In a perfect world, new tools would come ready-to-use right out of the box. Unfortunately, the world isn’t perfect, however, so when you bring a brand new chisel or plane iron home, you need to do some sharpening. I do not consider myself an expert at sharpening, but I am able to get consistently sharp edges on my tools using a few basic tools and skills. If you are new to sharpening, I highly recommend Leonard Lee’s book The Complete Guide to Sharpening.
There’s a lot of different ways to put a sharp edge on a tool. I mainly use waterstones. The picture below shows the basic tools I use for sharpening my chisels and plane irons:
- 1000 / 4000 grit combination Norton waterstone
- 8000 grit Norton waterstone
- Veritas Mk II honing guide
- A plastic tub of water
- A spray bottle filled with water
- A old rag for wiping down the blade, as needed
Some people store their stones in water. I don’t do this; it’s just a personal preference. Therefore, before I start my sharpening session, I drop my 1000 / 4000 grit combination stone into a tub of water. When it stops bubbling, I pull it out. It only takes five minutes or so to saturate the stone with water.
An 8000 grit waterstone does not need to be soaked. I just spray the surface down and I’m good to go.
When you take a brand new chisel out of the box, it’s almost always coated in lacquer. You must remove this lacquer before sharpening the blade. If you don’t, you’ll clog your waterstones up with gunk. I pour some lacquer thinner onto a rag and wipe the blade down. This dissolves the lacquer, and I can usually rub it off with a little elbow grease. Once the lacquer is gone, it’s time to start sharpening.
A sharp edge is simply the intersection of two flat surfaces. In the case of a chisel, those two surfaces are the back and the bevel. Both surfaces will require your attention, but you should start by flattening the back. I start by rubbing the back of the chisel in a figure-eight pattern on my 1000 grit stone.
I spend the most time on the coarse grit stone, because this is where the back actually gets flattened. I know I’m done when I have at least 1/4″ of evenly scratched surface at the edge of the blade.
Once that back is flat, I polish it on the 4000 and then the 8000 grit stones.
This process leaves me with a very flat, very polished back. Nice! Now, it’s time to turn my attention to the bevel.
I love my Veritas Mk. II honing guide. Some folks prefer to freehand sharpen, but I find the honing guide gives me accurate repeatable results. The Veritas Mk. II has two components: the actual honing guide (the black portion) and the registration jig (the silver piece).
I start by sliding the registration jig onto the honing guide and setting it to the proper position using the built-in scale. I am sharpening a 5/8″ chisel, so I set the jig to 5/8″. I tighten down the registration jig to hold it in place.
Next, I set the registration jig to the appropriate bevel angle. For general-purpose bench chisels, I always use a 25 degree bevel.
Now it’s time to insert the chisel into the honing guide. The registration jig automatically centers the blade in the guide, squares the blade up, and sets it at the appropriate angle. I tighten down the blade and remove the registration jig.
Once again, I start with my coarsest stone and work my way up to 8000 grit. When honing the bevel, I am careful to use the entire stone. If I were to only use the center, I would quickly wear a groove.
Honing the bevel creates a small wire edge. You probably won’t be able to see it with your naked eye, but you can feel it by running your finger along the chisel’s edge on the back side of the blade. I remove the wire edge in between grits by giving the back of the chisel a few strokes on the 8000 grit stone. Do not use the 1000 or 4000 grit stones to remove the wire edge! Once you’ve polished the back of the chisel to 8000 grit, that surface should only touch the 8000 grit stone… otherwise you’ll have to re-polish the back of the chisel.
And here is the bevel honed to 8000 grit.
If you want, you could stop at this point. The chisel is sharp and will perform well. I like to take it one step further, however, by creating a micro-bevel along the edge. This makes future honing sessions fast and easy.
My honing guide has a knob attached to the roller. I keep this knob set to the 12 o’clock position when honing the primary bevel.
Turning the knob to the 6 o’clock position increases the bevel angle by 2 degrees, which allows me to easily create a micro-bevel on the edge.
To create the micro-bevel, I follow the same procedure that I used for honing the primary bevel. The micro-bevel only needs 2 or 3 strokes per grit; it only takes a minute or two. Again, just like when I honed the primary bevel, I remove the wire edge in between grits.
If you look closely at this picture, you can see a black line along the edge of the chisel. That is the polished micro-bevel. This chisel is now sharp and ready for action!
Nice post! I didn’t know that the 8000-grit doesn’t need to be soaked. I thought it was interesting that you didn’t mention the nagura stone, because everything I have read said that you need to use a nagura stone on anything 6000-grit and above, to create a slurry. Still, you’re getting results without one, so is it just marketing hype?
Also, is it necessary to rub off the burr in between each stone, or can you just wait until you’ve gone through all the grits?
@Eric: I have not yet encountered a situation where I needed a Nagura stone to get good results from my 8000 grit waterstone. My guess is that the Nagura is not as necessary with the man-made Norton stones as it is with natural Japanese waterstones.
As for removing the burr, you can wait until the very end to remove it if you want… but it only takes 1 or 2 strokes on the 8000 grit stone to take care of it. My personal preference is to remove it between each grit. Try it both ways and stick with the method you like the best.
Is a good tool for the shop for a better sharp.
Dave,
Great demo…
Have you tried Lie-Nielson planes and chisels? It would cut down on the sharpening. Well, on the initial sharpening.
Tom
@Tom: I have one LN plane, and you’re right… the iron was MUCH easier to sharpen initially than these chisels. The LN chisels are beautiful but they were (unfortunately) outside my price range when I bought the MHG set. If I ever upgrade again, the LNs will be at the top of my list.
These MHG chisels are pretty nice and relatively inexpensive. It took some effort to set them up properly, but they are 100 times better than my old set of cheap chisels. I’ve been pleased with how well they retain their edge.
[...] was smaller. I used the method of creating a micro bevel, which is what my school teaches. (here’s a good overview of how to sharpen chisels with a micro bevel… one thing I noticed, he doesn’t soak his 8000 grit stone, and although I would assume [...]
I have a set of MHG bench chisels and recently bought a set of MHG carpenter chisels, which are very heavy. I have been delighted with both sets. I have three L-H mortise chisels, and they are nice, but I like the MHG handles better, and hate it when the handle falls off. The backs of the MHG chisels were dead flat out of the box, and I only did a microbevel with 6000 and 8000 stones. After some very heavy use, the bench chisels needed a new bevel cut which was relatively quick with 320, 400, 600 grit paper, then a 1200 grit stone. I then did the micro bevel. I love my Veritas honing guide for chisels of 1/2 ” plus in width. I find it works poorly at smaller sizes. We all have to find our own way on sharpening.