what worked for them, and used it
    There is more than one way to skin a cat, and I sincerely don't think there was a "one way" method back then, just like there really isn't "one way" now.
    There are people that use convex bevels, back bevels, concave bevels, flat bevels, on and on today. I think the old fellas used whatever worked for them.
    IMHO, of course.
    Last edited by Mike Baker 2; 02-21-2018 at 4:25 PM.

  8. #38
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    More Testing of my Narex Chisels

    In order to test some of the suggestions given here, I did some more work in the shop today. I started by grinding the chisel back a bit, probably a mm as suggested by Patrick. I then put a small back bevel on the chisel and proceeded to chop some pine. To my subjective eye, it appeared that the edge lasted longer.

    Since I had changed two parameters I couldn't tell which one might have contributed to the longer life, so I took another Narex chisel and only did the grind back on the bevel. That one seemed to hold an edge longer than in my original test. These results are completely subjective - I have no way to objectively measure sharpness or how long an edge lasts - but subjectively, I'd say that the edge lasted longer. I did use a 10x loupe to examine the edges after chopping for a fixed number of "chops".

    It was during my examination with the loupe that I noticed something unusual on the 16mm chisel. There is a defect in the steel.
    2018-02-21Narex001.jpg

    Here's a closeup of the defect
    2018-02-21Narex002.jpg

    The edge could be sharpened to a sharp, smooth edge but as soon as I used the chisel, the edge broke at the defect area.
    2018-02-21Narex003.jpg

    And here's a closeup of the edge after use, showing the "chip" in the edge.
    2018-02-21Narex004.jpg

    This is not what I was getting last time - last time I was getting a rolled edge - so this problem showed up because I ground the edge back a bit. I'll probably have to grind the edge back past the defect.

    Anyway, it seems that grinding the edge back a bit improved how long the edge lasted. I'll keep using the chisels and see if my opinion changes when I'm doing real dovetails.

    Mike
    Go into the world and do well. But more importantly, go into the world and do good.

  9. #39
    i know that I have seen you tubes of woodworkers in places such as China and India that use ancient methods to make various items. In videos where they actually show the person sharpening their tools, they always are using some horrible looking stone that is cupped beyond imagination. It works for them and the workmanship is always amazing.

  10. #40
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    I made some dovetails in cherry today and used the Narex chisels. The edges definitely held up better than they did originally.

    Since that original work, I ground the bevels back a bit, but otherwise sharpened them the same way as before. When examined with a 10x loupe after use, I could see that the edge was not smooth, like it was off the stone, but it was not rolled like it did originally. Just a bit rough. That was after a fair number of dovetails.

    For the price, about $9 each, I'd definitely give them a "thumbs up" (note that I bought them used,not new. New, they would cost a bit more).

    Mike
    Go into the world and do well. But more importantly, go into the world and do good.

  11. #41
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    I continue to work with the Narex chisels. One thing I noticed is that the size marked on the chisel is only nominal. They're not exact in either mm or inches. Here's what I measured on mine (I did the inches measurement in fractions and then converted to decimal so that was one more place for error):

    Nominal size (mm) Measured size (mm) Measured size (inches)
    6 6.2 0.25
    10 10.35 0.40625
    12 12.3 0.484375
    16 16.05 0.6328125
    20 20.1 0.796875
    26 26 1.0234375

    I did a small amount of rounding when I read the calipers (one mm, the other inches) so if you convert my measurements they'll be close but not exact.

    The 6 (6.2) is pretty close to 1/4. The 10 (10.35) is close to 3/8 (about 1/32 wider). The 12 (12.3) is close to 1/2 (about 1/64 short). The 16 (16.05) is close to 5/8 (very close, maybe 1/128 wider). The 20 (20.1) is close to 3/4 (about 3/64 wider). And the 26 is close to 1" (about 3/128 wider).

    This really isn't a problem because most people "fit" their chisels to the work and not to a measurement. But I found it interesting that with today's equipment for making chisels they didn't make the chisels more accurate in width.

    Here's a question for Patrick Chase: You said that Narex shapes and sharpens before heat treatment. Would heat treatment cause these differences in the width from nominal? Or were they just not machines to the exact size in the beginning?

    Mike
    Last edited by Mike Henderson; 03-13-2018 at 8:27 PM.
    Go into the world and do well. But more importantly, go into the world and do good.

  12. #42
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    This really isn't a problem because most people "fit" their chisels to the work and not to a measurement. But I found it interesting that with today's equipment for making chisels they didn't make the chisels more accurate in width.
    My Narex mortise chisel hasn't been checked for size. It just cut two dozen 1X1-1/4" mortises without having to be resharpened. It was in pine, so not too tough a test.

    jtk
    "A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty."
    - Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965)

  13. #43
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    I don't expect a $9 chisel to perform like a $30 chisel. I have some Narex mortise chisels that I have been happy with, but I don't use them often.

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