I’m fortunate enough to have a lovely set of Lie Nielsen’s bevel edge chisels, however I keep lacerating the top half of the outside of my LH 1st finger when paring as the edges are so sharp.
I can’t be the first person to have experienced this and Ben Strano, Mike P et al seemed to make reference to this in one of the Shop Talk Live podcasts I was listening to recently. So what is the resolution?
Be more careful?
Take a fine abrasive to the edge?
or something else?
Thanks
Replies
This is not uncommon with new chisels, my Veritas VM-11's did the same. The solution, and actually suggested by Veritas, is to break the edge with a couple of quick strokes on a fine stone. It won't take much but just enough to dull that razor sharp edge.
I have had the same issue but I choose to keep mine the way they are when dovetailing to get nice clean corners and I’m just careful during use .hope this helps cheers.
You don't need to change the profile, it only takes a couple of passes on a fine stone to kill the edge and won't affect the ability to clean out dovetails in any way and your fingers will thank you for it.
PS. Try one of your wider chisels that you don't often use on dovetails and see if you don't agree.
you'd be fine breaking the edges of them. two cherries buffed the whizz out of chisels (probably still does) and created a fear of breaking edges lest they become like those.
I came up with a method to finish just the tip of a chisel with a buffer, which rounds the corners slightly (about 3 to 5 thousandths of the corner is rounded off). I've yet to use them on dovetails and have any persistent fibers in corners.
The manufacturers don't want to do anything by hand as somehow people have gotten the idea that knife sharpness is a sign of superb finish. A 90 degree corner that's polished will easily shave hair - it shouldn't be on a tool that's delivered as new. I guess the only practical way to remove the crispness of a tiny amount of the edge is by hand and then it might look like someone actually did something by hand on the chisels.
Lie Nielsen laps the backs of their chisels by hand. They have heavy steel plates they charge with automotive lapping compound and flatten every chisel that way.
Thanks for the replies so far. Presumably I could limit knocking the edge off the portion 0.25” - .5” back from the cutting edge as I can’t recall holding the side that close to the tip
You just need to knock the wire edge off it won't have any impact on the ability of the chisel to clean out tight corners. 2-3 passes on a 6000 grit stone or similar will get the job done. Test it on a wider chisel first.
To me, tools should be sharp where they cut, dull where they don't.
Wearing weight-lifting gloves also helps. They're padded in the palms and cover the fingers up to the third/base knuckle.
I stoned mine.
I had the same problem, and I used 320 and 3000 grit sandpaper on the edges. Now they feel great!
This forum post is now archived. Commenting has been disabled