All of the items below are myths, not potential myths proven to be true.
This page is dedicated to the skeptical (but not always relevant or informed) relatives of mine, and the masterfully informed Randy Sohn who eons ago mapped out the recipe for an Old Wives’ Tale for the average young fella (I was young at the time…..and fellettes, too!).
Myths and OWTs or overgeneralizations don’t always come from intentional misguiding, but it’s on us as a matter of being respectful to each other to choose to speak precisely about what we may suspect could be true vs. what is.
I still read the forums a little bit, but have this eerily similar feeling to when I stopped watching political news about 10 or 15 years ago. The less involved I am, the more I wonder why I didn’t stop earlier. That said, they will make for great fuel here. These are things I know, and if I suspect something (but can’t prove it), I will say so.
Metallurgical Myths – Woodworking Related
Powder metals are finer grained than other steels – often in support of V11 being “finer” than other common steels. V11 is less fine than O1 or typical chrome vanadium steels. V11 not finer than A2 if both are heat treated well. Carbides are less dense and more widely dispersed in A2, but the large carbides in both are about the same size. The characteristic most people notice with V11 when comparing anything other than an abrasion test is – I suspect – a difference in hardness. Powder metallurgy allows packing in more carbon and other elements making even large carbide volume steels. Historically used woodworking steels don’t have this large volume. Fineness at very fine levels (AEB-L or 1084) is determined by composition and PM technology wouldn’t improve those steels.
Chisel Myths
Firmer chisels have straight sides and are meant to be hit firmly – a better translation than Firmer would’ve been “former”. The name firmer comes from French for “former” or “to form”. Firmer chisels are intended to form a shape based on older texts describing them, with finish work done by a finer paring chisel. They are what we think of as bench chisels now, but originally described as having flat sides and a business end that tapers to near parallel and thinner (not overly heavy). Later listings of firmer chisels, similar in design and heft did have beveled edges. I suspect this was due to the advent of synthetic grinding wheels (corundum and silicon carbide is miles faster and cooler than coarse grinding with silica). Pre-1900 catalogues show straight sided and bevel edged firmers in the same listing, and in some cases, paring chisels with both flat and beveled sides.
Sharpening Myths
Grinding a primary bevel is a modern thing – false. Often stated by people who think that they’ve seen everything and assume their instructors in the 1950s were hard core hand tool users (economics of high level hand tool use were probably dead around 1900). Nicholson (1812), Hasluck and Holtzappfel all have deliberate discussions of grinding at a shallower angle and focusing finishing honing at a higher angle. There are technical reasons for this, but also efficiency reasons – as Hasluck goes on at length about, describing a craftsman who uses a convex bevel as robbing themselves of hours of work per week. Nicholson and Hasluck describe hollow grinding. Exceptions to this (my supposition here) are carving and other tools that may require registering the bevel side (instead of flat) on work for accuracy. For amateurs, these are few. I would suspect that separating honing and grinding angles has been standard for far longer than a few centuries.
Finishing with a Fine Stone Shows Lack of Skill – this is another false statement often asserted to show how much better then claim maker is than everyone who “needs fine sharpening stones that weren’t used”. Going as far back as Nicholson’s mention of sharpening in the Mechanic’s Companion, and likely long before then, Nicholson prescribes a turkish oilstone. A turkish oilstone is a relatively fast cutting oilstone that’s about as fine, and perhaps some samples finer than an 8,000 grit equivalent waterstone. Certainly with skill can provide a finer result. Turkish stones were already around that time being described as declining in availability. I have a turkish stone. It’s excellent, but would have probably been described as second class at the time. I wouldn’t be surprised if the selected fine stones were somewhat finer. There is no real reward for skipping finishing of the edge, and the “one angle” busted myth lays the groundwork to be able to use a really fine stone on a small part of the edge rather than wasting time polishing metal that’s not in the cut.
Planing Myths
Plane Flatness Doesn’t Matter – this is a myth that is pervasive. For some things, it probably doesn’t. For coarse jack work, a plane would have to be pretty bad for the sole to have much of an effect. For a try plane, jointer and smoother, the soles should be reasonably flat. Couple the cap iron with use of the plane and each plane creates a continuous cut in some direction on a surface to take advantage of using its sole’s length and with. If a sole is convex only (mouth touches wood first) with no twist, there may be no real ill effect. Twist and concavity are toxic as they will prevent a plane from continuously contacting a flat surface. You’ll find no luck smoothing something efficiently if the sole of a smoother is concave or twisted, and the same with jointing. When the planes are used properly and have an appropriate shape, the work off of the *plane* is accurate and any deviation with straight edges and winding sticks should be a surprise, not something expected. That said, a defective plane won’t infect a power sander, so folks who generally rely on those may not be convinced.
Skilled Workers Don’t Learn Anything from Plane Shavings – this is more nonsense that comes from sander-wielding tax preparers and house builders masquerading as professional fine workers. Sanding is fine. Being great at it doesn’t mean you can give good advice with planing. If you want to work entirely by hand, you will walk into learning what a straightened or modified shaving means if you’re using the cap iron, or what a broken shaving from the jack means with the same. That is, the surface of the wood will be better. With a smoother, you will have achieved lack of tearout regardless of shaving shape *if* the shavings coming off of the plane are unbroken from end to end and side to side. Why this would be controversial must be a matter of incompetence. It’s easier to see fine damage in a smoother shaving than it is to stop and stoop and run your hands all over a board when the shaving is already communicating to you that it is not continuous. It would take a leap of false faith to believe that somehow the shaving is showing discontinuity in the same spots over and over but somehow the surface is perfect. The opposite side of that is also true. Observe the shavings to confirm your plane is set properly and to avoid stopping to check surfaces when they’re not ready to be checked, to clue you in when you need to adjust something to make shavings continuous.
Of Making by Hand with Wood and Steel 