Not all tool makers do a good job of chamfering the top of a chisel. Some, like Lie Nielsen, do a beautiful job of bringing that almost to the back of the blade, and others, like Crown, put a little camera on top of the blade and call it a bezel. As far as I’m concerned, this is taking p…s, almost to the point of contravening the Job Descriptions Act. I don’t like manufacturers who play like this and I won’t hesitate to point it out and steer less informed people away from them.
In the same way that the flat jack is a multi-purpose tool, the bevel edge chisel is used in many ways. Opening cans of No…don’t go there. It should work when we want to cut horizontally or vertically and where we want to hit it with a mallet, not hard, but purposefully. We need a delicate precision tool that will hold the edge well, have a sharp edge, and will take a light blow.
As I wander around the twenty or so benches here at Rowden Workshops, I see four or five favorite brands of bevel edge chisels for furniture makers. Since none of them seem to be perfect, I will describe each one of them giving you the pros and cons in each case as I see it.
Shop favorites are the bench chisels offered by the American manufacturer Lie Nielsen. These are certainly beautifully made tools. The bevel is precise and well cut, the corners can be clearly seen and the back of these blades invariably comes to us straight and straight. This is an essential quality and don’t let tool makers tell you otherwise. The key surface of a chisel is the back, if you are looking to create a flat surface with a chisel it is the back that you will be pressing into the work extending a surface that you have already cut to the left and right using the corners of the blade. . If the back of a chisel isn’t flat, you have a lot of work to flatten it out. Or you could use it to open cans of…
The handles on these blades are good and two versions are offered, a long handle and a shorter handle, the different size blades have different size handles. The manufacturing of the blades is of an exceptionally high quality. It’s the design that gives me a problem, it’s a relatively heavy blade and I personally find it quite clumsy. The steel used is a modern cryogenically treated A2 steel. The hallmark of steel is to take an edge and then hold it exceptionally well. The challenge I have is that I feel like this quality steel has a good edge, but not as sharp an edge as high carbon steel, even cold rolled high carbon steel. I don’t see the advantage of keeping an edge for as long as an excellent one in a professional shop, as a skilled fabricator will be able to put an edge on a blade in less than a minute. I see the fact that these blades do not have the sharpest edge as a disadvantage.
For that alone I wouldn’t buy them. I’m sorry, Mr. Lie Nielsen.
