Chisel and plane sharpening

[Birdhunter]

I received several emails this week touting a Woodpeckers chisel and plane iron sharpening tool.

It looks like Woodpeckers has taken the best aspects of the Lie Nielsen and Veritas  sharpening jigs and improved upon them.

If I was not heavily invested in the LN sharpening jig, I’d go after the Woodpeckers product.

 

[derekcohen]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=5&v=5qAx0gG8Ubw

Designed by an engineer and not by a woodworker. This honing guide will only sharpen bench chisels and is unsuited for plane blades. Why do I say this? Because it is designed to be used with widely spaced wheels ("for stability"), and it will not be possible to create a cambered edge on this (without building a special jig to do so ... and that is getting unnecessarily complicated).

I suggest that Woodpecker design a central wheel ala the Eclipse and the LN.

The other limitation is that the angle setter only goes up to 47 degrees. For BU planes - which would again be limited to straight blades - the highest cutting angle is 59 degrees. Compare that the LN can do 62 degrees and the Veritas 65 degrees.

The other major issue is that it seems designed around parallel-sided blades. That might rule out many vintage types with tapered sides.

This is an awfully expensive guide when compared with the much cheaper LN, which has so much more potential and is beautifully built.

Regards from Perth

Derek

 

[Cheese]

If I was not heavily invested in the LN sharpening jig, I’d go after the Woodpeckers product.

I ordered one yesterday.

I have the original model Veritas and it's starting to show it's age. I know this is operator error, but if I don't really concentrate sometimes it will tip slightly on the single roller. I also am not enamored with the micro bevel adjuster. I mostly sharpen chisels.

I was ready to pull the pin and purchase the Veritas MK II but this Woodpecker system seemed to tick all the boxes. I really like the positive manner in which they achieve the micro bevel.

 

[tomp]

While I have and use bench chisels, a lot of my work is done with butt chisels and most honing guides do not work with these short chisels. Looking at the Woodpeckers guide, it appears that the distance between the rods which contact the back of the chisels is about the same as the 1-1/4" projection of the chisel specified so I'm thinking that this guide may not be suitable for a butt chisel. Several years ago, I heard about the Kell Honing Guide, did a little research on them and wound up buying a #2 Guide with the large rollers. Easy to set up and, using a piece of plate glass and wet/dry sandpaper,  I'm able to sharpen all of my chisels and plane blades 
with this guide.

Kell Sharpening Guide

I have a setting jig made out of a scrap of BB plywood and a piece of UHMW that allows me to quickly set the projection.

 

[grbmds]

Lie-Nielsen's jig is definitely a great one and much less expensive than the WP jig. However, LN says up front that their jig is designed for LN chisels and plane blades. No matter which jaws you own, the LN jig just doesn't work for some chisels. I still use the LN jig for the others with great results for those and i love it. There is almost no way you can fail to get your chisels sharp with the LN jig.

Also, the WP wheels can be mounted inside or outside. I would think that, with the wheels mounted inside, just by shifting pressure of your fingers you could create a slight camber. Plus, not everyone puts a camber on their plane blades so that might not be important to some.

 

[RKA]

I had a similar observation to grbmds regarding [member=4358]derekcohen[/member] 's statement about camber.  With the wheels turned inward, it should allow you to camber a bevel down blade, which only requires pressure on the outside edges to achieve a few thou of difference from the center to the edge.  But on a bevel up blade which requires a more dramatic camber, may not work well as Derek states?  He has far more experience than I ever will, so maybe he can comment on whether I'm out in left field or not. 

The other thing that struck me as odd was the registration of the back of the blade to the jig.  It seems like the pictures and videos represented a mish mosh of prototypes.  Some appear to have the bushing for the central locking rod machined with some tiny flats (bad idea), others show a groove on the inside edge of the jig to hold the blade (which appears to be the final design).  But it's just a square shoulder, so you would probably have to be careful to fully seat the blade against that shoulder before you tighten it down.  And many chisels have a very narrow edge so the contact area with the honing guide and the chisel might be very limited?  The LN jig uses a V groove which may clamp better and more consistently with very little torque required on the knob. 

One nice thing...no other parts to fuss with when moving from wide blade to narrow blade, just move the wheels. 

This is probably where their one time model fails.  Whether the concerns above are real or perceived, we may not know until trying it.  Meanwhile, there is something on the market that does the job admirably (LN jig) with very little fuss and more flexible if your tool of choice includes a bevel up plane. 

 

[Chance Beasley]

I may have asked this in a different forum before but didn't receive a definitive answer. Does anybody use the Lie-Nielsen sharpening jig with Blue Spruce Butt Chisels. My butt chisels do not work in my Veritas MK2. The blades aren't long enough to reach the stones in that jig.

 

[MikeGE]

I ordered one yesterday.

I hope you're not in a hurry for this, as the expected shipping date is the end of September 2019.  [eek]

 

[RKA]

I may have asked this in a different forum before but didn't receive a definitive answer. Does anybody use the Lie-Nielsen sharpening jig with Blue Spruce Butt Chisels. My butt chisels do not work in my Veritas MK2. The blades aren't long enough to reach the stones in that jig.

LN has long jaws that attach to their guides that will accommodate short blades.  If it will handle a spokeshave blade, I think you’ll be okay with a butt chisel, but I don’t own any BS butt chisels so I can’t say with 100% certainty.

https://www.lie-nielsen.com/product/honing-guide/long-honing-guide-jaw-pair?node=4239

 

[greg mann]

The notion of removing and reattaching the wheels is just dumb. This could have easily been designed to just reverse the assemblies on the rods and screw. Who wants to fumble around with the little screws holding the wheels on?

 

[Cheese]

I hope you're not in a hurry for this, as the expected shipping date is the end of September 2019.  [eek]

Not in a hurry at all, these chisels have been dull for over the last year, another 9 months will not delay a project. It will just force me to be more creative in my solution.  [smile]

Woodworking exists beyond sharp chisels and sharp planes. Many ways to skin the cat.

 

[Cheese]

Who wants to fumble around with the little screws holding the wheels on?

Well if you own a LN sharpening guide, who wants to fumble around with the little screws that hold on the extraneous jaws that attach to his product? He could have done better...he’s smarter than that.

Truth be told, that's the main reason I never even considered purchasing the LN sharpening guide. Once I saw that there are 7 different jaws offered, that decision was over for me. And I'm a LN fan as I own 8 of his planes so this decision should have been a simple slam-dunk. Instead, I decided to investigate the Veritas MK II.

 

[Birdhunter]

My LN guide fits both my LN chisels and my Blue Spruce chisels. I do have several sets of jaws for the LN guide to accommodate  different size chisels and plane irons. I also have a set of LN jaws that allow sharpening of angled plane irons.

To be fair, LN has had their guide out in the field for a while and have the advantage of manufacturing the chisels and planes for which the guide is intended. WP is just getting into the guide business. My guess is they will get up to speed quickly.

The fascinating aspect of the Woodpecker guide offering is the angle setting jig. I made a angle setting guide from the LN plans and it works well. If I were starting over, I'd buy the LN guide and the WP angle setting jig.

I see the biggest problem with the WP guide is the wide stance of the two wheels even when set in the inner most position. It looks like this wide stance would limit how much of the water stone that one could use. The single LN roller allows me to angle the tool tip just about anywhere on the water stone.

 

[grbmds]

[member=60593]Chance B[/member] To find out about your Blue Spruce chisels you could try calling Lie-Nielsen. If they know they will provide the answer, but they may not actually know since the design of their sharping jig was based on Lie-Nielsen chisels and plane blades. This fact may be the reason they offer multiple jaws - namely to make the jig more universally usable.

Changing jaws isn't a big deal. It takes a couple of minutes. For me, the standard jaws work for the majority of sharpening I do and I only need to switch to the long jaws once in awhile.

I don't necessarily think the Woodpeckers jig is a more universal jig (although it seems they approached the design more from that perspective) or an improvement over the LN jig. It would be hard to assess that without using it and I'm not inclined to spend the money for the WP jig regardless of the fact that I am a Woodpeckers tool lover.

Also, whether you use the WP guide for setting the angle or make one, it seems as if it's about as easy as making a guide for the Lie-Nielsen jig. Does it matter whether the final result is a degree or two off from an exact number? I doubt it.

 

[Billedis]

Use the Rob Cosman method and save some money!

 

[sancho57]

This is the one Im looking at getting. A buddy in the UK had one and used it onsome of my very dull never sharpened chisels and it did a pretty good job at sharpening them. It can also be used on plane blades
https://www.infinitytools.com/shop-...ides/m-power-fasttrack-sharpening-system-4365

 

[ChuckM]

This thread confirms one thing that many of us already know: there is no single perfect honing guide out there including the free hand method that can meet all the sharpening needs. (Try free hand sharpening a skew rabbet plane blade, and one will know how slow it is as compared to using a Veritas MKII jig with the skew registration guide. If your skew angle is off, you will have issues setting the blade to make proper cuts).

If there were, WP's latest jig would not have been coming out. The best one, I suspect, is a combination of different systems (including free hand methods and a power sharpening system (for speed)) that address each individual woodworker's varying needs.

I free hand sharpen regular chisels and plane blades, but use a jig for skew blades, back bevels, mortising chisels and the narrowest  chisel (1/16"). I turn to a grinder to reestablish bevels or remove nicks on edges when needed (which could take a long time to do on a stone, and also wear out the stone).

The requirement to use a screwdriver (for the WP's and L-N's) is indeed a nuisance, but not a deal killer, because you can sort your tools into groups, and finish one group first before changing the wheels or jaws. This is no different from using the domino joiner cutting all the mortises with one width setting (e.g. standard) before switching the dial to the wider setting.

Anyone who wants a jig that is most price competitive should consider this:

I used the modified side-clamping jig (there are other videos out there showing you how to fix the Eclipse) before saving enough change for the MKII guide.

 

[Sanderxpander]

I like the Veritas Mk2, with the narrow blade head it does well for my chisels. I suppose some folks feel it's too fiddly, but I'm just an amateur and don't need chisels every day or even every week. They get very very sharp with a little effort though. But I really hate the micro bevel thingy. It always ends up skewed and after googling it seems this is almost a universal thing. I've taken to just moving the chisel back a little in the jig.

With some practice, I suppose most jigs can do quite well. I spent ages debating over scary sharp, water stones, 3m lapping film, diamond stones, this jig or that jig... Just try and see what works I guess. Almost any sharpening is better than no sharpening if you're a little sensible. You'd have to try pretty hard to ruin a chisel forever and even then, it's just a chisel.

 

[ChuckM]

Snip.
But I really hate the micro bevel thingy. It always ends up skewed and after googling it seems this is almost a universal thing. I've taken to just moving the chisel back a little in the jig.

Is the micro bevel skewed or is the edge skewed? If the micro bevel, it won't affect the cut or performance. If the edge is out of square, it may not be the micro-beveling but a registration issue (the tool is not secured square to the jig).

The image shows the kind of micro bevel I usually get from the MKII standard honing guide (05M0901). The micro-bevels will look much less uniform after a few rounds of free hand sharpening. Same observation on the plane blades. The more important part is the squareness of the cutting edge, not the uniformity/slight variation of the micro-bevel.

 

[Sanderxpander]

It's the microbevel that's not parallel with the edge. The edge is square with the sides. If you google for this you'll see it's a common issue. I can kind of correct it if I heavily lean on one side of the jig. It's not a problem for sharpness but it means grinding way more than I should have to because the mb goes up really high on one side. Plus it looks terrible