CS about capirons

[george wilson]

That is exactly the truth,Dave. I hate seeing newbies getting mislead by the internet discussions.

[Pat Barry]

Wasn't it entirely predictable that the discussion would evolve to the two positions that are always taken whenever the name(or initials) of an 'expert' are introduced to a discussion here? Its like on one side we have envy and jealousy about the (pretense) of 'expertise' and the other side we have our internal point of view where we know for a fact that we know more than the 'experts' and never the two shall meet. Topics like this can amount to nothing but a bunch of puffed up chests, shouting, one-ups-man-ship, slandering, etc. Can't we all just get along?

[David Weaver]

>>know more than the experts<<

Who are the experts? There are two here that I can think of. Rob Millard would be a blog expert, though I don't know that he updates his blog often. Same with the Anthony Hay cabinet shop blog. CS is not an expert (at least not in woodworking), which is exactly the point.

I agree with Dave Anderson's sentiments exactly, and can't blame him if 15 years has worn him out. And his sentiment about where to get information is spot on - either from actual professionals by observation or from older texts. Criticism is not only driven by envy, though that's the easy accusation to make. I'm not sure what there is to envy.

For those of us who started woodworking in the internet era and found out the people who we thought were experts actually are not, and who didn't give us very good information (compared to what a true professional/expert wood) but gave us a lot of it, it's more about wishing someone would've pointed us in a different direction to start. Everyone has their turning points as amateurs. That doesn't mean we're competent (i'm certainly not a "competent" woodworker), it just means we can identify when a route change made us better relative to what we were. For me, it was the first saw handle I posted. I got all rah rah, and I thought it looked OK. George pointed out several elements and expedited improvement (and satisfaction) in what I made. It was information that amateurs can't consistently provide. It made a drastic difference in my second saw. to the point that the second saw was almost acceptable as tasteful, and the first one clearly was not close.

Most of the rest of the stuff that gets kicked around on the blogs (the next new tool, the next new set of classes, etc...) is fatiguing, but it's the same as the magazine issue. If blogs are going to continue their viability, especially in line with the shows (or if they are selling something), they need too appeal to beginners. Eventually people with experience will go their own route and stop reading them, or read them only for entertainment.

I like Dave's advice, and my pondering on the professionals thread has a lot more to do with thinking that it's almost pointless for me and other amateurs to provide advice - I probably wouldn't take my own, and I'm not too offended when someone doesn't take mine, either - what credibility do I have? None, as it should be. The forums and careful attention to who knows what has proved to me who does, though.

I really don't think it's a bad thing to suggest what is, you may suggest what is to be something different, but I won't accuse you of envy because I have no idea what your goals are. I'd point out that something was totally incorrect if you were way off base, though, and that's what the forums are good for. People will do that less in print because it's permanent and they have relationships to keep. If I stopped reading here tomorrow, there are several people I'd keep in contact with from here, but I don't ever put the brakes on because i'm afraid to offend them.

[ian maybury]

Broadly +2 - but with some reservations. There's inevitably a learning curve involved - and it means that there's a time for most of us (if we haven't been in a position to learn from somebody) when we hoover up all the written and internet material we can get our hands on. I for example found it very helpful to get the field scoped out, and in absence of local capability to find out how many standard tasks are handled by others - but these days don't buy magazines either, and am fairly selective in my internet engagements. There comes a point where most of it has been around once, and it starts to repeat, and the commercial bias starts to irritate and so on. Plus we get to the point where to progress we need to focus on a finer level of detail than the generic stuff that usually gets written about.

The internet is no different to normal society I guess - most of what you hear needs careful interpretation. It tends to be reasonably genuine stuff though - not the cream puff marketing adjusted stuff the mags run with. Which means that while getting miseld is easy it's as in normal life very much down to the individual to apply discretion. There's not much likelihood of filtering everything for correctness anyway...

I'm relatively speaking a fan of Chris Schwarz. Of course he's (like us all) got his limits in technical terms, and he is writing for mags - but his energy and ability to enthuse people is spectacular. It's a tough road he's on. Hard not to take flak at times since people tend to put writers up on a pedestal so they can knock them down again...

[David Weaver]

It's a tough road he's on.

One thing is for sure, and that's that nobody will make everyone happy with their approach.

[Pat Barry]

>>know more than the experts<<

Who are the experts? There are two here that I can think of. Rob Millard would be a blog expert, though I don't know that he updates his blog often. Same with the Anthony Hay cabinet shop blog. CS is not an expert (at least not in woodworking), which is exactly the point.

I agree with Dave Anderson's sentiments exactly, and can't blame him if 15 years has worn him out. And his sentiment about where to get information is spot on - either from actual professionals by observation or from older texts. Criticism is not only driven by envy, though that's the easy accusation to make. I'm not sure what there is to envy.

For those of us who started woodworking in the internet era and found out the people who we thought were experts actually are not, and who didn't give us very good information (compared to what a true professional/expert wood) but gave us a lot of it, it's more about wishing someone would've pointed us in a different direction to start. Everyone has their turning points as amateurs. That doesn't mean we're competent (i'm certainly not a "competent" woodworker), it just means we can identify when a route change made us better relative to what we were. For me, it was the first saw handle I posted. I got all rah rah, and I thought it looked OK. George pointed out several elements and expedited improvement (and satisfaction) in what I made. It was information that amateurs can't consistently provide. It made a drastic difference in my second saw. to the point that the second saw was almost acceptable as tasteful, and the first one clearly was not close.

Most of the rest of the stuff that gets kicked around on the blogs (the next new tool, the next new set of classes, etc...) is fatiguing, but it's the same as the magazine issue. If blogs are going to continue their viability, especially in line with the shows (or if they are selling something), they need too appeal to beginners. Eventually people with experience will go their own route and stop reading them, or read them only for entertainment.

I like Dave's advice, and my pondering on the professionals thread has a lot more to do with thinking that it's almost pointless for me and other amateurs to provide advice - I probably wouldn't take my own, and I'm not too offended when someone doesn't take mine, either - what credibility do I have? None, as it should be. The forums and careful attention to who knows what has proved to me who does, though.

I really don't think it's a bad thing to suggest what is, you may suggest what is to be something different, but I won't accuse you of envy because I have no idea what your goals are. I'd point out that something was totally incorrect if you were way off base, though, and that's what the forums are good for. People will do that less in print because it's permanent and they have relationships to keep. If I stopped reading here tomorrow, there are several people I'd keep in contact with from here, but I don't ever put the brakes on because i'm afraid to offend them.

Notice I used the word 'expert' in quotes just because of the connotation that CS is an expert is not agreed with by some people here, but on the other hand he is a respected 'expert' to the other 90+% of the woodworking world because of his position and his visibility. As far as my goals, its purely to point out the fact that many are non-accepting of the 'expertise' that exists outside the little sandbox we have here. I do tend to believe that CS knows what he is talking about even though I do not know the source of his information.

[David Weaver]

I understand what you mean. Randy Leffingwell was an "expert" on tractors, too, his publications have a lot of visibility. They're visually nice, lots of pictures, etc. And then there are folks like the late JR Hobbs. I don't know how often Leffingwell is accurate, maybe 90-95% of the time? I don't know if JR was ever wrong, but his answers could be considered definitive. That's kind of the same thing going on here. It's up to everyone to decide where they want to get their information, and if they are more of a Leffingwell kind of person than a JR Hobbs (JR could be very abrasive, and he bristled at the fact that a lot of writers used his information or wrote incorrect stuff about the same topics he did), that's OK as long as they don't say something like "Leffingwell's and Hobb's advice carry equal weight". Because they don't, even if Leffingwell is far easier and more entertaining for most people to digest.

[Adam Cruea]

Not sure if you are talking about a high angle bedding of the blade or the angle of the meeting of the shaving against the chip breaker.

From my experience since this has all been made clear, setting of the cap iron has more effect on reducing tear out than setting the mouth tight.

Of course as always,

Attachment 297257

jtk

I was talking about the final angle that breaks the chip, period. My understanding is that you can make a high angle using a couple of methods.

1) High bedding angle for the iron
2) High bevel of chipbreaker
3) (only for BU planes) High bevel of iron

A single iron looks like this at the tip:
/

A capiron/blade will look like this at the tip (essentially):
\/

It's the leading edge (in the above graphic, the "\" that actual bends the chip far enough to cause it to break. So the higher that angle (what I'm calling a final angle), the faster the chip will be bent to failure and thus broken off (avoiding tear-out).

I view it kind of like a scraper, whose cutting edge looks like this (essentially):
_\

So the card scraper has an even higher final angle, which completely removes tear-out altogether (and secondarily only takes a minute shaving which helps reduce tear-out).

Make sense? I realize it's crappy ASCII art, but hopefully somewhat discernible.

[Dave Anderson NH]

Part of what I'm trying to get across is what is an insidious situation for a beginner. The beginner has developed a trust for the advice of a particular individual based on a conglomeration of their past advice, the length of time they have been working wood, and their number of posts on a particular forum. This time however the advisor has led them down the wrong path or given them bad advice. This is not necessarily because the advisor is/was wrong. It could be from a post of years before and the advisor has changed his views, it could be a misunderstanding of the question, or the situation advised on is similar to, but not exactly like the one the beginner is describing. The salient point is that there inherent dangers in accepting any advice from any internet source forum, blog, etc and that danger is particularly enhanced for the beginner who might not know the correct questions to ask or the terminology to use to present his request clearly. It seems to be that I've watched the advice on any particular topic cyclically change over the years more due to "soup de jour" than by any rational measure. There is a tendency to pile on and have a particular tool, technique, or "truth" become fashionable. The only guaranteed advice I would give the beginner is caveat emptor.

[george wilson]

I think Warren just wants credit to be given where credit is due. I see nothing wrong with that. The re discovery of correctly using the chip breaker is a valuable piece of information. One which I certainly had no idea of.

I may be wrong here,though. I went back and re read what I could readily find of CS's blogs. He does not seem to be trying to take credit for discovering how the chip breaker works. BUT,he only mentions Mr. Charlesworth as a source,IIRC. There was no mention of Warren,David,Kees,or any of the other people who have worked on this very valuable re discovery. If this is true,I can see why it is a problem for Warren.

I don't think wanting recognition for valuable contributions should be dismissed as chest beating,or any of the other terms ascribed to it. now that CS has embraced the chip breaker,he has gone to considerable effort at Lie Nielson to test it out on many woods. But,still no mention of where the knowledge sprang from. At the same time,no attempt to take the credit for himself. I think that sometimes the non admission of where knowledge came from just might lead the less informed astray. I'll leave it at that,admitting again that I may not have studied this matter thoroughly enough,and am willing to be corrected.

[Bob Strawn]

Chris Schwarz:
While a few people on the forums have burned this topic in effigy, I have found that a reasoned, historical-based discussing of this 18th-century device helps students immensely. Most woodworkers don’t have the patience to wade into the nasty discussions about double irons to extract the useful bits.
This lecture is about the useful bits. (And why Stanley needs to spanked for almost ruining the technology for us.)

There has been a reasoned and historical based discussion of this topic on various fora for over seven years. There has been historical and present day evidence presented by Todd Hughes, by me, by Steve Elliott, Chutaro Kato, Gary Blum, John Strawn, David Weaver, Bill Tindall, Kees van der Heiden, Wilbur Pan, and Jeff Burks (and more) For years Chris was denying or denigrating our testimony. It is insulting that he now compares himself to the source of this knowledge and paints himself as the voice of reason, knowledge and historical perspective.

Stanley needs to spanked for almost ruining the technology for us? Schwarz certainly tried to ruin it also.

I understand exactly where Warren comes from on this. I remember him being attacked on all sides, quite harshly. Not just the consensus, more like everyone, knew that Warren was wrong and that a bevel up thick single iron on a low bed angle or a 55 degree bed angle on an infill would always beat a double iron arrangement. The absolute knowledge was that the double iron was a mistake in history caused by cheap manufacture and slick salesmanship. I was in agreement and about to chime in against the double iron too, but for the realization, that I had not actually tested my beliefs. I took a Japanese plane, tuned it to precision, and tried the chip breaker at a range of positions. At that time I found that when I set the chip breaker to about half the thickness of the shaving from the cutting edge, magic started to happen. I had to test it again and again, but I was getting better results than anyone except Warren. I was actually nervous to come in and post that Warren was indeed correct, chip breakers worked and they worked well. There were some serious detractors who hunted out discussions of chip breakers on any forum and attacked with methods as harsh would be allowed to pass by the moderators. We had our few discussions with streams of vitriol spewed between our posts by several consistent detractors.

Truth is the consensus was that a slight back bevel was the way to go for sharpening. Ruler trick, that sort of thing dominated at the time. A back bevel is quite likely to ruin your attempts with a chip breaker. If you did not set up your blade exactly the way that Warren described you were not going to like a top iron used as a chip breaker. With your blade sharpened by using a "trick" you were not going to be happy with the results.

I do think that Chris has contributed some very good analysis and logic to the woodworking community, I respect his work. I also think that he, an a lot of other people should take a few important life lessons to heart over this. The lesson is not your wrong he's right. One big lesson is to test your beliefs. Sadly few folk do, and that is why they are sheep.

Now put yourself in Warren's shoes for a moment. You are standing up for reality against a hoard of naysayers who could test the argument with less than an hours work, but would rather just shoot you down at every possible opportunity. You know you are right, you use these methods daily, but when you make a post you are automatically attacked and insulted.

Along comes a popular and reasoned magazine editor. He decides to kick your horse too. He could have tested it in less time, but instead he puts together a very well written and convincing article that you know is based on hearsay and misunderstanding. You know this because you prove it every time you pick up a smoother. Worse than that, the respected expert uses dead solid evidence of a chip breaker doing magic as an argument against chip breakers.

Now in defense of CS, there is a hint that his subconscious mind was working on this issue. His mention of the six pack and the manner he does it leads me to think he had on another level put two and two together without yet coming up with the right answer consciously. I personally believe that this is not representative of CS' typical thinking, and I am quite sure he works hard not to be one of the sheep.

Warren, thank you for holding in there long enough for me to learn better woodworking. In the end your strength helped quite a few of us to improve our practice of the craft.

Bob

[Kees Heiden]

I was talking about the final angle that breaks the chip, period. My understanding is that you can make a high angle using a couple of methods.

1) High bedding angle for the iron
2) High bevel of chipbreaker
3) (only for BU planes) High bevel of iron

A single iron looks like this at the tip:
/

A capiron/blade will look like this at the tip (essentially):
\/

It's the leading edge (in the above graphic, the "\" that actual bends the chip far enough to cause it to break. So the higher that angle (what I'm calling a final angle), the faster the chip will be bent to failure and thus broken off (avoiding tear-out).

I view it kind of like a scraper, whose cutting edge looks like this (essentially):
_\

So the card scraper has an even higher final angle, which completely removes tear-out altogether (and secondarily only takes a minute shaving which helps reduce tear-out).

Make sense? I realize it's crappy ASCII art, but hopefully somewhat discernible.

No, I am afraid you are not correct on the mechanics of how these things work. I have explained it in detail in the article published on Steve Elliotts site:
http://planetuning.infillplane.com/h...pbreakers.html

Very short: A high angle works because it doesn't wedge the fibers apart. A chipbreaker works because it pushes the shaving back into the wood.
A scraper looks a bit like a double iron plane, but with a very limited range and a very weak edge.
The beauty of the double iron plane is that it still cuts at 45 degrees, with all the pleasurable planing dynamics that comes with that.

[David Weaver]

Warren, thank you for holding in there long enough for me to learn better woodworking. In the end your strength helped quite a few of us to improve our practice of the craft.

Bob

Ditto that. There will be more high end planes with double irons because of Warren and the noise made on forums.

We (many of us) literally thought warren was trolling us back then. Because there were some serious trolling issues going all the way back to knots (and it wasn't just one person). There were times where I thought he was, I had no idea.

[george wilson]

Pat: just what is the 90% of the "other woodworking World" composed of? What percentage of the woodworking World are really competent wood workers? What percentage have mastered design?

I have seen an awful lot of competently made furniture,knives,jewelry,and other things that just sucked as far as their design was concerned.

[bob blakeborough]

Pat: just what is the 90% of the "other woodworking World" composed of? What percentage of the woodworking World are really competent wood workers? What percentage have mastered design?

I have seen an awful lot of competently made furniture,knives,jewelry,and other things that just sucked as far as their design was concerned.

This is very true, but really, do we consider someone who mechanically speaking, is capable of building something properly, but maybe is not a designer, less skilled? There are painters who are capable of painting amazingly realistic subjects from a photo or subject, but they can't do the same thing without the subject matter in front of them. Does this mean they are less competent? In my mind they may not be as creative, but they are still absolutely able to speak with authority on how to build (or paint) things. You also have extremely creative people who can design anything, but now way in heck could they ever build it...