A member of our carving group was talking with Vic Hood and he recommended them to her. She bought the 12 piece unsharpened set (they are now available pre-sharpened) and asked me to sharpen them for her. It took about 2 hours to get them carving sharp…. that includes putting a few of them on a water wheel, as they needed to be reshaped. While I had them, I tried them out and found them to hold an edge for the 10 – 15 minutes I used them.
What I did notice is the QC in the manufacturing process may not be the same as the more expensive tools, such as Pfeil. ie: the V-groove (flute) of the parting tool (V-tool) was not centered, making one side thicker than the other. Since this tool seems to offer the beginner sharpener the most problems, the offset flute only compounds it. Since I have only worked with one set, this may not be an issue with all of them.
I know Joe Dillett (The Carving Shop) personally. (Some of you may remember him from ‘Carving Magazine’, where he had a recurring column called ‘Ask Joe’.) He is a very talented carver and an excellent teacher. You won’t find a nicer guy. I trust his opinion and believe his review of Schaaf tools to be his honest opinion. He wouldn’t have made that video if he believed otherwise.
I teach beginner carvers and always tell them to buy the best tools they can afford. If that means they can only afford the Schaaf, I would recommend them. I believe a real issue for the beginner is the sharpening. If they are not proficient at sharpening, or have readily access to someone who is, I would not recommend unsharpened tools. That being said, these tools would be good for one trying to learn to sharpen vs. a more expensive tool.
I do not believe Joe uses a pedestal grinder to sharpen his carving tools. I know he uses a hand drill, a Tormek, stones, diamond plates, and a home-made bench-top sharpener (and possibly other items), but nothing I know of that turns at a high RPM. (I know he sharpens… or use to… knives, etc. for other commercial business, so he may use a grinder for those…. I just don’t know.)
For anyone interested, I’m going to start a new thread on how I build a powered sharpener.
.... Dave
Old carvers never die.... they just whittle away.