Bill I see what this guy is saying but i feel much of his experience is based on Japanese chisels which is a different cup of tea. They deliberately made that way.
http://www.finefurnituremaker.com/woodworking_tools.htm
This guy hit seems to be way more experienced and hit on the very point i was looking at with my inherited ones.
Where he says Quote
Steel Bananas
However the problem we have encountered with the Sorby blades is FLATNESS or lack of it. As far as we can see it seems that somewhere towards the end of the process of manufacture heat is being introduced to the blade after it has been flattened. Because it seems to have once been flat then another process introduces heat to part of the blade and the whole blade then seems to bend slightly.
What arrives in the customers hand is a blade that in our experience three times out of five is curving from the tip of the blade in a convex pattern towards the handle of the tool, so if the blade is put on a flat surface it will touch near the heel of the handle and touch at the point of the blade with a hollow in the centre of the blade. This hollowing may only be half a milimetreover the whole length of the blade. But it should be dead flat.
My experience with the batch of sorbys and others from sheffield of the same generation is not that they are like the Japanese. It would be great if they were. But they literally are like a bow out of Robin Hood and the bow can go either way. In some cases there is so much to take off to get a flat enough section if i did i would literally shorten the chisel and these "mortise" chisels ...
NOT more like bench chisel, would be very thin wedge at the sharp end. Mine are not beveled as he shows they are like the ones that are in the link on the LV site (but way older but the same thickness and shape) and he makes a very good point about beveled ones needing to have a thin edge like LN.
One other thing, after returnig to sharpen yesterday subsequent to my revised post i then went on to set up to sharpen my
Narex newly acquired set of true mortise chisels. Real ice picks. These are so understated but i think they deserve a lot of credit and a good looking over by anyone that wants a low cost quality set of mortise chisels in nice small sizes.
5 good chisels for $60 bucks i think is a bargain especially for the newbie to woodworking and thats from Lee Valley.
1) They were all ground to the same initial bevel of 25 degrees
2) They were all flat top to bottom on the rear of the blade seeming to be cut from the same slab of steel. To polish the underside up will be nothing.
3) Good wooden handles nothing super fancy but with hoops on the top.
There is a
set of bevel edge chisels also from Narex for $76 that i will look at when i next go to LV and see how they are. For the record i will ask to see one of the more current Sorbeys i linked to but i will take my engineers square along to check out the back and see if they have done anything about making them straight and not bananas.
I would love some Blue Spruce tools but well $800 plus for a set is way out of my value range for my hobby handtools. Perhaps a treat of one or so for a go to chisel would be nice but then what size would you choose if you only got one.
Personally after my experience with these old boys some of these "pedigree high priced brands" from sheffield can take a back seat the Czech republic and the Narex line.
Apparently Stanley are bringing out their relaunched version of the old stalwart chisel that Lie Neilson has produced. Wil be interesting to see the reviews that gets. Their line of premium planes did not fair too well took them a few trys just like woodriver to make grade of acceptable.
I apologize if this has a rant tone to it but man i got blisters today just to be able to flatten the backs of my chisels and the amount of time i have in them now what with previously having made new handles as well I am slightly peeved. I dont want anyone to go through this if they dont have to. As i said in my article mine are hand downs other wise they would be scrap metal.