Shop Made Tools

[TGTool]

I'm struggling to understand why it is so important for the flat sides of a wood chisel need to be mirror like in finish. Are you using it for a mirror? The only thing that I can see being important is the cutting edge. What am I missing here?

The cutting edge is defined by two planes, the front surface where it is continually sharpened and the back face which isn't usually considered an important working surface. But if you looked at the sharpened edge where the two planes meet, an irregular or rough surface of the back would create a very irregular and often unsharpened edge.

[bborr01]

Ok, results
This was my setup. The angle between the 'top' face of the chisel and the back was a little more than 1.75° but not as much as 2°. So I went with slightly shy and jacked up the end to fine adjust. I worked out the sfm's of the Tormek diamond wheel and also Evan's wheel in the 2011 thread I linked to earlier. That gave me 260sfm and 630sfm so I had some guides to work within at least. That equates to 250rpm and 610rpm for my smaller wheel. I settled at 450rpm to start and got really good results with the 12mm wide Stanley. The metal and the wheel were still cold to the touch.



Next up was the first victim. First thing I found was that unlike the Stanley, the sides weren't parallel enough to grip securely in the vise. I put the back of the chisel against the fixed jaw, one edge against the bottom of the vise and clamped the angled face with a dowel in the V of the moving jaw. I trued up each side so that I could grip the chisel and also so that the sides were square to the average of the face I was going to grind - otherwise it was going to tip front to back in that setup.
I found that initially the wheel was probably only making contact at one point around the revolution until it wore true. To be honest, this was quite helpful as it reduced the contact and hence the heat. With a much wider chisel once it was making full contact there was noticeably a lot more drag. I was still doing fine for heat until I was far enough down the chisel that the opposite side of the wheel engaged with the blade too. There wasn't any coolant at that end and the extra contact really made the heat build quickly at that point. I did end up blueing just the tip of the chisel but it should come out when I (hand) grind the primary bevel. Why did I grind the entire back when just an inch or two would have done? Well, to be honest, it just looked really bad. What I did have to do is once I got the deep gouges (from the factory grind) out of the middle was then to grind just the end as far as not making contact with the opposite side of the wheel. You can see a slight difference in colour (about 2/3 along) on this pic where that happens but it's not noticeable by eye. I knew it was cupped but I had to take off 0.5mm before it cleaned up! I did this in 0.04mm DoC steps. Probably took me a couple of hours (I'd have been there weeks by hand!) but this is the result:




As an idea of how it was before I started, this is another that has factory grind on the right hand side and quite a lot of hand lapping on a 140grit diamond plate on the left. You can still see the deep gouges of the factory grind. If you look closely, the top left corner is not planar with the rest so more would have to come off to get that to clean up.



I really struggle to understand how the factory grind can be that poor. Ok, that's not entirely true as it's obviously been outsourced at lowest cost....but it disheartens me that a once dependable brand could fall so far.
Just seven more to go *facepalm* Some of them aren't as bad though and the thinner ones should be less trouble.....I hope!

I'm struggling to understand why it is so important for the flat sides of a wood chisel need to be mirror like in finish. Are you using it for a mirror? The only thing that I can see being important is the cutting edge. What am I missing here?

[bborr01]

Ehhh ... maybe, maybe not. They/you could have experienced diamond wheel destruction in some situation and decided not to ever use it on steel. Not knowing any particulars, of course, I doubt that any controlled study was done (that diverts manpower). Not using it on steel was _sufficient_ to prevent loss, if not _necessary_. People do tend to conclude "necessary" when all they have seen is "sufficient".

We had two grinding departments with dozens of grinder hands, most of which had decades of experience and I apprenticed under them and none of them ever used a diamond wheel on steel or much of anything softer than carbide or hardened M4 tool steel.

I lifted this quote: Super-abrasive wheels have better performance characteristics but a narrower range of applications as the wheels do not perform well on softer materials. CBN wheels are used most often on hardened ferrous materials and can be found in machines like tool and cutter grinders, camshaft grinders and gear grinders. Compared with Al₂O₃ wheels, CBN wheels run cooler, last longer and can function at higher speeds. Diamond is used to grind carbides, glass and other extremely hard nonferrous materials. Super-abrasives are more productive but expensive. They frequently cost 10 times more than other types of wheels, and their applications are typically very specific.

From this site: https://www.ctemag.com/news/articles...grinding-wheel

[Cenedd]

Ahh, my boat is very difficult to float Reggie....and sometimes demands that I put holes in it for aesthetic purposes
Right now, I'm viewing things very much as a (inexperienced) metal worker. As such surfaces need to be true and angles square for them to fit with my world view. Those of you thinking that you do metalwork and this doesn't sound like you probably have more experience....or aren't both blessed and cursed with perfectionism. Were I not also lazy, I'd exhaust myself! As it is, there's an odd dynamic balance. It's the same reason I will try to get 20.00mm measurement on a diameter when it really doesn't matter - I kid myself that it's practice for when it does....and there is some value in that but it's not the entirety of the truth. Similarly I have to watch out for zeroes.... they're just so "right" when often they're quite wrong.
Perhaps when I get more experience with wood (or just with sharpening) I'll accept the compromise or even admire the superior wisdom in it....but right now, I'm not ready and I'm learning from the ground up. Believe it or not though, I appreciate the input - frustrating though I'm sure it must be. Sometimes though you've got to make life hard for yourself in order to appreciate how much easier you can make it and I should come away with a fairly wide swath of ancillary knowledge that I wouldn't have had I just been shown the 'correct' way from the start. Sometimes you also have to question what is known to be right...even if you find all of it is, you at least understand why.

[reggie_obe]

Oh I'm grinding the ENTIRE back When I was doing it by hand I was definitely taking that shortcut as otherwise it would take a lifetime....but the surface finish is so bad on some of them that it just looks terrible....more so once there's some good surface to compare to! These are definitely going to be used - parts and materials already in for the project - but there's also a certain amount of ....pride/shttps://toolsforworkingwood.com/store/blog/243elf-esteem/perfectionism on the line too. Not entirely sure how to put it but between those you'll either get it or think I'm nuts....which may be fair. I could half-arse it (in my eyes - I know it'd be perfectly functional) but I've come this far and can't let it go now. Besides that, the "throw-away" Stanley I did as a test puts the "decent" ones to shame with its perfect rainbow-mirror finish

What ever floats your boat. A different viewpoint: https://toolsforworkingwood.com/store/blog/243

[Cenedd]

Oh I'm grinding the ENTIRE back When I was doing it by hand I was definitely taking that shortcut as otherwise it would take a lifetime....but the surface finish is so bad on some of them that it just looks terrible....more so once there's some good surface to compare to! These are definitely going to be used - parts and materials already in for the project - but there's also a certain amount of ....pride/self-esteem/perfectionism on the line too. Not entirely sure how to put it but between those you'll either get it or think I'm nuts....which may be fair. I could half-arse it (in my eyes - I know it'd be perfectly functional) but I've come this far and can't let it go now. Besides that, the "throw-away" Stanley I did as a test puts the "decent" ones to shame with its perfect rainbow-mirror finish

[reggie_obe]

Ah, ok. When you said "toe clamps", I had in my head the standard clamping kit clamps that would have obstructed the top. You mean something more like this? Toe Clamps for T-Slot ....but obviously self-made as that's $150 a pair (from MSC rather than that source - but the diagrams are better on this link). I can't justify that cost and I really haven't got the time to make them at the moment - I'm already into making tools to fix tools to make parts to do a shop storage project....if I nest it all in another layer of making tools, I may never find my way back to the top of the stack! I'll definitely add them to my list though - I already need to make some proper hold-downs for the vise so they'd probably fit into that project quite nicely...and that one's been floating its way to the top of the pile for a while now Thanks for that, useful stuff.

No, toe clamps, strap clamps, regular items you probably have if you own a basic milling machine clamp kit. Yes part of the back will be obstructed, but you aren't grinding more than the last 1-1/2" or 40mm are you? Flattening more than that seems pointless to me. Will you be chiseling out deep mortises with these chisels?

[Cenedd]

Ah, ok. When you said "toe clamps", I had in my head the standard clamping kit clamps that would have obstructed the top. You mean something more like this? Toe Clamps for T-Slot ....but obviously self-made as that's $150 a pair (from MSC rather than that source - but the diagrams are better on this link). I can't justify that cost and I really haven't got the time to make them at the moment - I'm already into making tools to fix tools to make parts to do a shop storage project....if I nest it all in another layer of making tools, I may never find my way back to the top of the stack! I'll definitely add them to my list though - I already need to make some proper hold-downs for the vise so they'd probably fit into that project quite nicely...and that one's been floating its way to the top of the pile for a while now Thanks for that, useful stuff.

[reggie_obe]

No, I appreciate that. The 'top' face and the back aren't parallel to each other (deliberately). The closest stack of angle blocks I can make is 1°, 1/2° & 1/4° which is a touch too little but a 2° block is too much. The Stanley was the same, incidently. I was thinking that a sine bar might be the ideal way of doing it but I lack both a sine bar and a gauge block set A tilting vise might also work but the only one I have tilts in the wrong axis. An angle plate might work better....but again, I don't have one of those. I'm also slightly at a loss as to how to clamp it down to the table/angle plate when I need access to the entire top face. I would hazard a guess that doing it 'properly' would involve a mag chuck and a sine plate in some combination. Although I'm not aware of any reason I couldn't change the angle to a nice round 2°, I wanted to minimise the amount of material that needed to be ground away and that meant matching the existing angle as closely as possible.
If you can explain how to do a direct-to-table mount, I'm all ears as I've got more to do!

With the cutting end firmly resting on a block directly sitting on the machine table, you can male any angle you wish with a machinist's jack. When an indicator swept across the back of blade in both axis shows it's parallel to the table, two toe clamps secure it. You can learn a thing or two paging through a book on jigs and fixtures.

[Cenedd]

No, I appreciate that. The 'top' face and the back aren't parallel to each other (deliberately). The closest stack of angle blocks I can make is 1°, 1/2° & 1/4° which is a touch too little but a 2° block is too much. The Stanley was the same, incidently. I was thinking that a sine bar might be the ideal way of doing it but I lack both a sine bar and a gauge block set A tilting vise might also work but the only one I have tilts in the wrong axis. An angle plate might work better....but again, I don't have one of those. I'm also slightly at a loss as to how to clamp it down to the table/angle plate when I need access to the entire top face. I would hazard a guess that doing it 'properly' would involve a mag chuck and a sine plate in some combination. Although I'm not aware of any reason I couldn't change the angle to a nice round 2°, I wanted to minimise the amount of material that needed to be ground away and that meant matching the existing angle as closely as possible.
If you can explain how to do a direct-to-table mount, I'm all ears as I've got more to do!

[reggie_obe]

To be honest, it could also be that the handle end wasn't supported well enough since my vise isn't wide enough to grip the whole length. I did have a machinist jack under the handle but it could be that at that end it was part grinding and part deflecting the workpiece - which wouldn't be a problem if it didn't also tip the other end up into the wheel. Tiny amounts but when you're talking about 0.04mm advance, it's going to make a difference. I should point out that I realise that when I said 0.04mm DoC, that is the downfeed as marked on the fine feed wheel, not any sort of indicator and it will consist of an element of DoC and an element of wear on the wheel - how much, I don't know but there isn't noticeably less wheel than when I started

If you had clamped the blade to the table using blocks to clear the handle and toe clamps, you would be better off. A vise isn't the universal answer to work holding.

[Cenedd]

The trailing side of the cup is only a "problem" because your mill is well trammed. Just knock it out of tram & the the other side won't touch. 😉

To be honest, it could also be that the handle end wasn't supported well enough since my vise isn't wide enough to grip the whole length. I did have a machinist jack under the handle but it could be that at that end it was part grinding and part deflecting the workpiece - which wouldn't be a problem if it didn't also tip the other end up into the wheel. Tiny amounts but when you're talking about 0.04mm advance, it's going to make a difference. I should point out that I realise that when I said 0.04mm DoC, that is the downfeed as marked on the fine feed wheel, not any sort of indicator and it will consist of an element of DoC and an element of wear on the wheel - how much, I don't know but there isn't noticeably less wheel than when I started

Good work & it sounds like you're having fun, which is the most important part!

Thanks. I'd be having more fun if there weren't 7 more to do! Interesting learning curve though and undoubtedly a tool I'll be using again for other things.

I am afraid that is way too much time to spend on such a cheap chisel. Though I understand it is what you have to work with.

I'm afraid you're right. I went for these because they were the very model my dad had - and he only bought the best. I suspected they weren't what they were in the 70's but I didn't realise how bad they were until I really got into it. It's always bugged me that most of his set had 'walked' over the years - and that's really what drove the selection. I'd have probably been better with something by Narex (there's plenty better still but I'm talking at the 'sensible' end of the price range) but they wouldn't have meant the same. Hopefully if I can get them all sorted out they'll be something I can take pleasure in.....currently they've somewhat soured the experience.

[ezduzit]

...the first victim...Probably took me a couple of hours...

I am afraid that is way too much time to spend on such a cheap chisel. Though I understand it is what you have to work with.

[Bob Engelhardt]

... grind just the end as far as not making contact with the opposite side of the wheel. ...

The trailing side of the cup is only a "problem" because your mill is well trammed. Just knock it out of tram & the the other side won't touch. 😉

Good work & it sounds like you're having fun, which is the most important part!

[rcaffin]

it's obviously been outsourced at lowest cost....but it disheartens me that a once dependable brand could fall so far.
Like the little bird: cheap, cheap, cheap.

Sad, Cheers
Roger