Blind leading the Blind

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Chris Hall
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Blind leading the Blind

Sat May 23, 2015 12:50 pm

Occasionally i have a look at sawmill creek's forum, see what people are doing over there. There's a section for 'Neanderthals' over there, referring to people who use hand tools presumably.

Saw this post (hence the title of my post):

http://www.sawmillcreek.org/showthread. ... se-chisels

Where did this idea of soaking the chisel handles in water get started? Who's advice are people following? It's dead wrong to soak the handles in water, for obvious reasons.
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Brian
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Re: Blind leading the Blind

Sat May 23, 2015 1:16 pm

It's worth noting that Stanley Covington is a regular participant on SMC and has mentioned many times when the topic comes up that using water is not the proper method.

I dont know how exactly proper my methods are but I do the following depending on the wood;

- Compress the wood with hammer taps and press fit the hoop.

- Take paring cuts, and then press fit the hoop. Thus far I have needed to do this on ebony handles, which dont compress very easily.

I've seen mention of people baking the handles and this seems like it would work pretty well, but I've not done so myself.

In order to mushroom the ends of certain handles I've take to your method of using oil.
djwong
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Re: Blind leading the Blind

Sat May 23, 2015 1:29 pm

Hi Chris,

It's one of those tips I initially picked up from Toshio Odate's book. Is the proper technique to mushroom the handles with the wood dry?
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Chris Hall
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Re: Blind leading the Blind

Sat May 23, 2015 2:09 pm

Brian's on the right track.
Is the proper technique to mushroom the handles with the wood dry?
There is a technique where you lightly dampen the very end of the handle - not SOAK - so that the fibers are more compliant and squish a bit more under the hammer. Remember that the end of the handle is sticking out beyond the metal hoop by about 1mm before you commence rounding over the grain with a hammer. You would not want to dampen any portion of the handle beyond that 1mm. You can also use a clothes iron in this process, dampen the end then use the clothes iron to steam the dampness off, thereby making the fibers more readily compressible. Dampen, steam, hammer, and repeat. Oil at the end if you like.

With certain handle woods, like ebony, this process will not work so well as the wood does not tend to take on the water easily nor will the fibers, quite brittle in ebony, tend to become much softer. As Brian noted, the use of a bit of oil to soak in the handle end also can aid in the kigoroshi process.

Obviously, if you soak the handle, then, yes indeed, it will expand, and that will give you a tight fit to the hoop, but only for as long as the handle remains damp. However, once the handle loses that moisture, it will shrink down to where it was, only smaller, since the time in which it was expanded against the hoop there will have been some grain compression, from which the handle will not fully recover. Thus the ring will then be loose, and as the top of the handle was rounded over slightly by hammering, the hoop will spin in place. Also, the water soak will cause the hoop to start rusting, which will ultimately cause some slight spalling on the inside surface of the ring, which will make the ring loose in the end.

The behavior of wood when wetted, expanding in a mortise, and then developing grain compression set, is one of those basic details than anyone working solid wood should be aware of - Hoadley's book, Understanding Wood, gives a good account.

Fitting a chisel striking hoop to a handle and fitting a hammer head to a handle are exactly the same process....
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Chris Hall
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Re: Blind leading the Blind

Sat May 23, 2015 2:19 pm

Though I very rarely refer to it, I do own a copy of Odate's book, so I thought I should take a look to see exactly what he says. Here's the direct quote, with emphasis provided by yours truly:

"...with the hoop in place, dip the top end of the handle into water for a few seconds"

I'm relieved to see that he was not advocating that anyone soak the chisel handle. I guess then that some folks must have thought that if a little water did the job, maybe a lot more water would somehow do it better. An easy conclusion to leap to, and completely incorrect.

His book has some lovely hand-drawn illustrations and interesting anecdotes, but some of it I certainly don't agree with. His section on sharpening in particular is not the best.

Here's a picture of a blade that someone has avoided tapping out for a long time, for instance:
P5230001-small.JPG
P5230001-small.JPG (462.39 KiB) Viewed 5399 times
Beta ura to be sure, and the ura-suki is asymmetrical. He has worked the blade too far up the stone and scarred the iron portion above the forge weld line, so it looks kinda ugly overall. Not the sort of picture I would be inclined to show myself...

He may be one of those woodworkers who doesn't care about the issue and that's fine, it's a free country and all, though as a result he does make things harder in sharpening than they need to be.

No surprise then, given that ura view, to see a picture on the same page showing him squatting down and using a stick as a lever to apply heavy pressure to work the back of the blade on the stone. Beta ura goes with such techniques, since you are gradually increasing the amount of hagane to work by avoiding the tapping out process.
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Brian
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Re: Blind leading the Blind

Sat May 23, 2015 3:46 pm

Ah, I see the distinction. Just enough to peen the ends and nothing more.
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Re: Blind leading the Blind

Sat May 23, 2015 9:32 pm

My experience on the subject is this: I bought a 10 piece set of Koyamaitchi chisel and first set them using oil, pretty much exactly as Chris explained on the carpentry way. The handle are red oak (it might be important to note, it's not a wood I'm familiar with at all). The problem I got with oil is that the fibers became very weak, breaking and even desintegrating as I hit them. They all lasted a couple of months but eventually I hit the hoop and had to do it again. Stuart from toolsfromjapan told me that he used very very hot water (boiling, why not) to soften the end fibers only for a couple seconds to help mushroom it. It's a complete success. In either way, I never had a problem with hoops getting loose, and it's no wonder it's going to happen if you soak the handle.

Chris, have you ever had that kind of trouble using oil? Do you think it might have something to do with the essence of wood involved?
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Chris Hall
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Re: Blind leading the Blind

Sat May 23, 2015 10:27 pm

That's interesting. I have only one chisel handle on a timber chisel which is red oak, and I used the water and steam iron method to set the hoop- this is years back. That chisel handle has always been a problem in terms of fraying end grain, which I had put down to the material, as I've never had any issue with white oak or gumi in this regard. So, sorry to hear you had less than optimal results with your red oak handles using the oil, however I'm surprised that you had success afterward with boiling water, as I would have thought that it would have soften the wood fibers far more than any oil could do.

I have a book from Japan entirely devoted to chisels, with a very detailed chisel set up section, which shows no use of water to soften the ends of the handle. They don't even show any work to peen over the exposed end of the handle after setting the hoop. I've noticed on a lot of Japanese sites showing chisel prep work that they simply peen over the end's arris with just a hammer, no water used to soften.

I guess if one method doesn't prove successful for you it could involve some omitted detail in the prep, or maybe that the particular handle wood doesn't cooperate so nicely so you need to shift approach a bit. I certainly have kept away from red oak handles for chisels since that first one.
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Brian
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Re: Blind leading the Blind

Sat May 23, 2015 11:23 pm

Here are some ebony ones I've been using for a few weeks and some rosewood (Brazilian?) I've just assembled. I've taken very light cuts around the perimeter with a gouge until the hoops can be installed as a press fit.

These are gouges (ebony) and bench chisels (rosewood) and aren't subject to the 675g Gennou that I have for my striking chisels and mortise chisels which are white oak and red oak respectively. So I have not done anything beyond installing the hoops with a compression fit, I put together a hammer in a similar fashion with an ebony handle and that locked together very solid once a good compression fit was achieved...maybe the same thing can be applied here.

These are relatively poor choices for chisel handles that will be used with a mallet, but since these are for light hammer use....and because I'm a sucker for exotic woods...here they are;

Image
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Chris Hall
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Re: Blind leading the Blind

Sun May 24, 2015 9:00 am

They're purty!

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