Gaging the 1-2-3

Straightedges, rules, squares, sumitsubo, sashigane - those items we employ when 'putting the lines on the wood'
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Chris Hall
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Gaging the 1-2-3

Sun Aug 02, 2015 6:06 pm

Learned something interesting today about 1-2-3 gage blocks. I use the one which comes with the Lee Valley set, primarily as a paring guide, so I don't have a pair of these blocks like most machinists would - thus, I don't use them in the same way, very often at least, as most machinists would. However, I'm quite sure the one supplied in the LV set is as defective as the other cheap imported ones.

Defective? how so?

Check this video out, especially the first 90 seconds, and it will be clear:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e2BpFdXlXNI

Will be getting better ones next time....
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Brian
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Re: Gaging the 1-2-3

Mon Aug 03, 2015 10:39 am

Interesting, we always used makeshift standoffs along with t-nuts and studs, but seeing how these are supposed to be used is enlightening.
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Yxoc
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Re: Gaging the 1-2-3

Tue Aug 04, 2015 6:36 am

I've seen you use the 1-2-3 block for paring Chris and I imagine myself scraping the edge of the chisel against the metal surface every time I used it - clearly you have a good and careful habit pattern with it. I will stick to wooden blocks for a while.
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Chris Hall
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Re: Gaging the 1-2-3

Tue Aug 04, 2015 7:09 am

The hagane has a higher Rockwell value than the gage block, so it doesn't seem to get scratched, and neither does the block, come to think about it. I would have noticed if the hagane was getting scratched, every time I hit the sharpening stones.

Also I slightly dub the long side arrises of any chisel on a sharpening stone to reduce the odds of slicing the side of my guide finger when hand paring, so that slight blunting also reduces any likelihood that the chisel would scratch the gage block.

Recently I bought a couple of large metal precision 4-face parallels to use as paring blocks, measuring 12" x 1.5" x 3". They are heavy lumps but they should come in handy when working longer surfaces.

Wooden blocks work fine, but you have to check them all the time to make sure that they are holding square. With the metal blocks, I never have to think about it or doubt the squareness.
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Chris Hall
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Re: Gaging the 1-2-3

Tue Aug 04, 2015 7:15 am

Now that I understand how gage blocks bolt together (providing you have ones which are correctly made), I can see that it would be great to have a pair of them bolted together to form an 'L' shape, which would be great for laying out and paring around a square line around the arris of a stick, for clamping to the end of a stick to pare the end grain, etc.. It would be simple enough to place them atop a surface plate for bolting up, so as to make the guide faces on the two blocks aligned to one another.
John Whitley
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Re: Gaging the 1-2-3

Tue Aug 04, 2015 2:43 pm

Enlightening, thanks. My extremely limited machining background didn't even make it to this aspect of 1-2-3 blocks. But for my current uses, it's as a setup block (in metric) or as a standalone setup block (where I've relegated my inch block).

As the slow grind towards production on my current project continues, I've thought about getting a set of custom setup blocks made that better capture the dimensions I'm working to, and reduce fiddling about with the smaller, shim-like blocks (esp. the 1mm and .5 mm). I suspect the cost/benefit wouldn't justify it, but it may still prove useful if I'm ever so lucky as to need to bring someone else on to help out.

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