Page 93 of the Mechanic’s Companion. This will cause an “oh” moment for some as it remains accurate now. Nicholson talks of the usefulness for plane irons. You can read the text – I don’t plan to just copy and display sections for my own use, even though it may be perfectly legal to do so. These books are in print and reprint now, too, but you don’t need to buy something you don’t yet know will be a reference – if at all. They are not the property of the republishers and it’s your discretion to support those folks. You are not obligated to pay someone to reprint public domain if you don’t want, though.
On to the sharpening and grinding.
As you read the text, you’ll see Nicholson prescribe a round grinding stone. This would’ve been sand stone though there may have been natural corundum wheels made, I doubt they’d have been large. Steel at the time didn’t need corundum, anyway. Friable coarse sandstone would do the job. As the method is discussed, you will see that Nicholson prescribes holding up the iron to press it against the stone, and then to prepare a relatively shallow bevel that would not hold up if it was the honing bevel. Put differently, he’s telling you to grind shallower to give yourself room to hone later. He also goes on to say that when properly done, or in his words, when the grind matches what you see in your mind as what the result should be, you will have a hollow that matches the wheel. Not flat, not convex, not sloppy, but neatly done.
We have rests now for grinders and this can be done easily. I’ve always felt from experience that a bench grinder 6 or 8 inch type hollow grind improves your productivity because it makes it harder to do the next steps and chase bevel angle steeper by accident. At any rate, you still are better served by being able to use a flat rest where you hold and control the tool otherwise, not constrained by jigs or holders, and developing this skill to grind neatly.
After describing this, Nicholson prescribes honing the edge of the tool steeper with a turkish oilstone. You’re probably not going to have one of those. They were stones that were somewhat superior to what we see as a Black Arkansas stone now as they were very fine but slightly friable. you can look for them in google pictures – the good ones are black/brownish with what looks like fracturing in the matrix. There are cretan/greece hones sold now, and they are close to this, but I doubt as fine. I have one of these – and a lighter brown turkish – you get what you can find. The turkish is a finer stone, more like a fine washita but with more cutting power.
This part is important – you lift the iron to the extent that you find it should be lifted with experience when doing this honing step. The text says that you have ground at an angle that a honed edge won’t hold up, so of course, you need to hone steeper to make up for that. Who thought secondary bevels were a new thing? I doubted they were, but being a lazy person on the side of reading things, never found these references until a year or two ago. At any rate, Nicholson uses the term “nearer to perpendicular” when describing this steeper secondary edge finish. Don’t confuse that with perpendicular. Though it’s not provided here, Holtzappfel in another text does prescribe 30 for the secondary angle for softwoods (off of a shallower bevel) and 35 for hardwoods. That may sound too steep – you don’t have to follow it to a T, and the rest of this will clarify that you should be getting back to grinding before you get a big fat secondary or tertiary apex.
After that, Nicholson describes that when you refresh the edge without grinding, you should use a rub stone before using the Turkish stone. Now, we’re up to 3 bevels. If you’re going to use a fine edge all the time – and there’s no reason not to, you’ll need 3 stones or a process that has three steps. A rub stone is nothing but a larger sandstone that would be equivalent to a coarse/middle honing stone for us. Choose what you like by experience.
You could read this section to imply that the rub stone should be used at the same final angle as the Turkish stone – it’s not clarified. You can, but I think it’s at least as practical or more to be careful and choose to do this wear-chasing with the rub stone at an angle slightly less than your final angle. Doing that will drastically improve the uniformity of your edge, even on lazy days…or especially on those days.
Nicholson then says, somewhat predictably, that use the process without the grinder eventually leads to a honed edge that gets too thick. You’ll find this on your own. There should never be variance in your results – pay attention to what you’re doing and give yourself a break. Trying to hone as this bevel gets too large is a fool’s errand. Do what Nicholson says next once this honed secondary, or secondary and tertiary bevel gets too thick…
…..return to the grinder.
Do the stones matter? No. I used to be bonkers for expensive synthetic stones. I still love the feel of all of the natural stones, but I can’t make the case that they will give a superior result because you can get graded abrasives and use them on a substrate and actually get a finer edge. If you want to use a cheap grinder, an india stone and 5 micron honing bar on MDF with a drop of mineral oil, you will do well with that. If you want to use a hard surface, the final step will need to be a good bit finer to get a really good edge.
You should not assume that you pair levels of sharpness to different tools. As in, there is not “sharp enough for the jack” or whatever else – everything is sharpened to the same level, perhaps with some extra care if you need to pare something.
One more tip from me – when you are honing with your middle stone, lighten up a little bit on the last couple of strokes. Leave the burr on the tool until you’re done, and if it comes off on the stone, use your finger and get rid of it or it can spoil/roll your edge.
Well, two tips – the discussion doesn’t mention laser flattening of tool backs, but the back of your tools should at least be finished to the same degree as the bevel uniformly. It doesn’t need to be the entire back, but if you lay a tool down on your finest stone and the burr doesn’t go back to the bevel side, you have a problem to address. Use chasing the wear on the back as a way to thin the burr.
Of Making by Hand with Wood and Steel 