"I only sharpen to what's needed for the task"

[Phil Pascoe]

Take no notice D_W, sharpening makes a lot of them very uneasy. Doesn't take much to set them off!
Keep up the good work - I am reading it and may even take some notice.

You could even plagiarise it for your next lecture.

 

[Phil Pascoe]

Well, i do like to base things on facts, but really this is getting a bit pedantic. I use as i have for years, a medium carburundum, fine natural stone, finish on a very very fine natural stone, lubricated with turps and sewing machine oil mixture. In two minutes i can shave with the edge. Good enough for me. You can over analyse anything.....

Two minutes? Eons.

 

[Trevanion]

Actually there is one enormous difference which is that the hand worker was also the motive power and the style of working would be much harder and very different from modern hand work.
You can see it in those old films chair makers, clog makers etc - they were making ordinary stuff at speed, not the so-called fine woodwork favoured by the mags and the amateurs of today. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wGDkliy1DEU
You can see it in a lot of old furniture where every detail is a compromise between haste and speed resulting in a standard which is only just good enough

I don't see how my signature quote of Foyster's was a part of the conversation? :?

To be honest, I'm not even sure what relevance what you said had to it. It's more to do with the fact people always associate handwork as "craftsmanship" when there's equal measures of craftsmanship in doing the same job with machines.

 

[D_W]

Have you made anything with the tools? That's what I'd be interested in seeing on the forum.

That's funny. I spent 7 hours in the shop today. The only power tool I used is a spindle sander for guitar body work.

I don't normally use power tools much, but electric guitars were designed in the era of electric tools and it doesn't make much sense to do certain things on the bodies with hand tools. But the necks can easily be made without them.

I can tell you why people don't post much work. Nobody responds. People say they like to see work, but they'd rather talk about sharpening.

 

[D_W]

Just using the search function...

post1286189.html#p1286189

Very nice guitar D_W I'm impressed. Have you built any sheds lately? :lol:
PS I might have a go at going one stone finer tomorrow - you've talked me into it.
I'v got black and white Arkansas - the black seems finer is that correct?[/quote]

Thanks, Jacob. I've got no interest in sheds, but since I don't know much about them, I'm definitely qualified to find a thread about them somewhere so that I can develop a grudge against the guy who seems to be the most knowledgable.

In regard to the Arkansas stones, whichever one is more dense is the one that will cut more finely when its settled in. Different retailers have one or the other generally finer based on their mines.

For example, Dan's here in the states claims that their black mined stock is generally their most dense. What used to be halls stones had finer translucent than black stones.

Most older black and trans were quite fine, though (older being turn of the century). That said, if a trans stone passes light easily, it's a pretty safe bet. Black stones vary more than light passing trans stones.

 

[Andy Kev.]

I'm trying to work out why David's efforts are not appreciated as much as they might be. He's gone to considerable effort and expense.

In trying to distil his posts to a couple of simple messages, I think I get to these:

1 - The new "PMV111" steel used by Veritas does keep an edge longer than the carbon steel used for the last 250 years.
2 - Sharpening to a very fine grit is worthwhile - the edge lasts longer and the finish is better.
3 - These differences are not often noticed because
(a) most of us don't hand plane for long periods with frequent sharpenings and
(b) some boards of the same species will blunt an edge much quicker than others.

Is that a fair summary?

I'd got to more or less the same point of view by that stage in the thread: David's done a lot of work off his own bat and he's offered up his findings. He's not being dogmatic nor is he preaching. For instance, it's not as if he is demanding that we all ditch our old plane irons in favour of PMV11. What it essentially boils down to is providing the information that a final trim with the very finest grit is a useful thing to do and we can take or leave that as we see fit.

Everybody will have their own response to this data (there! I used the word) and FWIW mine is that I won't change from PMV11 on my LAJ but I'm quite happy with older steels on other planes which see use for shorter periods (the LAJ being my work horse) as I don't mind the very short time that it takes to touch up the edge of the older steels. The PMV11 is very slightly more tedious to sharpen but that has to be done less frequently, so it makes sense to me to have that on the dogsbody plane.

OTH my take on this is rightly only of minor interest to anyone else, which is the way it should be. We can choose not to let DW's data have any influence on us but surely we cannot deny it as a matter of fact. And for taking the time and effort to produce it, he has my thanks.

 

[Andy Kev.]

Just using the search function...

post1286189.html#p1286189

Very nice guitar D_W I'm impressed. Have you built any sheds lately? :lol:
PS I might have a go at going one stone finer tomorrow - you've talked me into it.
I'v got black and white Arkansas - the black seems finer is that correct?

Eh? I don't think that even Pete Townshend could bash out decent chords on a shed. It'd look daft on stage, anyway. :mrgreen:

 

[MikeG.]

........surely we cannot deny it as a matter of fact........

Nor can we yet accept it as a matter of fact. His tests are insubstantial and subjective. That doesn't mean that the results are wrong*, just that until the tests are done properly, many times over, and by other people, they are nothing more than a claim. They aren't helped by over-blown claims of expertise amounting to an argument from authority, one of the classic logical fallacies.

*You'll notice that at no stage have I ever suggested that what DW has come up with is wrong. My argument is that his tests are weak and so his claims are subjective.

 

[Jacob]

............... My argument is that his tests are weak and so his claims are subjective.

Which stronger tests with less subjective outcomes did you have in mind?

 

[ED65]

They aren't helped by over-blown claims of expertise amounting to an argument from authority, one of the classic logical fallacies.

I don't want to get embroiled in this but Mike, to be equitable shouldn't you be equally critical of some of the logical fallacies used by others in their responses? I skimmed the thread last night and managed to spot three or four.

 

[John Brown]

Just using the search function...

post1286189.html#p1286189

Very nice guitar D_W I'm impressed. Have you built any sheds lately? :lol:
PS I might have a go at going one stone finer tomorrow - you've talked me into it.
I'v got black and white Arkansas - the black seems finer is that correct?

Eh? I don't think that even Pete Townshend could bash out decent chords on a shed. It'd look daft on stage, anyway. :mrgreen:

Who's Pete Townshend?

 

[Jacob]

Actually there is one enormous difference which is that the hand worker was also the motive power and the style of working would be much harder and very different from modern hand work.
You can see it in those old films chair makers, clog makers etc - they were making ordinary stuff at speed, not the so-called fine woodwork favoured by the mags and the amateurs of today. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wGDkliy1DEU
You can see it in a lot of old furniture where every detail is a compromise between haste and speed resulting in a standard which is only just good enough

I don't see how my signature quote of Foyster's was a part of the conversation? :?

Why would it not be?

To be honest, I'm not even sure what relevance what you said had to it. It's more to do with the fact people always associate handwork as "craftsmanship" when there's equal measures of craftsmanship in doing the same job with machines.

It's just that the sheer hardwork of hand tool production gets forgotten. Take DTs - it's fashionable to fuss about slowly with gadgets, jigs, fret saws etc but back then one man would bashing them out 100s per day, head-down brain-off.
Morticing he would resemble more the hand mortice machine triumph-mortiser-restoration-t116867.html than modern bench top fiddlings we see on youtube etc. A human machine.

 

[Trevanion]

It's just that the sheer hardwork of hand tool production gets forgotten. Take DTs - it's fashionable to fuss about slowly with gadgets, jigs, fret saws etc but back then one man would bashing them out 100s per day, head-down brain-off.
Morticing he would resemble more the hand mortice machine triumph-mortiser-restoration-t116867.html than modern bench top fiddlings we see on youtube etc. A human machine.

I appreciate things were harder to do before the advent of machines but I’m not sure hard work automatically equals craftsmanship. Arguably I would say most joiners now work just as hard as any of the joiners of old, it’s just the tools used are different and quicker than handwork. To me, true craftsmanship is more about taking pride in quality of your work and not sacrificing quality for speed, if I can keep the quality so that it equals or surpasses the old craftsmen but can do it in half the time using machines what’s wrong with that?

The next logical leap is CNC machining, of course the old craftsmen will be throwing their arms about saying “there’s no craftsmanship with CNC!” but arguably there is still craftsmanship, it’s just a totally different skill set. And before somebody says “anyone can set up a CNC machine, there’s no skill in that!” I’d like to see you try, it would probably take the same amount of time as a standard apprenticeship would to actually get proficient with a proper CNC.

 

[Jacob]

.......... if I can keep the quality so that it equals or surpasses the old craftsmen but can do it in half the time using machines what’s wrong with that?

Nothing wrong with that.
It's just that I'm interested in how they did stuff so fast almost all by hand alone, and the way they optimised their effort with nothing done which wasn't necessary, as compared to Derek's perfect dovetail work here enrty-hall-table-for-a-niece-t119882.html which is a very different approach to how the old chaps would have done it.

 

[Trevanion]

Yes, but Derek’s work is in a totally different league to the boys who were making 100s of “utilitarian” dovetails per day, he’s making very high-quality heirloom furniture in some of the most difficult to work timbers on the planet whilst the old boys were just banging together drawers from pine for very utilitarian and inexpensive furniture where having a gap here or there didn’t really matter.

 

[D_W]

........surely we cannot deny it as a matter of fact........

Nor can we yet accept it as a matter of fact. His tests are insubstantial and subjective. That doesn't mean that the results are wrong*, just that until the tests are done properly, many times over, and by other people, they are nothing more than a claim. They aren't helped by over-blown claims of expertise amounting to an argument from authority, one of the classic logical fallacies.

*You'll notice that at no stage have I ever suggested that what DW has come up with is wrong. My argument is that his tests are weak and so his claims are subjective.

Very weak, Mike. The tests literally have been done by other people. Steve Elliott did edge duration tests by fineness and two different tests were done by planing robots to test wear.

The entire point of my test pushing the blades far longer is that the wear tests done elsewhere were used to measure a small amount of wear, but we don't know if the small measured wear bevels were always the same shape when measured by length. Nobody else wanted to test to dullness with v11. Elliott did, but without v11 because it didn't exist.

Lv planed approximately 1.6 miles, and I planed 10 or so total. I had to toss two tests because they encountered mineral deposits in maple, so the total planed feet were about 50000, 9.5 miles.

There is literally no data from any other published test that differs much or materially any from mine. I don't think you know much about likelihood, either. You only have a textbook empirical sampling comment that you've probably never seen applied in practice. The reason that all of the sources are in relative agreement is that this just isn't that hard of a test or group of tests to perform accurately.

 

[Jacob]

.......the old boys were just banging together drawers from pine for very utilitarian and inexpensive furniture where having a gap here or there didn’t really matter.

My point is that craftsmanship in the real world is about producing a good result in spite of banging stuff together at speed.

 

[Trevanion]

My point is that craftsmanship in the real world is about producing a good result in spite of banging stuff together at speed.

The intention wasn’t to produce a good result, it was to built a piece of furniture as quickly and inexpensively as possible for the common man, if nails were cheaper than the labour they would’ve used them instead. It’s only recently that dovetails became an attractive and expensive joint rather than a quick, easy, solid and ultimately cheap joint (when you’re not aiming for absolute perfection) that didn’t require any glue or nails.

I’m not saying there’s no skill in doing hundreds of dovetails by hand in a day, it definitely takes great skill to do that but I think it’s debatable to call it craftsmanship, I might be wrong but I think they didn’t really care too much about the product so long as it didn’t fall apart. As you said, they were human machines that did their task without much thought of anything else. Its sort of like saying the guy using the nail gun to put together mass produced sofas in a factory is a craftsman.

 

[MikeG.]

.......Very weak, Mike........

I have some wisdom for you D_W. How's your Spanish?

 

[D_W]

The skill discussion aside is interesting. I think working entirely by hand on fine work is probably an improvement, but it's not economically feasible for most things. I think a roughly made hand-done chair also has a chance of existing for the long term, while a machine made chair doesn't for two reasons:
* the machine made chair will probably have some compromises on the joints
* the machine made chair will likely have aesthetic compromises that go beyond just being roughly made

As far as fine work, It isn't that machine making has to make a less fine result. In commodity dimensional stuff, it can certainly make accurate work over and over. I think it generally results in something less lively and interesting and the reason would have something to do with psychology.

If we think of the finest things ever made, generally (which is subjective) we fall back into items made by hand. Especially fine production items like violins, early furniture (relatively early, like 250 years ago), carvings.

I fall into the same trap - I do better work when I do all of it by hand. It can be frustrating on something like a large case, because I could spend a day in the shop on an 8 foot tall case and sort out and dimension all of the lumber that i'm going to use and then work from there. But taking three days time to do all of that work by hand instead, I will see and select things better, and I will spend more time fitting, and make fewer compromises in regard to aesthetics.

I spent yesterday making a dovetail plane. I could probably find a way to make a router setup that would do the same thing, and if I had to make 50 cases, I'm sure I would. Making the dovetail plane on something one-off is easier - conceptually and the chance of ruining any stock is near zero when using it. I probably would've sunk the shelves in dados and made some compromises on case joinery. If I was using a router table, the doors, would probably be cope and stick, but they will be haunched mortise and tenon.