Official Luthiers Forum!

I went and bought some good paper and a granite tile today. USed my new veritas jig to hone an edge on the Two Cherries curved chisel. Dang! You can really get those puppies sharp! Helps a lot too.

Mike

I like a 1" chisel for most work as well. There is much less chance of it slipping of the brace with the increased width and as mentioned the mass makes the initial wood removal more controllable for me. I use the ibex planes with flat bottoms for removing mass from the peaks and tapering into a triangular shape.
Terry

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It's not what you don't know that hurts you, it's what you do know that's wrong.

Well, my two cherries curved chisel, flipped over, has proved to be my best approach yet. Plus, depending on the thickness of my brace, my 8mm ibex has also come into play way more than I ever anticipated. I think I am going to buy a 12mm ibex (convex) for thicker braces. Small is good.

Mike

The few times I've done it, and trying different tools, I ended up coming back to my 1" Sorby paring chisel. Since I had no instruction when I started woodworking, I always flipped the chisel over to use the bevel side down when necessary and didn't think anything of it; it really helps in a lot of cuts, especially cutting curves like on braces! Sometimes it helps not knowing the 'right' way to use a tool

If I were hand carving some braces today, I'd use the paring chisel, a scalpel, a small very sharp scraper, and a razor blade. Unless the wood is too hard to push an edge through, these are my go-to tools for any sort of manual wood shaping. A small spoke shave would work really well, too, if it was well put together.

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Bob Garrish
Former Canonized Purveyor of Fine CNC Luthier Services

I always use it beveled down for scaloping braces. That is the correct position for making curved cuts. Weather or not the bevel is up or down depends on the type of cut you are making.

Chris,

There is nothing special about the curved two cherries, bevel down (compared to a flat paring chisel) except for this one point: The ergonomics of holding the curved chisel bevel down kept my attack angle much lower... and thus much more controllable. I could apply more force without fear of slippage. And if I did slip, the bevel down approach minimized any damage to the the top (if any at all).

I still ended up using the 8mm ibex for pre-shapping of the end taper. At least 40% of it.

However, I will be buying one more ibex, 10-12 mm for the wider braces.

BTW, how in the heck does one accurately sharpen these SMALL ibex (rounded) blades???

Mike

I didn't understand you were talking about a bent chisel. But what ever works to make the cut as far as I'm concerned is alright. The one thing that will make carving easy is getting the tool as sharp as possible. Woodcarves get their chisels extremly sharp and spend half of the time sharpening their chisels.