Idea: Making your own wood carving chisels

[KCSO]

I go to yard sales and pick up the lod Stanley spade bits and make all my specialty chisels from them. They hold an edge very well when properly tempered and the shanks make them easy to put a handle on. I have bent skews, dog legs and a whole passel of shaped scrapers for doing M/L carving.

[scrapcan]

KSCO said what I was going to add. You can also find chisels and spade bits at hte pawn shops in this area for cheap.

[andremajic]

Next thread will be of me using these chisels, a handsaw, and sandpaper to cut some hardwood pieces and shaping them into 1911 grips.

[Dutchman]

If you wish to produce your own carving tools, I would highly recommend the old books by Alexander Weygers, "The Modern Blacksmith", "The Making of Tools", and "The Recycling, Use, and Repair of Tools", they have been compiled into a single book , "The Complete Modern Blacksmith".

Weyger is (was)

He was a Dutchman born in Indonesia (Java).

If making your own tools is what flips yer switch then this advise to get these books is the best advise you'll ever get.

And if you scrounge up a small wood lathe you can make yourself some really cool tool handles with copper tubing ferrules.

Dutch

[scrapcan]

Or following on Dutch's comment, you can use old cartridge casings for the ferrules. I have a few file handles for small files made this way.

[StrawHat]

After using this chisel for a while, when it starts dragging a little with the cutting, I take it to a marble tile and use some 800 grit sandpaper to dress up the edge and it's good as new!

Another way to keep the edge is using a strop. Not a loose strop like a barber uses but a fixed one. Glue a strip of leather to a piece of wood (I like it about 2" wide), after the glue dries dress the leather with a rouge and you have a strop that will easily keep you final edge sharp. Also good for polishing the bevel so the shaving slides off without friction.

[KCSO]

I use scrap aluminum stock to turn handles. With a set screw one handle will swap on all my needle files. I also found in a junk pile 3 old cast iron file handles with screw tighteners for large files.

[shunka]

Next thread will be of me using these chisels, a handsaw, and sandpaper to cut some hardwood pieces and shaping them into 1911 grips.

Glad to see you are home safe.

Good job andremajic ! thanks for the pics and keep up the good work.

best
shunka

[NoZombies]

Here's a chisel I made years ago.

The handle is osage orange, the socket is forge welded seamless and the main material is wrought iron, and has a 52100 bit forge welded on to provide the cutting edge. As far as I know, it's still seeing daily use in the shop of the carpenter it went to.