Can you help us Find a WINNER? Go here. I have just been fitting the handles to my own new tool chest. Near the end of the job, fitting components with screws is satisfying and tricky. One slip and the surface is scarred. Overtighten and the screw head is burred or worse it snaps off. Done well, it depends on preparation, good pilot holes, choice of screws and screwdriver.
There are dozens of screwdrivers in my box, gathered over the years they are used for a multitude of indelicate tasks. Opening tins of paint is a favourite. Yet a really good screwdriver should be very carefully fitted to the screw head. Do this well and it will sit in the head of the screw, gain purchase and drive the so and so home with no damage to the job or the screw head. Happy days.
This is the head of a well prepared screwdriver see how the worn end is reground to exactly fit the slot and see the two small chamfers on either side of the blade this is to suit the width of the screw head, stopping it projecting beyond the chamfered screw head and scuffing the countersink in the job
This is the set of screwdrivers we have picked to go in the cabinet that Chris Schwarz made and Jon Greenwood has prepared. They are cabinetmaker style handles in beech; boxwood would have been posher but it has no effect on the job.
There is another class of screwdriver that is maybe better than these. these are gunsmith screwdrivers. Here the blade is not tapered as in the blades above but parallel where they fit the screw. So, more contact with the screw but more expense. The blades above came off eBay and with a small amount of work from Jon Greenwood will be usable for years. Just remember all screwdrivers get worn out just now and again, so dress the end to fit the screw you are using.
These screwdrivers are for slotted screws. We found a nice set of Posi drivers from DeWalt that will be arriving soon for more general work. These cost us about £16 from one of the sheds.
A lot of trouble with Posi drivers is again that they get worn, and rather than pick a new one out of the box we bash on with the job, burring over screw heads. So this little set will enable our young Woody to help avoid that. Many of us at Rowden have taken to using a small cordless drill to do all the small screw driving around the shop.
I would like to put one of these drivers in the box as well but I don’t think we have one spare. Though this is a hand tool box I think we all use these now pretty well all the time.
Remember folks these tools are going into a tool box made by Chris and being GIVEN away in a competition. Closing date is end of November. You must be under 25, a Woody or would-be Woody. Write to me tell me why we should give it to you and send some images – that’s all it takes. Here are the details. PASS IT ON PLEASE
Can You Help us Find a Winner? Chris Schwarz came here this summer and made this wonderful tool chest. He sells these in America for $4,000 which is a pretty fair price. We are offering this chest a s prize to a young talented woodworker full of tools and with an all expenses paid trip to Rowden for a one week course (this will be for the finalists). Entries close Nov. 30, 2015. MORE DETAILS HERE and pass it on.
All they have to do is send me a short paragraph about themselves and why they make and a file of images of what they have made. Anyone 25 or under. I am not restricting this to UK, but finalists would need to get to Devon for the week course and would need to get the tools chest home if they won.
What Tools go in that Tool Chest? Today and over next few weeks we are going to look at the tools we are putting into this chest and why. The aim will be to fill the chest with either new or secondhand, quality tools. Many will come from my own tool collection or from Rowden toolboxes or, maybe, from donations. What I can’t find here I will ask other makers to help donate and what is left we will buy. Maybe one or two tool sellers and manufacturers are going to be asked to contribute a specific tool that we cannot supply ourselves.
Chisels This will be controversial. Well, this is an English tool chest and I wanted Sheffield steel chisels. I could have gone for Ashley Iles chisels, which are very popular in Rowden. But I didn’t. I could have gone for Lie-Nielsen carbon steel chisels, but they are American and I get the message from my students that one member of the staff is pushing the A2 chisels as being just as good as O1 steel.
Well, after 40 odd years doing this I would disagree. O1 carbon steel takes a sharper edge than A2. This modern A2 is great above 30°. It is also great for the amateur who does not sharpen every day as it holds the 30° edge for a long time. But a bench chisel is not just for battering with a mallet.
At Rowden we grind at 25° and hone at UP TO 30° (without the training wheels). The advice we give is that once 30° is reached, regrind to 25°. Then you can pare and chop with the same blade. Above 30° you can only chop. I have a mixture of pre-1960 Marples chisels and Japanese chisels in my own tool chest and I have bought the blades shown on eBay for my own students. The steel is hot forged, not cold fabricated. This makes it, I believe, a carbon steel better than O1, which is the modern high carbon steel.
So I have gathered a mixed set of Marples and Sorby blades plus a very nice thin-bladed paring chisel that I have had for 20 years. You can see from the existing Marples labels two or three of them are hardly run in, let alone used. Most have boxwood handles and the narrow neck that defines the period of Sheffield steel that I am talking about – pre-1960.
I use Japanese paring chisels, so this lovely paring chisel will go in the chest. It’s a really beautiful tool: thin bladed, forged steel, as hard as it comes and sweetly shaped by an expert. Jon Greenwood, bless him, is tasked with the problem of flattening the backs of these blades and grinding and honing a perfect edge. Ready for work.
Next screwdrivers, then marking and measuring, then maybe planes. We are really stuck with the saws!
I may have chopped off one of my favorite fingers on Monday, but not even that could keep me away from Woodworking in America 2015. Chris’s three classes on staked furniture, workbenches and back irons are, respectively, just the tip of the Lost Art Press iceberg at this year’s festivities, which also feature courses by LAP contributors Roy Underhill, Megan Fitzpatrick, Don Williams, and Mike Siemsen.
Over in the WIA Marketplace, the Lost Art Press booth is hosting two special “meet the author” book signing events that I just learned about. At 2 p.m. on Friday, St. Roy will be in the booth to sign babies, chests and books. In addition to Calvin Cobb: Radio Woodworker!, we welcome you to bring any of Roy’s other eight inimitable titles for signing.
And most importantly of all, I your fearless forum moderator will be at the booth all day Friday and Saturday. In addition to showing you my “accidental amputation” (as they labeled it in the emergency room), I am particularly looking forward to hearing your thoughts and suggestions on the forthcoming Lost Art Press forum.
Part of our delay in launching the full forum has been due to our internal deliberations over how deeply to plunge into the universe of hand tool woodworking. We originally envisioned the forum as a space to discuss LAP books and the projects contained therein. But one thing we learned almost immediately from the beta forum is that many of you have questions and interests which delve more deeply into the marrow of the hand tool world. To hear more about the options we’re considering, and to weigh in, please stop by the booth.
When we pulled up to the Festhalle Barn the morning of the Handworks show, we were impressed to see a long line of people wrapped around the barn, along the fence and into the street.
As we made our way to our booth, we realized this line started at our booth. I put down my bag and the first guy in line pounced on me.
“I’m here for the calipers,” he said.
Calipers?
“The Studley calipers, the limited edition ones. You only have 50,” he replied.
“Dude, that was two years ago,” I said. “We don’t have any calipers.”
He insisted that we did, and that I had been blogging about it leading up to the show. He got a little cranky and I thought he might take a swing at me. The next guy in line had the same story. I looked and John and mouthed “WTF?”
We still don’t know what happened and why 100 people thought we were selling calipers. So if you are coming to Woodworking in America, read this next sentence: We don’t have any H.O. Studley calipers. We have the book and DVD on Studley, but not the calipers.
(If you want a nice pair modeled after Studley’s, you can buy them from Lee Valley Tools here.)
We do have some other cool stuff at Woodworking in America. A beautiful letterpress poster for $20 that was a joint project between Steam Whistle Letter Press and us. We’re bringing about 470. We sent 25 to Classic Hand Tools in England, which they will offer over there. If we have any posters left over (and we should) we’ll find a way to put them up in our online store.
We also have our crazy Bandito shirt – a skeleton holding two dovetail saws – that was designed by Shelby Kelley. Will these sell? We don’t care. We’ll just wear them all if we have to. The shirts are in an olive green with black ink. Also $20.
Book Signing for ‘Virtuoso’
If you’d like to get your copy of “Virtuoso: The Tool Cabinet and Workbench of H.O. Studley” signed, stop by the Lost Art Press booth at 2 p.m. Saturday. Author Don Williams and photographer Narayan Nayar will be there to sign your books.
Our booth is at the back of the Marketplace, a small corner next to Stumpy Nubs’ triple-wide booth.
Stop by to say hello to me, John or Brian Clites, our new forum moderator.
Given a choice between reading estate inventories or criminal records I go for the criminals. The carpenter above was found guilty in August of 1678 and his punishment was having ‘M’ branded on his thumb. If convicted of murder he would have been hanged. Life was not easy for the working class in the 17th century and punishment was harsh.
The Tyburn Tree…built by Carpenters.
Before being taken to Tyburn the condemned spoke with an Ordinary (a member of the clergy) and a statement was entered into the official records. Themes of Idleness, Excessive Drink, Swearing and Lude Company were often written into this final statement. Theft of even very small amounts could lead to execution.
May 1690 Execution at Tyburn: Andrew Browne condemned for Felony and Burglary, he is Aged 30 years, was born in Shrop shire, and bred a Carpenter. He followed that Employment Three Years in Red-Lyon-Fields. But leaving his Trade, and taking to an Idle Life, he fell into Evil Company, and thereby Committed the foresaid Crime. He said, that he had been guilty of swearing and excessive Drinking, of which, he now Repents.
They do not labour like the ant, Their work is play and play their want.
Apprentices seldom had an easy life and there are many accounts of runaways and other trouble.
October 1718 Execution at Tyburn: Henry Abbott, condemned for Burglary in breaking the House of Mr. Jonathan Jones, and stealing then 5 Silver-Spoons, a Silver-Cup and other Plate and Goods. He said he was 19 Years of Age…That he was bound Appentice to a Carpenter in White-Chapel, with whom he had been two Years, he left him, upon the account of his great Severity to him and his Hastiness in giving him Blows on the Head, and anywhere else he could hit…That as soon as he had left him, he went to serve another Carpenter, who was to maintain him for his Work till he had serv’d out the Remainder of his Time, which was five Years; but of those…he had not serv’d above two when he committed the Fact he now stood condemn’d for; which he confess’d, but said it was his first, and would be his last, if he should live never so long.
May 1728 Execution at Tyburn: George Gale alias Kiddy George, about 17 Years of Age…born of Honest Parents who took care of his Education at School, and instructed him in the Christian Religion, and afterwards put him to a House Carpenter or Joyner, which Business he never followed; but was one of the most wicked, cross and disobedient Boys upon Earth; and married without his Parents Consent. He committed many Robberies, and was a constant Thief for a considerable Time…
Next, we have this fellow and an 18th century version of ‘Wanted!’: Advertisement for January 13, 1716: Whereas James Goodman alias Footman, made his escape (with Irons on, by leaping over the Spikes of the Bail-Dock and the Rails) at the Sessions-House in the Old Bailey, on Saturday last, being the 14th Instant, about 6 in the Evening; he is about 37 Years of Age, 5 Foot 10 Inches high, much Pock-fretten, has many Freckles in his Face and Hands, a wide Mouth, down Look, speaks very broad, a reddish beard, but did wear a brown wig, a Carpenter by Trade, and lately live at Aylesbury…He was shot in the Nape of the Neck about a month since, when he was taken, which Wound is not yet well, and several small Pieces of his Scull taken out of his Wound. Whoever can discover the said Person, so that he be brought to Justice, shall receive Twenty Pounds reward from Bodenham Rowse Head Turnkey of Newgate.
Cabinetmakers were a different story and were usually the victims of a crime instead of the perpetrator. In some cases we learn a bit more about them as in this example from March 1798:
John Westfield a cabinetmaker with Banner and Bruce’s Coachmakers in Long-Acre went to the country for six weeks. John Robinson, age 24, was a carpenter who worked for Westfield as a porter. While Westfield was away Robinson stole a pannel saw, carcase saw, sash saw, dove-tail saw, a stock, 27 bits and one saw pad.
Westfield: When I returned I found the chest broken open in the shop, and the articles in the indictment taken out; they have all been found since. In consequence of a suspicion…got a warrant, and went with the officer to search the prisoner’s lodgings; I found the small saw pad in his chest…
Westfield further testifies that his shop employs 7 to 9 men and sometimes Robinson did some work other than being a porter. Tools were sometimes lent to Robinson, but never the items that were stolen from the locked chest.
John Wray-Officer: searched the prison’s lodgings…Ifound two boxes, a number of duplicates [pawnbroker tickets], some saws, one stock and a centre-bit.
William Crouch-Officer: (Produces a stock and bits, and a saw)…Itook them of a young woman who said they were her husband’s.
Cross-examination of Crouch: Q. I believe you know it is no unusual thing, when poor people have duplicates that they sell them, and honest persons sometimes get possession of duplicates of things improperly come by? A. It is very often the case.
Westfield: That is my saw, it is my own sharpening; the stock has my own name engraved upon it at length.
Cross-examination of Westfield: Q. Do you mean to swear that this is your saw, merely because it is of your sharpening-do you sharpen differently from anybody else? A. There is a great deal of difference in sharpening, the same as difference in handwriting.
Q. Because it is done in a more bungling way than common, perhaps? A. I do not know but it is. Q. Any young beginner might blunder in the same way? A. There is as much difference as there is in handwriting.
John Robinson was found guilty of grand larceny and sentenced to six months confinement in Newgate Prison and fined 1s. A century earlier Robinson would have been condemned to death.
While some of the Old Bailey proceedings were very grim reading (execution for theft of a handkerchief in the 17th century), other cases brought to mind Horace Rumpole and his constant defense of the Timson crime clan…the window was already broken when I reached in and my hand happened to land on the silver plate.
