When Ty Black started as a shop assistant last summer, he was bemused and amused that all my hand tools were stamped with my shop mark.
“I’ll bet your kids are stamped with this, too,” he joked.
Ty’s reaction is common. Many home woodworkers and tool collectors I’ve met take a dim view of marking your tools. It is “hubris,” according to some, because you are putting yourself on the same level as the maker of the tool. I’ve been told that I should only mark tools that I’ve made. Stamping lowers the value of the tool to collectors (though that attitude seems to be changing).
I have to laugh at these attitudes. When you work in a shop with other people, marking your tools in some way is essential so you can keep track of your tool kit. Lots of people own a Starrett 12” combination square, and when yours grows legs, the stamp is the only way to ensure it’s coming back home without a fight.
I’m not worried about theft, per se (though that was a concern in early shops). But before I marked every marking gauge, chisel and hammer, my tools would end up going home with my students. It was always accidental, but is was always annoying and stressful.
Of course, one can go overboard with a name stamp. See Joel Moskowitz’s blog today at Tools for Working Wood for a great example of this.
If you are going to take a woodworking class and still think a stamp is silly, mark your tools in some manner. Add a dot with some nail polish. Add a temporary stripe of brightly colored tape. Something. I’ve seen too much confusion at the end of a class when people are trying to decide whose chisel belongs to whom.
And if you want a fantastic stamp, contact Infinity Stamps. The company’s employees will design a stamp for you based off a sketch or whatever else you have. They are fast and great to deal with.
Gotta go. I have make a crapload of try squares today. And I hope to stamp them all before dinner. That’s another thing I like about my stamp. It announces happy hour for the day.
— Christopher Schwarz
Hey Chris, those squares look very similar to the BS ones you were working on earlier this year. Or are they the Rouboesque variety? I’d love to know.
Thanks
Michael
These will be Seaton squares. Gotta make some for an upcoming episode of “The Woodwright’s Shop.”
I’m still having trouble deciding what color to paint my toolchest, and I can repaint that. How am I ever going to decide what to stamp my tools with?!
Is there any difference in execution between a maker’s mark, and an owner’s mark?
You still haven’t painted that chest? I’m going to send you a case of glitter paint.
Typically a name stamp was just for tools. If a piece of furniture was signed, it was via pencil, pen or paper label.
I use my shopmark for everything – tools, finished work and even cheese. This is my cheese.
I have my grandfathers #4 Bed Rock. The only reason I know that is that his initials are stamped on the side.
I need a way to cancel out your mark(s); half my tools have CS, C. Schwarz or dividers on them…
All you need to do is add “egan F.” after the dividers, and Viola! Yours for eternity!
Ty just scraped the marks off after he bought some of my tools. The traditional way is to simply add your mark to the tool alongside the old owner’s mark.
He scraped them off?! There goes the value…
I love the marked tools at the flea markets because a lot of people pass them over. My favorite plane is named Guido after the name scrawled in the japaning.
Nothing cheeses me off more than paying twice for the same tool, thus I’m fully in the mark yer darn tools camp.
Chris,
I take you are just hammering the mark on, so how is the stamp holding up to all the use it’s getting?
Cheers
Years of use and no degredation.
Chris, what size stamp do you use? I’m thinking 1/2 square is probably appropriate, but I’m always tempted to order bigger. Then I can’t decide, and I order nothing.
– Matt
I have a 3/4″ one for stamping wood and a 1/4″ for stamping metal.
Did you stamp your northfield? I guess there’s not much danger of that walking off, but still…
Yes.
Actually, a serious question.. Do you use a hammer with your metal stamp or do you have an arbor press?
Hammer.
No qualms about stamping my tools….
I did a traditional Cook’s apprenticeship in Switzerland (’85-’88) and of course we were required to have the specified knives and other equipment. Most of the pro knife shops there would stamp your initials on the handle if you bought above a certain amount. In the bigger kitchens knife theft was rampant, and tales of brawls, coerced dumpster diving (knives frequently get tossed out with vegetable peels…), and attempted amputations still circulate…..
Edward in Vancouver
I feel that on an older tool the name stamp adds value to the tool.
I like to assume it was a loved and used tool that did work for a craftsman, now its in my care.
Sort of like a horse being put out to stud.
You could do like the FastCap guys and print the GPS coordinates of each tool’s “home” on the tool.
-Steve
And then get a GPS chip in my skin – like my cats!
And a barcode on my head. And a QR code on my buttocks.
Really, they do that? GPS coords on a tool?
They mention it in one of their demo videos.
By the way, you already have a GPS chip under your skin. You just don’t know about it.
I always found it funny how the name lowers the value. One of my favorite planes is a sweet heart #3 with the name G.Young stamped on the side. I would love to know more about him. I feel honored to be the owner of his tool that he must have valued so much to put his name on.
I’ll just leave this one here…
http://imgur.com/r/woodworking/MfM6lb8