Weekend reading .... *LINK*

could swear I've seen that title somewhere else *LINK*

dave brown

>was it here . . .


thread 1

or *LINK*

dave brown

>maybe it was here . . . .


thread 2

ahhh, HERE it is  *LINK*

dave brown

>


thread 3

wait, here's another one  *LINK*

dave brown

>


thread 4

ok, I think this is the last one . . . .  *LINK*

dave brown

>


thread 5

Apply DIRECTLY to FOREHEAD! Hey, repetition works!

David Barnett - SW Florida

>

Apply DIRECTLY to FOREHEAD! Repetition works!

David Barnett - SW Florida

>

That is, without a doubt, a gizmo

David Barnett - SW Florida

>Harrelson Stanley is amazing. Hardly looks like the thing to hone Occam's Razor, though.

I used to hone only wider chisels and plane blades freehand, but in the last few years I sweep rapidly side to side on tools as narrow as gravers. Mostly, I do this because I don't want to break stride, and, of course, because it works.

The difference is that I use India, Novaculite, and diamond laps. If one uses softer stones, however, this might be the ticket.

Thorough and well-written, as usual.

Re: ok, I think this is the last one . . . .

Derek Cohen (in Perth, Australia)

>Heh ... heh.. yes, I did post the original article to a couple of forums, but not here. I thought I would do so because it is now up on my webpage (and it has a few updates). I was pleased with the article, and thought that there are those that do no venture beyond the shores of this website. You and I both venture far and wide, and frequently at that!

As I said in the article, and especially elsewhere in discussion, the Sharp Skate is not really my scene, and that I think that it will encounter a lot of resistance from a section of woodworkers. Partly on price and partly on concept. Some will like it, and even do so a lot.

My interest is really in the side sharpening process (which the Sharp Skate utilizes). The discussions I have had to date have indicated that many use this technique and do so with a sense of guilt - as if they were doing so illegally! I am increasingly seeing that this method dovetails with Front-and-Back, and will enable a lot more would-be freehand sharpeners to gain confidence and do so.

I have had further discussions with Harrelson, and there are a few tricks I will be trying out and passing on. One of his claims is that he gets flatter bevels and stronger edges. We shall see. Some of this just stimulates my scientific curiosity, and some is how it can be used practically. It will have to wait a while as I now have a lot of very sharp edges and plan to use them this weekend to build my son a novel bookcase.

Regards from Perth

Derek

Re: ok, I think this is the last one . . . .

Pam Niedermayer - Austin, TX

>many use this technique and do so with a sense of guilt - as if they were doing so illegally

OK, Derek, time to name names, this is the second time you've said this in public. My assumption is that many have always used side sharpening, not with any dogma, but as simply a good way to sharpen some edges. And as I said in another forum, I'm real tired of people "inventing" techniques that have been used for years by many and touting it as their brave new discovery. I'm not saying you're doing that.

Pam

Re: ok, I think this is the last one . . . .

Derek Cohen (in Perth, Australia)

>Hi Pam

I agree that side sharpening is not a new technique. That is actually my point! I am also saying that it is a very viable technique - as evidenced by the fact that many of us have been doing so for years. Several have said to me that that they thought that they were somehow "cheating" because it was not the recommended (F&B) method, as if their lack of coordination to do the latter was a stigma of some kind. Gee, these stereotypes and polarized positions never occur in woodworking, do they :). I would not make a big deal out of that because it takes us into such negative avenues.

Harrelson certainly did not invent the side sharpening method. As far as I am aware (and there is another point here as well), it has been a common, perhaps even traditional, technique used in Japan for a long, long time. However credit must be given where credit is due. I had not read anything - in forums, magazines or books - until Harrelson produced his DVD. Harrelson says that he coined the term - and I know that will get up your nose :) Frankly, I couldn't care less if he wants to use it for publicity for profit (after all he is a woodworker in the woodworking business - hence the Sharp Skate). I find the advice on side sharpening Harrelson offers to be interesting and helpful, and I give him credit for bringing it to my (our) attention. In my article I am just passing this information on. While many experienced freehand sharpeners know of this method, there are probably many more who do not.

Regards from Perth

Derek

Asante adage

Pam Niedermayer - Austin, TX

>The hen knows the sun is coming up in the morning, too; but she doesn't see the need to crow about it.

Pam

Re: Asante adage

Derek Cohen (in Perth, Australia)

>Hi Pam

I do not know what the politics of your lecture/workshop circuit are, and what Harrelson says or does. So, either I am somewhat naive about these matters, or you are somewhat paranoid. Or perhaps we are both. :)

Regards from Perth

Derek

Re: Asante adage

Pam Niedermayer - Austin, TX

>I'm not paranoid over anything woodworking, nor do I think of anything woodworking in political terms. I am as I said: sick and tired of people taking regular, normal, wide spread techniques and touting them as their own, exploiting them. This is happening everywhere, in technology (try doing any old regular thing in software, things that have been done for 60 years by many, without stepping on some company's patent); but here we're talking woodworking. I don't care if Harrelson wants to invent some whoopydo sharpening device, good for him; but to not even mention that thousands of people have been doing "side" sharpening for hundreds of years is an egregious travesty.

What lecture/workshop circuit?

Pam

Derek, thank you

Wiley Horne -- So. Calif.

>for posting a link to your review of Harrelson Stanley's Sharp Skate (tm) device for reading by the WoodCentral Hand Tool forum folks. The review is thorough and objective.

Pam, if you have a private beef with someone, such as Harrelson, it is best taken up directly with that person. This Forum, though it permits considerable latitude in opinion, will not be used to attack individuals or businesses. Accordingly, I am deleting your post at this point.

Please post no further invective in this vein, on this Forum.

Wiley

Well, it is a nice looking gizmo...

John in NM

>And undoubtedly handy if you need one...

But the whole side sharpening thing? I do that all the time. Lots of people do that all the time. It is a bit like having someone say "Hey guys! Look! The sky is blue!" I thought this whole discussion was about the practice of sharpening things like card scrapers and skates on the side of the stone, but now that I look at the link, I have to agree with Pam, this is just silly.

The guy invented a nifty jig, kudos on that. But there's nothing new or novel, or even immoral about so called "side sharpening"

I haven't seen Harrelson Stanley's DVD

Bill Houghton, sunny Sebastopol, CA

>and wouldn't be able to distinguish him from Woody Harrelson if I didn't already know what Woody Harrelson looks like, but it seems to me some of the reactions to Derek's post kind of wandered away from the original intent, which was to review a sharpening jig that takes a slightly different approach.

I recently bought all 26 of Lee Valley's reprints of the Popular Mechanics Shopnotes, and I am constantly amused to find tips from a century ago that have appeared in other magazines in recent years; that, when I see them in said other magazines, my reaction is "well, duh! I knew that;" and that were probably known in the trade for years before they appeared in Pop Mechanics. This rediscovery is a constant, often, though not always, made in complete innocence. It seems to me, from the secondhand info in Derek's post, that H. Stanley has devoted some attention to and tried to articulate the best technique for side sharpening and developed a cute little jig to aid in the doing of it. Great for him to have done both. If he's claiming to be the first discoverer, then people ought to write him and tell him he's wrong, wrong, wrong; but in this thread, it seems like the proper issue before the group is the idea considered without emotion and the cute little jig.

I recall one of the early Fine Workwooding issues had a whole article on side sharpening, which the author thought was a bad idea because he felt it would lead to a weaker edge (something to do with the grooves running parallel to the edge and making for little stress fractures, as I recall). Not hardly a new concept in the ether; not hardly much newer than Scary Sharpening.

Side sharpening jig in Wood magazine, June 2003

wilbur

>For what it's worth, Wood Magazine had an article showing how to build a "side sharpening" jig with scraps of wood back in June 2003, although they didn't call it "side sharpening". A member of our local woodworking club won a "sharpest chisel" contest using the jig and a bunch of wet/dry sandpaper.

The title of the article was "Low-Tech Foolproof Sharpening". If you go to the Wood Magazine website (www.woodmagazine.com), go to the Article Index on the left side of the home page, and search for "sharpening", you'll find it pretty quickly.

Here's a picture of the jig from the Wood Magazine website. The slider that holds the chisel runs back and forth in a dado in the base plate.

Forgot to mention

wilbur

>The article is available for download, but it's not free. Wood Magazine wants $3.50 for it. But I bet most of you could figure out how to build a version of the jig after seeing the picture.

Re: Asante adage

Pam Niedermayer - Austin, TX

>No politics in woodworking, no paranoia, don't know what lecture/workshop circuit you're talking about.

Pam