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As the blade was badly chipped and had lost its bevel, grinding was required.
As the other blades are in better shape, and I don’t prefer to leave the bevels of heavy chisels and slicks with a hollow grind (although not important…merely personal preference), I finish the grinding stage for my 25-degree bevels on the belt sander chucked in the Workmate. I use 60, 80, 100 and 150 grits lubed with WD-40 and lots of water, checking my bevel angle and edge with protractor and square as I go.
Final honing of 25-degree bevel and 30-degree secondary bevel will come later.
Next I rough out my handle stock. There are better choices for handles that occasionally will be struck, but I have some Honduras Mahogany left over from a boat project and will use that. I rip a 2” turning square of it on the table saw, 8-side it on the same saw, and cut two handles to length…the finished length of each handle to equal the length of blade and tang. I then 16-side them using a couple rehabbed old smoothing planes set for coarse and fine cuts. And except for the hanging hole in the 5C above, the Stanley 3C and 4C in the picture were in worse shape when I acquired them to replace the family’s old beech smoothers…the ones I used exclusively for 20 years…I was getting tired of renewing mouths and soles on those.
Next I’ll fit the ferrules on the striking ends of the handles. These are simple sections of 1 ¼” brass pipe salvaged from an old plumbing fixture with hacksaw and buffer-grinder. The centers are laid out, an interior line penciled…
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While I have a jig for this, I rarely use it any more
and freehand the 25-degree bevel using lots of water…turn that
blade edge 600-degree blue and it has lost its temper and all
the blue must be ground away… and I use a square and protractor
to check my progress. You should use a 6” bench grinder with all
the guards and a proper tool rest for this… and wear glasses, of
course.
