Chisel for Dovetails.. Why the side bevel?

[Steven McLeavin]

I just received my two cherries 1/2" chisel in the mail today! I am wondering something though, is there a way to grind off the sides so it is more of a triangle shape but with a flat part on top to help with sharpening it? The reason being for chopping out the waste in dovetails, so it won't leave that small 1/8" or so square part on the corners. And if this is do-able, would it just be done by eye, or is there some kind of jig to use to hold it right? Thanks for any help!

[Chris Friesen]

Sure, just grind a side bevel by hand at the desired taper. There are various chisels that come this way by default--the Lie-Nielsen and Blue Spruce, for instance.

[Steven McLeavin]

great! that little 1/8" has always bothered me.. is a 30 degree bevel good for chopping out waste?

[Paul Grant]

Timely, look what I just did to my LV chisels....great minds think alike.

[Steven McLeavin]

how did you get it so perfect?? i just did mine, it's kind of rounded over..

[Paul Grant]

Well....i dunno....I just sort of did it. Held it steady on the tool rest tight 'till my knuckles turned white.

[Casey Gooding]

I think Lonnie Bird talked about this in an article in Popular Woodworking several years ago. He suggests grinding the bevels to a knife edge on the first inch or so.

[Tim Leo]

I seen detailed instructions here:

http://www.hand-cut-dovetails.com/to...Egs/edges.html

I have no affiliation with the site, just passing the link.

[george wilson]

Old timers ground chisels without bevels(firmer chisels) to do dovetails. it was kind of rough and ready: They ground a bevel at an outwards angle,so it petered out about 5/8" from the cutting edge of the chisel. The rest of the chisel was left square edged. They ground away just enough to get into the dovetail. You may see an old chisel like that somewhere. Back in the early 70's,I knew an old English cabinet maker who did that.He was also adamant about having his whetstones mounted in blocks of wood ,screwed to the counter!! I prefer to keep mine portable.

I'd never grind my chisels to bevels unless the bevels went all the way up the blade,but I'm a symmetry freak.

[Jim Kountz]

Grinding the edge of your chisels works great but comes with a price!!
(thats my ring finger by the way)

[Steven McLeavin]

thanks everyone, Tim that is exactly what i need, although i did manage to get it the way i wanted it, it was kinda scary the way i did it though ... but it works like a charm, don't know why i never thought to do this before

[Sean Hughto]

[Pam Niedermayer]

Skew and fishtail chisels work great. So does sawing to the baseline.

Pam

[Terry Beadle]

In David Charlesworth's video he said he grinds his chisel sides 1:6 to match the steepest angle he does dovetails. He only does it for about 1 inch from the end. He also very slightly rounds the side edge with a slip up to about 1/4 inch from the cutting tip. This makes it so that you don't get a cut on your finger as shown above..ouch!

IMO : His video on using chisels is the best one he has ever done.