Problems with my honing

[Harold Burrell]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ojzzCXq5ook

jtk

Here you go:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ojzzCXq5ook

Thank you kindly.

[Derek Cohen]

If you use the eclipse jig for a while, you can use it without tightening the screw so much that the iron can't be moved in it with a bump. As in, make your stop reasonably strong and push the guide forward without loosening anything. I don't use mine for anything but a finish smoother once in a while, but it only needs to be on moderately tight if the user is putting pressure in the right place and not halfway between the edge of the iron and the top of the jig.

Lots of people love the LV jig, there must be something to it. I like it when everyone loves something I don't love so much, it eases the exit pain in $$ and time terms.

Hi David

There are positive features in the Eclipse, but resetting it for a secondary bevel is not one of them. Yes it can be done, but not with the ease of either the LV Mk I and Mk II.

Note that I am not knocking the Eclipse - I have two of them, and they get used for specific tasks. I am simply drawing attention to the strengths and weaknesses of each of these two honing guides.

I like the side clamping feature of the Eclipse as it is quick to lock up, and in fact I actually rarely use the secondary adjustment on the Mk II (since I only require one micro secondary bevel - this hones quickly on low micron media). However many do, and the Mk II guide caters for them, as well as offers other features that the Eclipse cannot approach (such as skew blades). The person who buys the Mk II is investing is a possible future broader honing system as well.

My use of honing guides is largely reserved for the high angle blades of BU planes. Otherwise I prefer to freehand sharpen (chisels and BD plane blades). Setting this secondary bevel is more critical, as a result, and the final cutting angle can vary wildly if done on an Eclipse in a "casual" manner.

It is important to keep in mind that the OP owns the Mk II, and what he needs is to learn how to use it correctly (my earlier post). Charles just enjoys stirring and being oppositional. It can be fun for a while However the bantering does not help the OP deal with his query. Going out and purchasing another guide is avoiding the issues that were reported at the outset, that is, there is a skill set that needs to be developed, as well as confusing the issues and costing extra.

Regards from Perth

Derek

[David Weaver]

Charles just enjoys stirring and being oppositional.

Yeah, I will not ever carry water for charles. At the risk of sounding like warren, a user with a little bit of touch can easily refresh an edge and pop a microbevel on something without taking an iron out or even loosening the iron, as long as it's not too tight to start. I don't have stops like most people have stops. Maybe I'll take a picture of my stops quickly and post it here. be right back with it...

[Derek Cohen]

At the risk of sounding like warren ...

Warren probably has forgotten more than you and I together have learned. He is one to emulate. However - and I write this hoping that Warren will read this point - he does not describe techniques in a way that helps us follow in his footsteps. The chip breaker is a case in point. He expoused his Stanley #3 on interlocked grain for years, but it was not until you began writing about it that most of us realised what he had been referring to all those years! More effort on teaching, Warren!

Regards from Perth

Derek

[David Weaver]

OK...here's what I do, I use these things only for smoother irons. It doesn't matter that they're dirty, the iron never touches them after the 1k stone.

I do what charlesworth prescribed with my smoothers, because if I can help it, I plane last, no scrape, no sand - I need to have precise control over my camber because I don't want to leave any marks and I also don't want to be planing a 1/2" wide strip, if you know what I mean. This method drives larry nuts, but it makes for a very strong edge that fails only by wear and only after a very long time.

Anyway, I start with a picture of the stops. I freehand the primary bevel if I am too lazy to step over to the grinder, and sometimes I grind it. If the iron is thin, I just freehand it around 25 degrees. The stop on the left is 32 degrees, the stop on the right is 35.

P1060373.jpg

So, I put my iron in and turn the screw finger tight and then just a tiny tick of additional tightness with the screwdriver. You can see the iron is tight against the stop.

P1060374.jpg

20 seconds on the shapton 1k, and I'll have a secondary bevel and worked camber precisely.

And I'll come back to these things and put the iron in the second stop. see the space, my thumb is underside just above the wheel at the back of the guide.
P1060375.jpg

A little bit of firm pressure and the guide slips right up the iron and I have this. Note the difference, no space under the stop.

P1060376.jpg

Another 20 seconds or so on a shapton 15k and I'm done. The guide isn't on so lose that it'll move easily or fall off, but it's also not on so tight that I need to use a screwdriver to loosen it, I can lever it off by hand or tap it on the bench twice and it'll loosen and come off.

I have to locate and use the screwdriver only one time, I like that better than picking things up and putting them down a lot.

I did have the MKII guide, I couldn't use it nearly as fast. I can go from a non-cutting plane iron to a finished plane iron off the shapton 15k in about 2 minutes.

[Jason Coen]

Hi David

There are positive features in the Eclipse, but resetting it for a secondary bevel is not one of them. Yes it can be done, but not with the ease of either the LV Mk I and Mk II.

How often does one actually change from sharpening the primary bevel to a secondary? Once the primary has been established, for me it doesn't get touched again until it needs to be chased back to speed honing the secondary. Thus, I usually hone the secondary maybe a half-dozen times before going back to the primary. So over the course of honing the secondary bevel six times or so, the Eclipse may add about ten more seconds to the total time spent honing. Hardly a difference worth considering in my regimen.

I think that extra ten seconds more than accounts for the times I spent chasing back a primary bevel only to realize the roller hd been adjusted to the secondary bevel position and I had been spending my time making my secondary bevel the primary.

[David Weaver]

At the risk of sounding like warren ...

Warren probably has forgotten more than you and I together have learned. He is one to emulate. However - and I write this hoping that Warren will read this point - he does not describe techniques in a way that helps us follow in his footsteps. The chip breaker is a case in point. He expoused his Stanley #3 on interlocked grain for years, but it was not until you began writing about it that most of us realised what he had been referring to all those years! More effort on teaching, Warren!

Regards from Perth

Derek

Yeah, I know. I'll never know as much as warren (I know that's not the way you meant it, but I'm reiterating it). I knew if I said "with a little bit of touch, you can....". That stuff always drives me nuts if I can't figure it out right way.

Thus the pictures. I can't remember what the discussion was that made me make these stops, but they are scrap poplar left from something, drawers, I can't remember...

I drew a line on them with a cheap angle gauge and just quickly cut them with a ryoba and glued them with thin CA. I figured if I liked the way they worked, the CA joint would split/fail shortly and I'd make decent ones. It's probably 3 years+ later now, and they still haven't let go.

They wouldn't work well with chisels, but I never put chisels in a guide.

If someone had to do chisels, they could make the guides more squat, like 1 1/2 inches of length on the diagonal. As these are, they work great for a smoother iron. My sharpening area is a complete slop...I love it, I never worry about what's below it, and it doesn't get on my good bench or anything else. Since I still have an inexpensive starter bench and have for years, I just put an extra 100 pounds in its base and butt it up against the machinist bench in this picture.

These eclipse guides go on sale locally here or online retailers from time to time for like 6 bucks. Every time they do, I buy one. If I meet someone who can't sharpen something, I just show them out to use them and give them mine. I still have 4 of them, I think.

[Jason Coen]

OK...here's what I do, I use these things only for smoother irons. It doesn't matter that they're dirty, the iron never touches them after the 1k stone.

I do what charlesworth prescribed with my smoothers, because if I can help it, I plane last, no scrape, no sand - I need to have precise control over my camber because I don't want to leave any marks and I also don't want to be planing a 1/2" wide strip, if you know what I mean. This method drives larry nuts, but it makes for a very strong edge that fails only by wear and only after a very long time.

Anyway, I start with a picture of the stops. I freehand the primary bevel if I am too lazy to step over to the grinder, and sometimes I grind it. If the iron is thin, I just freehand it around 25 degrees. The stop on the left is 32 degrees, the stop on the right is 35.

P1060373.jpg

So, I put my iron in and turn the screw finger tight and then just a tiny tick of additional tightness with the screwdriver. You can see the iron is tight against the stop.

P1060374.jpg

20 seconds on the shapton 1k, and I'll have a secondary bevel and worked camber precisely.

And I'll come back to these things and put the iron in the second stop. see the space, my thumb is underside just above the wheel at the back of the guide.
P1060375.jpg

A little bit of firm pressure and the guide slips right up the iron and I have this. Note the difference, no space under the stop.

P1060376.jpg

Another 20 seconds or so on a shapton 15k and I'm done. The guide isn't on so lose that it'll move easily or fall off, but it's also not on so tight that I need to use a screwdriver to loosen it, I can lever it off by hand or tap it on the bench twice and it'll loosen and come off.

I have to locate and use the screwdriver only one time, I like that better than picking things up and putting them down a lot.

I did have the MKII guide, I couldn't use it nearly as fast. I can go from a non-cutting plane iron to a finished plane iron off the shapton 15k in about 2 minutes.

Interesting stops and method. Pretty close to what I do, except I use a board similar to what Deneb shows in his video. I may add a 32° stop to extend the time between chasing the primary back down.

[David Weaver]

Now I can remember why I made these instead of the stops...the iron thickness doesn't matter, you get 35 degrees no matter what, and you don't have to measure anything.

In reality, it matters very little with different thicknesses of irons, but it bugged me at the time for some reason.

[Derek Cohen]

How often does one actually change from sharpening the primary bevel to a secondary? Once the primary has been established, for me it doesn't get touched again until it needs to be chased back to speed honing the secondary. Thus, I usually hone the secondary maybe a half-dozen times before going back to the primary. So over the course of honing the secondary bevel six times or so, the Eclipse may add about ten more seconds to the total time spent honing. Hardly a difference worth considering in my regimen.

I think that extra ten seconds more than accounts for the times I spent chasing back a primary bevel only to realize the roller hd been adjusted to the secondary bevel position and I had been spending my time making my secondary bevel the primary.

Hi Jason

Most honing guides are designed with secondary bevels in mind. The only exception that comes to mind is the Sharp Skate, which tries to replicate freehand sharpening, and is really designed with Japanese chisels in mind. The traditional way one hones a Japanese blade is to do the full face of the bevel.

Japanese laminated blades aside, honing the full face is unusual on a honing guide. It requires very careful positioning of the blade, otherwise each time you hone it is like starting afresh. Freehand honing the full bevel face of a laminated blade generally takes into account that the softer backing abrades easily. It is much harder work on a full face of hard tool steel.

So secondary bevels are intended to reduce the honing area, which speeds up sharpening.

Some, such as David Charlesworth, recommend using at least 2 secondary micro bevels. For example, on a 25 degree primary bevel one may use a 1000 stone at 27 degrees and a 8000 stone at 29 degrees. The LV Mk I and II dial these in with a turn of knob. The Eclipse is more complicated, but doable.

If you are honing full faces on a honing guide, I recommend that you try out the above alternative. If you mean that you do use the same secondary bevel angle for all grits, as long as it is small you are being efficient.

Regards from Perth (struggling with a cold - back to work in 2 days!)

Derek

[Derek Cohen]

Hi David

Your stops remind me of the angle setter for the Mk I. I don't doubt it works well for you.

Is this your regime with all blades, planes and chisels alike (just different angles)?

Regards from Perth

Derek (heading off to the shop now ..)

[David Weaver]

Smoother planes only, and even at that, only when they are the smoother irons meant for a final cut. From time to time, I'll do a straight across jointer iron with it.

Everything else is freehand one way or another.

I had the MK 1 jig, too, but the stop on it would've been better if it was 4 times as tall. It was too short and fiddly. These bigger stops are physical and intuitive, you don't have to look at anything to check it - if you put it against the stop, it is exact.

[Jason Coen]

If you mean that you do use the same secondary bevel angle for all grits, as long as it is small you are being efficient.

Regards from Perth (struggling with a cold - back to work in 2 days!)

Derek

Oops, sorry for the confusion. For a "normal" touch-up honing, my finishing stone (Sig 13k or Cho 10k) is the only thing that touches the secondary bevel. If the edge has been nicked, I'll drop down to 1k to remove it and then proceed to honing. When the secondary grows large, I drop back to 1k to chase the secondary back to within .003 or so of the edge, and then go to back to the finish stone on the secondary bevel.

Get well and be glad you didn't get the flu that's running around. My son got it a couple of weeks ago and then had an allergic reaction to Augmentin (penicillin). Hoo boy, fun times.

[michael osadchuk]

I have both the LV mk. 1 and mk. 2 honing guides, like them for some features but sometimes my inability to lock down a hand plane blade perfectly/inability to apply the right finger pressure at the correct area of blade while honing causes the the blade to skew and when that happens, I don't keep banging my head against the wall and will revert to the elipse/vice grip honing guide for that session.

The strong point of the elipse - apart from cheap (in Canada at Busy Bee it's $7 til the end of March) - is that it securely keep the blade edge 90degrees to the honing media (with the proviso that the hand plane blade/chisel sides are parallel).
Among the the strong points of the LV mk. 2 is the "built in" angle setting guide and micro bevel adjustment but doesn't have same degree of "user proof" ability to attain and keep a 90degree setting to the honing media.

good luck

michael

[Jason Coen]

Now I can remember why I made these instead of the stops...the iron thickness doesn't matter, you get 35 degrees no matter what, and you don't have to measure anything.

In reality, it matters very little with different thicknesses of irons, but it bugged me at the time for some reason.

I was betting that was the reason, as I OCD'd over the same issue. The idea that consistency was more important than an exact degree coupled with my inherent laziness got me past the idea of doing anything more than using the stops.