Contributor
Joel it looks as though the new chisels are worn out. The USABLE steel is truly minimal. What a short life they will have. My multi hollow chisels have far more usable steel and tapered gentle hollows that will reveal more usable steel with time.
Yours will do neither, send them back, you have been conned!
You can do a lot with very little! You can do a little more with a lot!
Contributor
Those are very nice chisels, & I imagine have not been subjected to sandpaper.Originally Posted by Derek Cohen
The photo of the back of the chisel, as originally shown by Joel, indicated that the back was skewed or canted. I assume that the back was not canted when he started out, and just not flat. The reason for this may well have been, as Mark surmised, that the flattening process cause the angle to be affected by the handle socket. As a result of this, there is now a need to “level” the back.
These multi-hollow chisel backs have a disadvantage in my opinion. I think that they are made this way to look impressive, and for this reason are often referred to as designed for tourists. A better design is a single hollow, which has just the outer edges to flatten. Below is one of my Kiyohisa chisels, a wide one, and t has remained like this for the 20 years I have used it ..
80 grit was my estimate that much work was needed to re-level the back. That is not the important factor and not one to obsess over. The relevant factor is to abandon the stones and use a long strip of belt. The length will not only be one efficient, but also enable one to maintain the jointing angle on the back of the chisel. It is also vital to determine whether the process is riding up on the socket. Use blue to determine where the grinding is taking place. One wants to remove high spots only, and not low areas, especially behind the mouth.
Regards from Perth
Derek
Contributor
Hi Cameron
These chisels are among the best, and the quality is superb. There is never a thought that they would be other than perfect. A light touch on a waterstone is all that was needed.
But these ...
... are not flat. The problem is that, if one continued lapping the back, the back would remain skewed and increasingly thinned towards the sharp end.
What is needed is to remove more steel from the further end, and perhaps even grind back the blade if there is too much rounded off there. That means that a LOT of steel is needed to be removed. With this in mind, one does not use a high grit. You'll be at it forever if that is the case.
How far can you go with lapping? Look at the bevel for the thickness of the hard steel layer ...
The issue here is not the sharpening media, and not Joel's technique of lapping, per se. The problem lies with premature decisions about a lapping plan. If, as I understand, Garrett watched Joel lapping the back, it was to comment on his control of the chisel on the waterstone. What Garrett likely did not do was examine the wear on the back of the chisel. If he had, no doubt he would have said that there was a belly, and this needed to lapped out in a manner that ensured equal depth removal. That is a lot of steel to remove. A fault of manufacture.
These Fujikawa mortice chisels needed to be lapped. They were the same as Joel's. Here is the end result ...
Regards from Perth
Derek
Contributor
I’d grind it square and sharpen. You’ll likely still have enough steel for a lifetime and just not repeat the mistake. That’s how we learn. Once it’s flat it’s flat and who cares what the uras look like. It’s now very clearly yours, that’s the healthiest way to look at it. Enjoy it.
[OP]
Contributor
They were not all like the ones in the previous pictures where the edge was not flat or close to flat across the edge. This here is an example of a chisel where right away it was clear that I was making even contact side to side from the beginning. I never needed coarse grits. In this picture, I am working with 2, 1, and 0.5u stones with different directions to see make sure the scratch pattern changes with finer stones to know where I am at in the final process. I am not finished. It looks shiny in person, but for sure tiny scratches are prominent in photos at certain angles. I am getting even contact side to side and front to back (yellow arrows). However, there is some concavity in between (blue arrow). I wish it was not the case so I could work towards a pretty look across the entire bottom, but I purchased them to use, and in this case, I do not think this issue in the middle will affect performance and to make it perfectly flat across, I would have remove from front - back until even, and I do not want to do that. In the others chisels, I understood that not flat at the edge side to side would be a problem with performance.
I for sure lack experience with rehabilitating flea market chisels or operations that involves grinding the backs etc, but I am not supposed to need those skills for new chisels. Thank you all for the input.
Chisel.jpeg
Contributor
Hi Cameron
These chisels are among the best, and the quality is superb. There is never a thought that they would be other than perfect. A light touch on a waterstone is all that was needed.
But these ...
... are not flat. The problem is that, if one continued lapping the back, the back would remain skewed and increasingly thinned towards the sharp end.
What is needed is to remove more steel from the further end, and perhaps even grind back the blade if there is too much rounded off there. That means that a LOT of steel is needed to be removed. With this in mind, one does not use a high grit. You'll be at it forever if that is the case.
How far can you go with lapping? Look at the bevel for the thickness of the hard steel layer ...
The issue here is not the sharpening media, and not Joel's technique of lapping, per se. The problem lies with premature decisions about a lapping plan. If, as I understand, Garrett watched Joel lapping the back, it was to comment on his control of the chisel on the waterstone. What Garrett likely did not do was examine the wear on the back of the chisel. If he had, no doubt he would have said that there was a belly, and this needed to lapped out in a manner that ensured equal depth removal. That is a lot of steel to remove. A fault of manufacture.
These Fujikawa mortice chisels needed to be lapped. They were the same as Joel's. Here is the end result ...
Regards from Perth
Derek
I disagree. There is no point in removing material from the handle end. Doing so just reduces the hollow for no benefit. Focusing the lapping toward the cutting edge matches the chisel getting shorter from repeated sharpening.
Contributor
Life is a learning process, mistakes are a great teacher.
I had a friend Steve, that moved from Canada to Japan to train as a woodworker, he lived in Japan for eight years before returning to Canada were we met and became friends. He died about 20 years ago. He told me that soon after arriving in Japan he went looking for some high end hand tools. At a toolmakers shop he picked out some nice tools, the toolmaker refused to sell to him and told him that he didn't have the skill, knowledge or experience to own such tools. He was told to come back in a few years.
You might do well to learn how to rehab cheap flea-market chisels and grind the backs to get the knowledge and experience. I don't know where you get the idea that you are not supposed to need those skills.
Oh Another thing about Steve, he died of lung cancer, it should never have happened. He was 40 years old super fit and healthy, non smoker. He complained to his doctor over a two year period of a persistent cough, the doctor ignored the evidence, because Steve didn't fit the profile for cancer..A healthy young man like him wasn't supposed to have lung cancer. so they ignored the evidence until it couldn't be ignored, he died a few months after finally being diagnosed.
A lot of bad shit happens when people operate on assumptions and ignore the evidence before their eyes.
Being told how to do stuff is not knowledge, it's just information.
Learn to learn. banish preconceived ideas, cultivate an open mind, Observe, question, analyze the evidence, experiment......understand.
Good luck on your journey.
[OP]
Contributor
I reached out to the individual that sold me these Tasai chisels on eBay. No reply. A couple of days later, I sent a followup message. Just got a reply.
Contributor
Many of the sellers dealing with Japanese tools on eBay are simply drop shipping. That's why you're not getting support from the seller.
Contributor
My Tasai chisels have far more gentle relief on the back.
You can do a lot with very little! You can do a little more with a lot!
Contributor
This advice is worth 1000x's it's lead-printed weight in unobtainium (~ a rather confusing way of saying: it's priceless)
Also, Tasai are considered.....expensive chisels. That might be the only adjective I use for them.
[OP]
Contributor
I understand and appreciate the advice. To avoid a misunderstanding, I was not suggesting that I should not have the skill to rehab the cheap flea market chisels above and beyond normal sharpening and honing (which has been my experience with other chisels I own). I value skill. It is for that reason that I chose to spend my 1 week of vacation in years going to a hand tool woodworking workshop.
I was saying that I did not think I was supposed to need those skills to properly flatten the backs of these brand new expensive chisels that were nowhere near flat on the bottom. I was told that by a mentor I trust and others. A flea market chisel costs orders of magnitude less money. .
For these chisels sold new, I think I should be able to reach the manufacturer and not by brushed off by the seller to be told there is no support and that manufacturer contact information would not be provided.
You buy a new car, and although it is useful to know rebuild the engine in addition to routine maintenance, most people would not think they need to know how to do that or spend the time doing that before taking it for a drive even if they did have that skill. If a used old car at an auction, a different story.
Contributor
Joel, it bares repeating that these chisels should have been flat - or very close to flat - when you received them. They are considered to be among the elite of Japanese oire nomi. Along with the steel quality, you paid for the workmanship. An experienced user would have examined where the backs were out of flat before delving into lapping. Frankly, Garrett Hack could have recognised your inexperience and paid closer attention to the chisel backs than your lapping style. He is not to blame, however. I am not even sure that you can blame the Seller, who is just an agent, although it is frustrating not to get what you expected you paid for. The fact is that most oire nomi are considered kits and require tuning. This is what the Toolmaker in Mark's story was stating - expensive, rare chisels deserve experienced users.
Now the chisel can be rescued, but you need to even up the lap on the back. The photos show a skew, which is why I stated that you would need to grind away a lot. There should be plenty of hard steel remaining at the end, so the chisel is not lost.
Regards from Perth
Derek
Contributor
Here is a deep dive into the issue...
https://covingtonandsons.com/2020/01...shing-the-ura/
Contributor
This is very unfortunate. Nothing worse than spending good money on something to find out they’re sub-par in areas they shouldn’t be. Live and learn I suppose.
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