This article was written by VitalBodies, a Wood Whisperer community member. If you like music, you’ll enjoy his story. Here’s a short bio:
From countless wood shop classes to contractor to fixer to starting to create a home shop. For the fixer I have been doing everything from fences to architectural planter boxes to refinishing furniture and more.

It all started by attempting to write a comment on TWW site to thank Marc for his scraper articles I found so handy while working on an antique writing desk. Meanwhile, I had also been asking folks of all ages for at least a week “what songs really lift you up and get you moving?” I told the folks I asked, “it does not matter what decade, era, genre or whatever, but WHAT GETS YOU DANCING?” I was testing dancing to some of the songs in between writing the comment. Does not matter if you are in the kitchen, shop, club or on the dance floor, what is the song(s) that sets you to flight?

Today I started working on an antique writing table. Not knowing antiques all that well I thought “U can’t touch this” but since it was only the top that needed work, I thought, “well maybe I should”? I mean, this is not the Antique road show is it?

I needed to refinish the top. It could have been hickory or oak, I was not really sure. I used a Dewalt Random Orbital Sander (ROS) with a VERY aggressive Bosch 40 grit disk, connected to a full blown HEPA vac. Even then, the wood was so hard I realized it would take hours and hours of sanding, in Uggs in a cold shop.

I then remembered I bought a card (cabinet) scraper and a burnisher! I heard about them from The Wood Whisperer and used his Amazon Store (you can too!) to buy them to support the show. Thanks Marc and all, even Mateo!

But, was the scraper sharp? And how to sharpen it? Although I did not have the sharpening, grinding or polishing stones, I did have the burnisher mentioned, ya! And it was not hard to get that baby lookin sharp, Like can you handle this? I feel like dancing on the table like a superstar!

Wow, when that scraper is sharp, it is nice and it moves! Like drop everything and check it out! Even then, it took quite a while as the scratches in that top were, what, Rolling In The Deep? Oddly enough they looked like someone put “Black or White” ink (mostly deep black) in the deepest parts – Old English or perhaps they were painting the town, or burning the place down?

There were small stains, large stains, other major artifacts plus the wood was so so hard. The stains were like Blood On The Dance Floor. Like, how do you get those deep scratches out, a 7″ knife?

There were artifacts that looked like they could have been from a “Fire Burning” or perhaps Dynamite, like they were trying to rock this club? I can tell you, with knee deep shavings, I was the last one standing.

It took hours of scraping, but at least that might help me be a bit more bootylicious and in better shape. I noticed it also took rhythm to get into the groove, like as in “Rhythm Is A Dancer”, I mean, you had to work it. As you know, Rhythm is a dancer, it’s a soul companion, people feel it everywhere, lift your hands and voices, free your mind and join us, you can feel it in the air, it’s a passion…

Every now and then the the whole writing table would jump forward with a Boom Boom Pow kind of sound, when the scraper would grab, and ya, it would grab like you never felt before.

But I Gotta Feeling that I will get this top right, although not sure what century that will happen!

The other way of doing this, you know, with the ROS, dust collection, ear protection, and dust mask could Make Me Want To Scream.

The wood, even still, was so hard that sharping the card scraper needed to happen about every 5 minutes! But that was easy with the burnisher. As you know, if you get dull, you have to sharpen up, like Bust A Move when the time calls for it!

For me, sharpening is purely a utilitarian task. Therefore it needs to be both easy and fast. I would much rather spend a little more money on a product that will help me reach those goals than to save a few bucks and wind up making things more difficult for myself. After all, the easier/faster it is to put an edge on your tool, the more likely you are to do it. Unfortunately, many folks tend to over-complicate sharpening and look at it as a skill to be mastered. In my opinion, sharpening is the woodworking equivalent of filling my car with gas. Do it right and the car goes. Do it wrong and I’m going no where. Perfecting my ability to swipe the debit card and insert the nozzle with style and flare doesn’t really change the fact that all I’m doing is filling my tank with gas. The primary goal is to get you back to work with as sharp of an edge as is required for your work. Hopefully this video will give you a few tips that show you how easy sharpening can be, with the right tools.

We’ll talk about water stones, Shapton Stones, the Veritas MKII jig, DMT plates, free-hand sharpening, scary sharp, and a few other topics from the chat room questions. Please enjoy this live presentation. And as always, I have no control over the commercials that show up in this embedded video.

Special thanks to Shannon from The Hand Tool School for helping me field questions in the chat room!

Recommended Products:

William uses Takenoko 4,000 and 8,000 grit sharpening stones and you can pick those up in his store. How do you like that fancy water bath?

Looking for a small set of card scrapers? Check this out:

Cabinet Scraper Set, Scraper and Mill File Cabinet Scraper Set Set contains a 2-3/4” x 4-3/4” gooseneck, 2” x 5-3/4” round end and 2-3/8” x 5-7/8” straight scraper for concave, convex and flat areas.Scraper Great for removing milling mar.. Cabinet Scraper Set, Scraper and Mill File

I started by tweaking my setup. An inefficient space is a frustrating space! My tool cabinet was originally mounted in a little alcove behind my oscillating spindle sander. This made it very difficult to reach the tools, which kind of defeats the purpose of my “handy” cabinet. So I moved it over to the other side of the shop and cut my big storage rack down to half-height. I was already starting to feel the tingly sensation of peace and harmony.

But I didn’t stop there. My next mission was sharpening. All of my chisels and plane blades were ready for a touch up, so I pulled out the Shaptons. Once I got started, I just couldn’t stop. So over the course of two days, I lapped every back and honed every bevel in the shop! I was getting so close to intergalactic oneness at this point.

So with a couple more days to kill, I decided to finish off my woodworking vacation with a little hand tool practice. Now you guys know I am not the type to mill up my project lumber using bench planes only. As long as my Powermatic jointer still has juice, you won’t see me flattening boards the old-fashioned way. But on occasions like this, I will select a very special board that I will refer to as “The Offering”, and mill that puppy flat and square using my trusty #5, #7 and #4 bench planes. I just go to town on The Offering until its flat or I run out of wood. Any stress that was in my head goes through my hands, into the plane, and ultimately escapes in the form of a wispy shaving. If someone were to observe me at this point, they might even hear me semi-consciously mumbling, “That’s for that stupid house that won’t sell!” and “That’s for that credit card payment I forgot to pay!” Life’s too short to hold on to these things, and the wood is all too happy to help me rid myself of them. If you haven’t tried this, I highly recommend it.

The grand finale of my week was getting some practice cutting a few half-blind dovetails by hand. I don’t do this often and I needed some practice before I teach the Guild members how to do this on their Shaker End Tables. It proved to be a great way to test the edges on my newly sharpened gear.

Although I am incredibly busy, I love what I do. Its hard to call it work when I would be doing this stuff with or without a paycheck. But its incredibly important for me to occasionally get back to basics and spend some quality time in my shop. And while I am no neanderthal hand tool junkie, its interesting to observe what tools I go to when I am in the stress-relieving re-centering mode. I had absolutely no desire to use electricity in the shop this week. But when it comes time to flatten my next project board, you can bet you’ll be hearing the sweet hum of a jointer and planer coming from my shop.

Feeling refreshed, renewed, and reconnected with my shop, I am ready to take on the insanely busy month of March.

Marc, I am watching your Entertainment Center Video (Pt 1) and noticed something odd with your large chisel. How did you flatten the back of it? It looks like there are three channels cut into it.

The chisels I use on the show (most times) are Fujihiro Japanese chisels. In general, Japanese chisels are made with harder steel than their Western cousins, which means it can take a lot longer to flatten their backs. And a flat back is an absolutely critical component to any chisel you actually intend to use! So to speed up the flattening process, a good amount of steel is removed from the back of the chisel. And as you can see in the picture, wider chisels can have multiple hollows. So now the actual amount of steel that needs to be removed in the flattening process is significantly reduced. Which means you are going to spend less time at the sharpening stone, and more time at the workbench.

This is the same concept behind creating a hollow bevel. Many folks prefer hollow bevels because they can be easier to sharpen, not just because of speed, but because its easier to balance with two points of contact. FYI, some may disagree with me on this but this is just my opinion from my experience. So the hollows are a little unusual-looking, but they do serve a purpose.

I borrowed the image to the right from a great article on FineWoodworking.com called “Speedy Freehand Sharpening” by Hendrik Varjhu.

The sand paper clogs too quickly, even on the coarser grits (the grits with the lowest numbers). They have to be cleaned constantly with the rubber cleaner to be effective. The coarsest grit provided isn’t coarse enough for even moderate metal removal. It is great for light metal removal, honing, and finishing to a near mirrored surface; but if you are looking to flatten the back of a wide blade that is fresh out of the box, or damaged, you will need to buy a coarser grit (100 grit) to start with.

The sticky backed sand paper is prone to air bubbles which is a leading cause of sand paper blow out. This at least can be corrected by using a needle to open a passage for the air to escape through the paper. This is a huge issue especially for the finer grits. The only positive angle stops are at 20, 25, 30, and 35. This is good for basic sharpening, but you are unable to get that 1 to 2 degree micro-bevel that I have been spoiled into getting with other devices. You can get a very decent 5 degree micro-bevel on the first three angles by setting it up a 5 degree notch though.

The ring that surrounds the spinning disc is made out of aluminum. This means that it is not conductive to magnets. It would be of great help to be about to attach magnets to the ring to attract some of the metal dust that is flung off the disc. The metal dust is an issue. With the WS3000 it is flung everywhere. One of the best and worst things about water stones is the water/slurry that is made during the sharpening process traps the metal “filings” or dust that is made, bonus for them; but the negative side of the coin is that it is sloppy and a wet mess afterwards.

With the top rest that can be used, that can also be mounted under the disc for free-hand sharpening, there is no angle indicator. Ok, I hear the “but that is what free hand sharpening is all about.” Well that is fine, but there are many times during my sharpening experience that the iron is pulled or jerked to the side. This throws off consistent sharpening. It would be good if they provided at least a registration plate to slide on to the tool rest, like a wide tight fitting washer that could be used to make sure the blade was perpendicular to the disc while sharpening, if it was desired. Another slight issue is that unless you are going free hand you are limited to a 2″ blade. That means that any plane blades over that and you are hosed, this includes #4 1/2, #5 1/2, and up. But look toward the bottom for a trick to over come this short coming.

For the plus side of things: You can basically use any 6″ PSA disc (PSA is the sticky backed type) on the system. As long as, of course, you punch a 3/4″ hole in the dead center. And you can get those at any hardware store, but it is generally not possible to find the higher 1000+ grit variety. So for those you are going to have to go to WorkSharp; or MAYBE a higher end auto parts/painting place or the Internet or maybe make your own. A great thing because, again, you can get 100 grit discs for the more hard core metal removal if you really toast a blade. Another one for the plus side is that sharpening gouges is great. The view-thru wheel is wonderful for irregular shaped blades that you need to watch as you grind. Although you still need to deal with the free-handed idea that you can’t set a stable angle without some practice, the tool rest can be mounted on the bottom to help with any blade. This is where this system shines. With stones and every other sharpening system I have used, outside of MDF and a molded contour with embedded diamond paste, this is the only system that truly allows you to effectively manage the shape and angle of the edge. By being able to actually look through the wheel you are able to hone an edge without wondering if I am bluing the edge or grinding it past the point of effectiveness. The aluminum flat tool rest for chisels acts as a decent heat sync. The registration guide can also be moved further to the left than is what is documented. This does make it possible to sharpen blades beyond the 2″ limit with proper registration but since the blade is off the aluminum heat sync backing you must be careful not to blue the edge.

Although I have pointed out some nit-picky details that I would like to see upgraded or at least optional, I like the unit as a whole. It is a great starter sharpening center for any turner, chisel or plane jockey, or gouge monkey that isn’t going to count on it to sharpen jointer blades or need hollow bevels. But it is just not the end all be all, and people shouldn’t look at it like it is. No sharpening set up is. They all have their own negatives and positives. I wouldn’t toss my 120 grit small grinding stone on my Delta sharpener, it is great for hollowed bevels. I wouldn’t toss my stones either, they are outstanding with my Veritas MK II guide for accurate angles and micro-bevels of 1 and 2 degrees.

Work Sharp ââ??¢ WS3000 Tool Sharpener This special package includes an additional slotted wheel. $19.99 Value! Air-cooled, dry sharpening system eliminates the mess of a wet system. Work Sharp ââ??¢ WS3000 Tool Sharpener