Dovetail chisels

[Jake]

You did make a very good point, Corset - the full set (of how ever many) always look so necessary and enticing, so that's where the price gets weighed up.

My main (and only matched) set of chisels is a meagre set of six, and I bet I use three of them ten times more than the others.

If I was a premium chisel maker, I'd start making sets graduated in 1/16 to sucker in the addicts. And then fill in with the odd 1/32 set. And so on, until they were very poor, or woke up to see the force of your point.

 

[matthewwh]

Matthew. How much thinner is the edge of the dovetail chisels compared to the mkII bevel edge chisels?

Hi Mattty,

The dovetails are effectively edgeless as the rounded face comes right down to the back.

I would be inclined to agree with Mark that it's an either / or choice with the AI bevel edged. Although the bevel edged do have minute edges (except for the 1/8" which is a true trapezoid) they are so fine that it would be hard to justify getting the dovetails as well.

If you already have a good set of bench chisels with chunky edges, then the dovetail set fills the gap nicely.

We have also introduced some 7/16" fishtail skews which are a bit meatier than the 1/4" ones in the dovetail set. Adding a pair of these would completely obviate the need for seperate dovetail chisels.

 

[bugbear]

I have a set of the two cherrys. The steel is good and holds a good edge after the first couple of sharpens. However they are not good for dovetailing my experience of them was not good.
They made a right mess of the corner of my dovetails.

You mean the "fat" side bevel did this, or something else?

If you chop out the waste then a wide chisel is hard work

Definitely - for moderate cross cuts (which waste removing in a fat tail most certainly IS), most people use a saw ;-)

BugBear

 

[Corset]

To make clear the square edge of the chisel meant that on the tails the botton corners became "squared" and then didn't fit tight and if you used the chisel to chop out the gap was glaring. Thought I was doing something wrong until i checked this forum for advice.
The two cherries have done stirling work on all my other projects and as I am renovating my house at the moment are my general chisels of choice. My japanese chisels have been a revelation and I have not had any problems with brittleness and I got them cheap. I ordered them from Japan on ebay and got a set of ten for under 100 quid. I was expecting rubbish but they have been decent. I wished I had got a set of the dovetail style chisels as they are really handy.
Owen

 

[p111dom]

Now I'm confussed :? I really want to get cracking on taking the hand made route after Christmas but maybe I would be better off waiting till March when I can have a better look at my options in the flesh. The A.I. stand at Harrogate seemed to cover turning and small carving chisels pretty comprehensively. I hope they're taking both bevel and dovetail chisels to the SECC and this time they have some to sell.

 

[wizer]

Maybe a supplier might be kind enough to send you a couple to look at ??

 

[p111dom]

[-o<

 

[afreegreek]

I don't see why I would buy the bevel edge ones just to grind them down.

Oh sorry; I sort of assumed (wrongly, by mad) that everyone knew that the two cherries were fairly famous for having really fat edge bevels, that would need a little extra grinding to work well for dovetail use.

The steel in them, OTOH, is highly regarded by most.


BugBear

lol!.. they really go overboard on the polished backs but once you lap the back flat the bevel is the normal size... they're great steel though but I'd never buy the polished ones again. it's too damn hard to get down that far..

 

[dannykaye]

My uncle was a master cabinet maker, all his tools (which were sadly sold at his death fitted in a box about 2.5'x2.5'x4'. He made everything from 2" square boxes to 20' boats and all I have seen of his work was superb. Bet he didn't have anything other than bevel edge, firmer and mortice chisels

Don't get me wrong I love tool **** and probabally have way more tools than he had, I would love a set of every tool made by Sorby and have a set of two cherries but the chisels I reach for are those on the bench

1/8" bevel edge two cherries
3/8" bevel edge marples
1" bevel edge marples
1.5" bevel edge anansi
1/4 mortice no name
1/2" firmer marples

I have all sort of reground odds and sods and old stuff but the only thing I am considering adding to the "set" is a copy of the one mad Pete made the other week, and that's mainly for the challenge of making it. If I could do half as good work as my Uncle I might consider a couple of other chisels but I suspect I would be too busy doing paying work with the "set". In school we used the same sort of set for everything and practiced a lot, I could cut o LOT better dovetails then than I can now...