Warren in Lancaster, PA
Warren, if you mortise a plane or something out of hard maple, you will see tiny chips in the edge if you look at it with light and magnification.

Well, yesterday I dug out a piece of hard maple and made four mortises and looked at the edge with a 30X loupe. No chips.

Then this morning I got the bright idea that maybe if I were rough with the chisel I could witness the chips. I "bashed" the chisel, hit it without holding the handle, levered it, twisted it, rootshed it, but still no chips. Next I tried levering it hard across the rough bottom of the mortise and in just seconds I had chips all across the edge. So a rough scraping action will chip the edge; not much of a surprise.