Frustration level: high

[Dukester]

First, let me say this isn't meant to be a whining post, just looking for guidance. I'm running into what I can only describe as sheer frustration lately with getting anything right in the woodshop. My jointer knives need sharpening so I got the Veritas honing jig (don't ask me why I didn't just get new blades). I thought sharpening should be easy using this. I was doing the Scary Sharp thing for what seemed like hours and could not get one knife sharp. No they aren't carbide blades. I mean it may as well have been an eraser on the end. I could not even get the wire edge with 60 grit sandpaper so I went to the bench grinder...mistake. Shwoop, into the trash they go.

Well I have some hand planes I wanted to try anyway, maybe I can joint my project edges by hand. I picked up some planes off Ebay, and a couple at flea market sales. I spent maybe $150 on a #4, 5, 6, 7. But getting them in working order has been a,..umm.challenge. The frog on the 7 won't keep the iron straight - I have to move the adjustment lever waaaay over almost bending it in half to getthe bevel sticking out straight and not skewed. Then it won't stay this way. I can't get the sharpening thing down on any of the blades. I have Lee's book on sharpening, but can't find anything on how you grind the initial bevel? No way I'm trying the bench grinder again. I tried the stationary belt sander and did nothing but make a mess. I got what I thought was a close bevel, but using the Veritas honing jig the honed line always seems skewed - I could never get it perpendicular to the blade edges.... Finally I got close (after 3 hours), then tried planing the edges...but my jointed edges do not make an invisible seam when glued together...argh..saw it in half...start over.

I go in there thinking that I have to do all these things like the pros do.. sharpen like a wiz, plane like a pro. And I know I'm trying this all on my own without anyone to guide me along. So, is it better to toss the old tools, start with new planes and get new blades etc., and a Tormek or Makita wet grinder for sharpening? It seems like I've spending way more time just trying to fix and fiddle with stuff or tools that are already crippled and attempt to learn repair, sharpening etc. than actually working wood.

Sigh.

[Dave in Fairfax]

Dukester wrote: snip of long story don't get new planes or blades, what you have now is superior unless you're going to spend a lot of money. Find someone to teach you haow to sharpen instead. If we knew where you are you might have a chance of gettingsome help. Over to you.

Dave in Fairfax

[Patriarch]

Dave in Fairfax wrote in news: [e-mail]:

Dave's right. You're 90% of the way there. Whatever it is that you're missing is likely a) important and b) not something we can see from here.

But what you're trying to do is not rocket science.

BTW, send the jointer blades out to be done. That's cheap and reliable.

Patriarch

[Dukester]

[Dave Jackson]

Duke, Take a day off... then try again. Sharpening tools is much like the art of working wood. It's learned through practice and patience, and if your new, ya have to start at the bottom and work your way up. As a learning exercise, I'd suggest taking a chisel (any chisel) and learn to scary sharpen it with the veritas jig you have and just focus on making that chisel the sharpest tool in your shop. Very Important - Make sure you have a flat surface to work on to start with. A piece of glass, MDF or whatever, so long as it is dead flat. Start by lapping the back of the chisel until it's flat. I'd suggest starting with

[Silvan]

I tried doing it on my belt sander, but then I eventually realized I have a bunch of screwed up plane irons in my inventory. Not screwed up beyond salvaging, but screwed up enough that I'm back to doing it the old fashioned way. The sander was not removing material evenly, even though I did everything humanly possible to ensure that it should have every opportunity to do so. Sigh.

So now I get the initial bevel the same way I do everything else. One stroke at a time. It's extremely tedious, and takes forever, but there's almost no opportunity to screw anything up at that speed.

It's tricky. It helps to check with a square against both sides of the iron or chisel before setting the knob. Make sure both sides are square, then it pretty much has to be really square. Then tighten the absolute hell out of the knob. Then be very, very, very, very careful not to skew the iron/chisel as you work. Even with the knob as tight as humanly possible, it's still possible to knock it out of alignment with a well-placed fart.

Jointing with hand planes is kind of a bitch. Not a good way to start off learning to use hand planes. In fact, I finally sucked it up and bought a mechanical jointer to solve this particular problem. It turned out to be a real bitch to get things to come out right with that too. Sigh. But if I don't remove much material, I don't have much opportunity to turn perfectly good wood into trapezoids.

If I had $300 to blow without feeling any pain, I would buy one of these in a heartbeat:

just trying to fix and fiddle with stuff or tools that are already

I'm kind of in the same boat, but I'm muddling through. My stuff works in spite of the edges that aren't quite square.

of them are really markedly not quite square, like really not even remotely close to square, like really skewed all to hell. But they still make shavings. Planes with bungled irons like this are completely worthless for jointing though.

Anyway, I feel your pain. The boat I'm in is a little different. I have all these mirror polished edges, and I thought I was a world class sharpener, plane slinger and tweaker and fettler extraordinaire, but then I discovered that I had bungled damn near every plane I own without even noticing. Some sharpener I am. I also discovered really pronounced shiplapping on a project I thought I had done such a good job of planing. Turns out I actually suck at this. Oh well, nobody else noticed, and that project has been in use for over a year now without anyone seeing the shiplapping until I specifically went looking for it.

So the lesson you can take from this is that screw-ups like us can still make stuff out of wood anyway. Screw it. It's not like we're getting paid, right? We still make better stuff, mungled and bungled and beflungled though it may be, than the vast majority of tool-less wimp wussy boys who don't know which end of a hammer to use to open a paint can.

Cheer up.

[George]

SNIP

It seems like I've spending way more time

Do they have a community college or HS Industrial Arts course down there? There's someone who teaches it, if there is, and s/he has probably learned a few things you can use. A drop-by at closing time might do you a world of help. They're generally delighted to have time with an interested adult, especially the HS types. Some even make house calls, and they also know where the best deals on wood are.

Hanging out around the sawmill or hardware store might work, too.

[Roger amd Missy Behnke]

. I got

I had the same poblem so I scribed a line perpemducular to the edge of my bench. I line the chisel or iron up with that line while holeing the front edge of the honing jig against the front edge of the bench. Works pretty well.

Finally I got close (after 3 hours),

You'll get that reduce to a much shorter time as you get some more practice in.

but my jointed edges do not make an invisible seam when glued

Do you clamp the blards together so that you are plaing the edges at the same time? That little trick did wonders for my joints.

I had similar doubts. I took a very close look at the irons that were in the old planes I had aquired and saw a problem. The surface rust I had removed caused very minor pitting on the back of the iron. It was very fine and hard to see, but bad enough to degrade the edge I was working for. So now I use the old irons for practice and purchased new Hock irons. Sharpening and planing became the rewarding experiences they were meant to be

Roger

[Dave in Fairfax]

Unless you've removed alot of metal trying to make it right, yes. The problem is *probably* that you've got a slanted cutting edge when compared to the side of the blade. Making that a 90 degree angle is the critical part to start with. The next part is that the frog and its bed match up and theat the frog is sitting parallel to to the throat when you sight down it and out through the hole from the back of the frog. Sorry, I don't know of a better way to describe it, that's why I recommended finding someone to help you. Old blades, in general, are better than the new blades, certainly if you're buying Stanley or Buck or Great Neck. If you want to spend some serious money, there are VERY nice blades available that will start out sharp and square. A Hock blade will run you about $35, but if you put it in the plane and the adjuster is centerline, then you KNOW the old blade wasn't ground square. Conversely, if the adjuster isn't centered, you know the frog and its bed are the problem and you can work on them until the adjuster IS centered. Sor of using a known blade as a gauge. Roger is giving you good advice as is Silvan.

If you have a digital camera and a trysquare, mark your blade as Roger suggested and send me a pic, less than 100K please, and I'll try to help you through the problem. I take it that you fettled the frog as described in Jeff Gorman's website:

You might want to read all the way through his website, BTW, it's really first rate.

Try not to do anything irreversibel and we'll see what we can do about it. Fairfax, BTW is in VA.

Dave in Fairfax

[Luigi Zanasi]

I use a 60 grit belt sander belt, cut open & laying flat on a piece of glass. Pretty fast, but not as fast as a grinder.

Second the square notion. Combination or machinist square works for me.

[Roger amd Missy Behnke]

I had the same poblem so I scribed a line perpendicular to the edge of my bench. I line the chisel or iron up with that line while holding the front edge of the honing jig against the front edge of the bench. Works pretty well.

[Paul Kierstead]

Let me second that suggestion. That trick is -- IMO -- the single greatest thing I have learned in gluing up panels. It works really well, giving beautiful glue line joints.

PK

[Larry Jaques]

On Sun, 06 Feb 2005 04:12:23 -0500, the inscrutable Silvan spake:

Try a diamond plate. They work a hell of a lot faster than stones, they never need flattening, and they work well DRY. (Less messy.) If I wake up and my house is on fire, I'll grab my DMT plate before leaving the building. ;)

-------------------------------------------- Proud (occasional) maker of Hungarian Paper Towels.

Comprehensive Website Design ======================================================

[Ba r r y]

I second that, but I sprinkle a little water on when I use them.

Diamond plates also flatten fine water stones quite well.

If I was starting all over today, I'd buy DMT plates first, then add an extra and ultra fine waterstone.

Barry

[Silvan]

That's actually a really good idea. I wonder if it wouldn't be hell on the brass roller on the angle guide flummy though. I guess not necessarily more than any other abrasive is.

[Silvan]

Just barely. :)

[Silvan]

I can second that one. I've got some old irons that are fine, but some that just aren't workable because of pitting on the back. It makes the edge collapse far too easily, and it doesn't take hardly any pitting at all to cause this.

I'll also throw out that Lee Valley sells both Hock and Veritas irons for the same price. They claim their irons are made of a better alloy than Hock. So far, I have only bought one, and I bought Veritas. Next time I'll buy a Hock, and see which I like better. I think they're both the same thickness. Serious hunk of edge those things. Probably worth putting on any plane you care about just to make it work better.