ouch! that hurts in more ways than one!

In the interest of the Wreck tradition of sharing tales of misfortune, I'd like to inform those who are unaware why they call it the Scary Sharp(tm) method.

I got my Veritas jig, my granite, rigged up a clamping system because the only spray glue I could find is way too blobby (anyone want a mostly-full can of 3M headliner adhesive?) and set to work in earnest.

I never did get *all* the tool marks off the back, even after spending five hours on one plane iron, but I got it down to just a couple of big ones. I worked through the grits and built up the mirror shine. It's a mirror flawed by a couple of curvy lines (dammit!) but a mirror it is. (They're far enough back from the edge that it might take me years before I need to worry about it anyway.)

So then I started on the bevel. The Veritas jig set the angle to the original 25-degrees so precisely, that I had to get through five grits before I was convinced it was doing anything at all. It was indeed. This sure beats the hell out of trying to hold the angle by hand!

I got up to 1000, starting to mirror up nicely, and I prepared to change to

1200. I set the iron and jig aside, as I had done umpty previous times, but at that fateful moment I set it just a trifle too close to the edge of the workbench.

It teetered, fell. As though it were a fragile egg, I reached out and cupped my hands to catch it.

I caught it.

Damn that was sharp! I hadn't even gotten all the way up to 2000 yet, but it was plenty sharp enough to separate skin cells and capillaries, driven by its own weight, and the weight of the jig.

When the edge plowed into the fat part of the base of my thumb in the palm of my left hand, I jerked back and sent the iron sailing...

Right across the shop and smack into my barrel full of metal windchime parts.

ARGH!!!!!!!!!!

As luck would have it, it hit copper, and evidently copper doesn't dent steel, even when hurled with some force. Phew!

So I got it sharp, set up the plane, and made shavings for an hour. I still have work to do on tuning this thing up methinks, but it sure is night and day compared to the factory edge.

I guess all's well that ends well, but I have a red 1.5" reminder of why they call it Scary Sharp(tm).

Reply to
Silvan
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Congratulations Michael! I'm glad that you've got a method that works for you, what the method is, is secondary. Enjoy the fluffies. Dave in Fairfax

Reply to
dave

One of those little reflex actions that you have to work at. It took me several years as a professional chef to learn that when something sharp starts to slip or fall you just jump back out of the way and get

*all* body parts clear. I've seen some ugly, ugly things when people have tried to catch sharp things.

Tim Douglass

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Reply to
Tim Douglass

red liquid inside, where it belongs.

One time, I had just gotten a set of 20" planer blades back from sharpening, so I honed them, then went to work installing them. I had a group of kids around, explaining what I was doing, and why, in setting up the blades. I had the few wrenches sitting on top of the machine, when suddenly, a student reached in to ask some thing like "what does that do", and in the process, knocked a wretch into the machine. I instinctively reached for it, as it was headed towards nicking my newly sharpened blades. The back of my finger slid down the blade, lengthwise, for a couple inches, costing a quick trip to the doctors, and three or four stitches.

I did catch the wrench, though!

Reply to
Morgans

Like so many things in life, this is a matter of having the right tool for the job. That little jig doodad is definitely the ticket.

Reply to
Silvan

Sad thing is I _have_ the right reflexes for most such situations, and I have the toes to prove it even though I habitually wear sandals in the shop.

I guess it's because I was putting so much effort into being delicate and precise in my sharpening. I started to think of it as something fluffy and fragile instead of a gigantic razor blade.

Reply to
Silvan

Yeowch! Well, at least you caught the wrench. :)

Reply to
Silvan

Reminds of when I used to shoe horses for a living back in my college days. On many occasions I've taken a hot horseshoe out of the fire, set it on the tail gate, got in a conversation, and forgot what had been in the forge until I reached over to pick it up barehanded. Upon seeing my reaction, anyone watching invariably asked 'Was that hot?" My standard response "Naaah, it just didn't take me long to look at it".

Reply to
Swingman

Tim Douglass responds:

Took me one catch when I dropped my razor my first week at Parris Island. Slapping the stock of an M1 with that hand for the week or two it took to heal was a great reminder, as was the drill instructor screaming at me for getting blood on it.

Charlie Self

"The income tax has made liars out of more Americans than golf." Will Rogers

Reply to
Charlie Self

Ouch.

Reply to
Silvan

Urrah!

Reply to
clutch

Ouch!

Beyond that, anything on the back more than a quarter inch from the edge doesn't need a mirror polish. You can do that when you need to.

-Jack

Reply to
JackD

except if you do a little figuring the resharpening would have cost less than the doctors bill.

Reply to
Young Carpenter

That's the kind of mistake you only make once.

Tim Douglass

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Reply to
Tim Douglass

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