Making a Fishtail Chisel - Bachi Nomi Style.

Well the title may be a little pretentious, as this chisel will not be a beautiful laminated white paper steel work of art, but it will resemble the bachi-nomi in shape,  and function.

Fishtail chisels are extremely useful in getting into tight angles - mortices and dovetails, as well as cleaning out the corners of butterfly inlay. See here:

Butterfly Inlay

For cleaning up the pins in half-blind dovetails, they are essential.

For the butterfly inlay mentioned above, I used a workshop made skew chisel, which worked well enough, but was not ideal.

I wanted a chisel in the Bachi Nomi style, something like this one from Japanese Tools Australia

I dug around in my old chisel drawer and found a couple of fine bladed chisels that would suffice.

One is a much used Alex Mathieson made in Glasgow, the other a Robert Sorby, made in Sheffield.

Both have excellent steel.

The first task was to mark out the edges of the chisels to be removed. I did this on the back where the steel was uniformly flat.

I ground these back on a bench grinder, making sure I did not allow heat build up in the steel that might change its temper. Constant cooling in water is a sensible precaution.

Once the shape had been established, I ground back the edges to re-establish the side bevels - sometimes called the lands.

I was careful to leave the backs flat, but a wire edge developed along each edge on the back side during grinding, and had to be gently taken off to prevent cutting of fingers in use.

The cutting bevel was carefully checked and re-worked a little to get a slightly lower angle, and each chisel sharpened.

Here they are with my dovetail chisels. (Blue Spruce and Shinogi Nomi)

I have the feeling that the larger one is going to be the most useful for its more angled blade, but time will tell.

Until next time - happy shavings to all........................

 Building a Small Chest of Drawers - Part 4 - Butterflies and Cracks

The silky oak that I have managed to find for the chest of drawers isn't without its imperfections.

Both pieces that I have available for the sides of the carcass have drying/seasoning cracks that need attention before I can proceed.

I decided to add a butterfly check to each of them on the inside of the carcass where they will not be seen.

First step is to cut out a butterfly using a piece of long grain timber. Offcuts from the silky oak will do nicely, as they won't be seen.

Use the butterfly as a template, and draw its position across the crack.

I use a sharp chisel to score just inside the lines. I will work back to these and then pare down to final size.

I start in the middle and work my way to the outsides.

Sharp chisels are a must. A skew chisel helps to get into the acute angles of the corners. A fishtail chisel would also work well, and might even be a better choice - I'll make one for next time. Sneak up on the sides, and do several trial fits until the butterfly fits perfectly.

To get the depth exact, and to establish a perfectly flat floor for gluing, a small router plane is ideal. This one is made by Lee Valley, but there are plenty of others now available in the marketplace.

Glue, clamp and leave to dry.

After the glue has set, simply plane the proud timber back to level with the surface.

The crack is now checked, and placed where it will be out of sight.

Until next time ........... when I'll outline how to make a fishtail (bachi-nomi style) chisel

..........................happy shavings to all.

 Millers Falls - Buck Rogers Handplanes - A Small Review

There has been a necessary pause in the chest of drawers, but I have been asked about the Millers Falls planes that appear in the build, so I will do a small review of them.

These are the Millers Falls 714 and 709 bench planes.

Like most Millers Falls Planes, the "14" and "09" refer to the planes' nominal length in inches - 14 inches and 9 inches respectively. So these are a jack plane - 714, and a smoothing plane - 709.

These are a part of a small range of similarly styled handtools that included a drill, hacksaw, small push drill, chisels, brace and a few others. They were made and sold during the 1950's when the design was considered futuristic, and the nickname comes from a science fiction character of the period.

There were only ever the two planes in the series, with some small variations between "types".

The earlier planes had a smooth rounded toe like the 714 shown, while the later type showed minor changes and had a painted and moulded toe - such as the 709 here.  Evidently they were not big sellers in their day and production only lasted about ten years or so

There is a solid heft to both planes that gives confidence to the cut, but they are well balanced and don't feel heavy.

My 714 has been well used, and it shows in body scratches and gouges as well as a shortened blade from sharpening.

A Closer Look at Specifications

The handles are more angular and upright than the more sinuous curves of some wooden handled planes, yet they are practical in use, if not as comfortable in the hand.

The rear handle (tote) is fully integrated with the frog, such that adjusting the position of the frog forward or back, moves the handle too. This is something like the handle/frog unit on current Veritas bevel down bench planes. There is no frog adjuster screw, but pushing the handle is simply done to move the frog if necessary.

In practice, this is a non issue as the quality of shavings and the smoothness of cut are more determined by blade and chip breaker alignment than anything else.

The mouth is clean with a gently scalloped curve flowing towards the front knob. It is aesthetically pleasing as well as allowing quick escapement of shavings without any jamming.

A great deal of attention has been given to the design of the blade, cap-iron/chipbreaker and lever cap.

They are homogeneous in their gentle curves and live happily together as a single design unit. I find them to be a thing of quiet beauty in their own right.  None of this impacts on their utility and functionality, and they perform very nicely indeed.

Millers Falls continued with their hinged lever cap design for this plane, similar to their other bench planes. It is articulated, so that the blade and cap-iron unit below the lever cap screw, is supported over is whole area.  It is a very stable and practical solution to eliminating/controlling blade chatter. It would also be a more expensive manufacturing option than the simple lever caps of Stanley and others - and a sign of a premium tool.

While comparing with a Stanley plane, it is obvious that the Millers Falls blade has a shorter usable cutter life, this being one of the constraints of the integrated design brief.  On top of that, replacement blades are going to be a a pain in proverbial to find, and may have to be bespoke.

The standard Millers Falls Blade is obviously thicker than the equivalent Stanley.

The steel is excellent, and it takes and holds a keen edge. No complaints at all there.

Two things stand out in the design of the frog. One is the obvious size of the depth adjuster wheel - a full 1-1/2 inches in diameter. Stanleys started with depth adjusters of one inch, and finished with 1-1/4 inches  See the comparison in the photo below where the Falcon F5 has the same sized adjuster as the original Stanley.

The mechanical advantage conferred by this 1-1/2 inch diameter wheel makes adjusting the blade depth a one finger operation, and as easy as pie.

Secondly, the shape of the depth adjuster lever shows an elliptical curve on the top and the bottom to prevent binding in the blade slot, and to make adjusting the blade smoother. This is a much mentioned feature of the Woodriver bench planes currently being sold. Clearly, it is a design feature that is at least seventy years old.

In terms of size, the 714 is the same length as a standard jack plane.

Here it is next to a Falcon F5, but a Stanley is the same length.

The 709 on the other hand is not the same length as a number 4. The Stanley No 4 smoother is shorter even though it has the same width blade.

In fact it is the same length as a 4-1/2 even though it does not have the mass of such.

Here it shown against the 4-1/2 and the number 4 for comparison.

In terms of mass, the 714 and the standard number 5 bench plane are near identical - tipping the scales at around 4-1/2 pounds each.

The smoothers are vastly different:

The 709 is near 4 pounds.

The Stanley number 4 is a mere 3lbs 6oz - making the Millers Falls smoothing plane over 18% heavier.

While this is not the same mass as a 4-1/2, it makes a big difference when using the same sized blade of 2 inches.  The 709 is just sooooo easy to push.

A good test of any smoothing plane body/blade combination is how it handles grain. Here the 709 has planed flat a butterfly crack-checker on the inside of a drawer carcass.  It had to plane with and across the grain simultaneously. Not too shabby at all.

Below, it handles long smoothing tasks like the side of this carcass with full even shavings, leaving a finish that needs little to no more work.

Just to wrap this up - the planes are striking in their design, and more than competent in their functionality.  They have some outstanding features that make them easy to use and a pleasure in the hand.

If you come across one - you might like to acquire it and enjoy the experience - as I have.

Back to the chest of drawers in the near future.....................

..................and happy shavings to all.

 Building a Small Chest of Drawers - Part 3

Hand cut Dovetails

The top of the carcass will be joined to the sides with through dovetails.

I cut the tails into the top and carefully chisel out the waste.

A coping saw removes most of the waste, and the remainder is done with sharp chisels.

Here is the finished top showing tails on both sides.

I use the finished top as the template for the pins in each side.

I like to clamp this in place while I mark out with a sharp marking knife.

Carefully mark all the waste to be removed.

It sounds so elementary, but it is so easy to remove the wrong parts - .............don't ask!

The pins are straight, so a small marking square is all that's needed to finish the layout.

I like to establish a shallow shoulder with a chisel, that creates a clean line to work towards.

As the waste is chiseled out I try to create a slight undercut, so that there is nothing protruding to stop the tails from sitting snug.

A skew chisel is a great aid in cleaning out the angled base of the pins.

I made this one from an old Jenbolaget chisel. Swedish steel is always good and holds a keen edge

Once the tails are cleaned up it's time for a trial fit.

I know some say not to trial fit but to glue up immediately, but I still have some work to do to the bottom in establishing where the feet will go, and I want to temporarily clamp some web frames to the carcass to test for square.

In part 4 I'll assemble the carcass

Happy shavings to all