Best Marking knive

Re: Best Marking knive

George Bustamante

>I would buy the blade from ron Hock and make your own.

Re: Best Marking knive

Chris Knight

>Ian Kirby recommends an ordinary pocket knife - specifically a small Swiss Army knife.

I find that the man has very strong opinions and I by no means always agree with them but in this case his solution works well for me. The blade registers well against pin or tail and can be used for right and left handed cuts. I have found that registering the blade properly against the tail - or pin as the case may be - is one of the most important things to ensure good joints.

Re: Best Marking knive

Lyn J. Mangiameli

>I'm partial to the Superior Works marking knife. Pretty, fits well in the hand, conventional steel takes as sharp an edge as you want to put on it, has a nice angle to the sides that allows for a narrow point for use within dovetails when used more vertically, but can be used at a lower ange to offer lots of registration area, and it is ambidextrous.

http://www.supertool.com/layknife.htm

I note that Lee Valley replaced their original Veritas marking knife with a design (now called a Striking Knife) almost identical to the Superior Works version, but with A2 steel and at one third the price of the Superior Works Version. I haven't used the LV tool but suspect it will work the same, though I'm not at all sorry I have the Superior Works model.

Marking Knife

Robert Tutsky

>Hi Robin,

What I did was to get a 3' piece of O1 tool steel 1/2" wide and 3/16" thick from Enco and made my own. I ground a bevel on two sides to a point and ground a tine on the other end to insert into a rectangular handle (a round handle would roll of my bench). I heated the tip to cherry red and dipped it into peanut oil to harden the metal. All in all it took about half and hour and cost was maybe 5 bucks and I used the rest of the steel to make some small lathe tools. BTW the knife works great and holds an edge for a long time. I left the steel hardened and didn't bother to anneal and it.

Rob

Re: Best Marking knive

Tim of San Leandro

>I've got the Veritas striking knife and like it.

I recently got Dave Andersen's marking knife - it is similar to the Superior Toolworks and Veritas - and like that one as well.

Those knives are good for working with ~3/4 thick material or thinner as the blade length is relatively short and the handles are turned.

I like the all steel japanese style marking knives as well. They have much greater reach but some persons don't like holding metal handles.

Tim

Re: Best Marking knive

Charles

>I cut them pins first. You don't use a knife to lay out the pins - a sharp pencil will do. When the pins are cut, I mark the tails with a scratch awl since I'm marking face grain (the advantage of the pins first method IMO) and extend the marks across the end grain with a sharp pencil.

FWIW, this is the 'Tage Frid' method, except he didn't bother marking the end grain on the tail piece. Sometimes I don't either. The more you cut the less you need layout marks on the end grain of the tail piece using the pins first method.

If you cut your DTs tails first, then you can simply lay out the tails with a pencil. You will need knife to mark the end grain of the pin piece, however.

Re: Best Marking knive

Alan Hamilton

>Robin,

I have the Lee Valley knife and a right handed marking knife (the kind Garrett-Wade and others sell). I always reach for the Lee Valley. With that design you don't need a second knife.

Alan

pocket knife

Bill Tindall, E. TN

>I lay out tails first with a fine gel pen. I keep coming back to a slightly dull pocket knife for marking pins. The slightly dull makes a wider line .

I like a blade pattern that I think is called a sheep foot. In any case it historically was used for trimming sheep feet. It is squarish on the end and flat across the bottom(sharp edge not curved) , the idea being that it would not stab shepherd or the sheep when they invariably kicked. (Nowdays I use hoof shears, but that is way OT)

Do mine the same as you

Andrew F in Australia

>I just lightly drag a sharp pencil along the knife line to make it more visible.

Works just fine for me, but all are different.

My marking knife is a bit of industrial hacksaw blade, ground to a point with an angle of about 30 degrees between the back of the blade and the cutting edge. Bevel on the blade is about the same.

I'll scan it in later if there's anybody interested.

It works as well as any shop bought knife (I haven't had to sharpen it in about 6 months) and takes about 10-15 minutes with an angle grinder to make.

Cheers,

Andrew

I use a chip carving knife...

Michael-San Francisco

>one of the long bladed ones, I guess it does have a sheepsfoot point on it. I think it came from the Lee Valley catalog, they have the standard knife, the stabbing knife and a longer bladed knife, that's the one.

The big sorta recurved handle fits well in my ham sized mitts, was marking out DT's once with an Xacto and kept getting hand cramps.

Michael

ditto on Dave's knife

Jack Guzman from Maine

>I also have one of Dave Anderson's marking knives and it's the best tool I've found yet for the job.---Crackerjack

Re: Best Marking knive

Wiley Horne--Glendora CA

>Hi Robin,

Some very fine tools have been mentioned. One other name that belongs among those already listed is Dave Jeske, of Blue Spruce Toolworks in Oregon. He makes a diamond-point (spear point) knife of fine quality and excellent balance. Actually, he makes two--a large and a small knife.

Dave's blade thickness is 1/16" for the large knife; 1/32" for the small. This may be of interest for those folks who sometimes like to use small pins, because these blades will get into a small pin entry. The blade is stiffened with brass bolsters on either side, which is functional and also looks great. The blade has good reach and a good feel against the sidewalls of the tails.

There are other fine options, but Dave Jeske belongs in the mix for sure.

Wiley

Re: Best Marking knive

Jim in Burlington Ontario

>I have bought and made a few different knives all good. The pocket knife is a good useable tools. The best so far is a kitchen knife some kind of pairing knife that is very flexable with a comfortable plastic handle.

Re: Best Marking knive *LINK*

Rossmoor Galoot

>I have the Veritas marking knife and one from Knight Toolworks which I use all the time. Both are double-beveled to allow me to use them with either hand. I like the handle on the Knight knife more than the Veritas.


Knight Toolworks Knife

Re: Best Marking knive

Steve Denvir

>I fully concur with Wiley's review of Dave Jeske's marking knife. It works well, it fits in the hand nicely, and it's a thing of beauty.

Dave's another of those (forgive me if I'm being non-PC) cottage industry tool makers, and these are the folks producing some of the best tools out there. Let's support and encourage them.

Ditto re: Blue Spruce Toolworks knives  *LINK*

Bernie Kremer

>


Blue Spruce Toolworks

Re: Ditto re: Blue Spruce Toolworks knives

dave jeske

>Thank you for your nice comments. Making quality tools for fellow woodworkers to use everyday is a true joy. I just want to mention that my web site is very old and if anyone is interested in my current products email me off-line. I hope to have a new web site up soon but I am not a very good web site maker. My sister-in-law is helping me out!

Re: Best Marking knive

paul womack

>I think I need a better knive as this one makes a line too thin

Actually the narrowness of the line is one of the advantages of a marking knife.

For the most accurate marking a single bevel grinding is required, which mean you DO need a left hand and right hand knife. The well known "dagger" tip allows the 2 knives to coexist rather handily.

It is rather easy to make a very functional marking knife, but simply grinding (and honing) a power hacksaw blade, and epoxying scale handles onto it.

BugBear

Re: dang!

paul womack

>reading the other posts, I was reminded that whilst a spear point allows right and left DT marking, a penknife blade sharpened "Finish style" (single flat bevel on both faces) also allows this.

BugBear

Re: Best Marking knive

Don Thompson, Cutler Ridge, South of Miami FL

>I am partial to the Knight Toolworks knife that I have. I have not used enough others to make a meaningful comparison, though.

The non-working areas of the blade are not what I would call highly polished, but the knife arrived razor-sharp, and has stayed that way.

Re: I use a chip carving knife...

Don Thompson, Cutler Ridge, South of Miami FL

>I have thought that one of those would be handy for getting into the corner on dovetails, but had also thought that one might have problems with it cutting the wood piece that is being used as the template (I will not get into whether it is a tail or pin board ;-)). Do you ever have this problem? What brand do you have?

Re: Best Marking knive

David Linnabary

>I know this is probably like hand tool blasphemy but I've long since known that a dedicated marking knife is just not something I need.

Literally the closest blade will work, carving knives with curved bevels, pocket knives, standard utility blades, chisels or plane irons, it just doesn't matter. The idea is to leave a mark and it doesn't have to be a deep mark. A little attention to the geometry of the knife and the way you hold it is all it takes, then its just a matter of consistancy.

If you've having trouble seeing your mark then chalk the surface first and it will provide contrast.

David

Curved Edge

Todd Stock

>Pqaul reminded me that one advantage of the pocket knife, or any blade with a radiused edge or point is resistance to dulling.

What ever gets used, it seems that delicate points dull quicker than slightly curved edges.

Re: Best Marking knive

Bruce, a MN Galoot

>Isn't that "the shiv" from Ron Hock? Got one myself, and I like it a lot for the reasons you stated.

Bruce