Bay Area Dave wrote:

Chuck, did you miss the part where I mentioned that my old Sears chisel
performs the same cuts with nary a blemish??

Uh, no ... because you didn't say that. You said you have a 3/4"
Sears chisel that holds an edge nicely, but that you were using a 3/8"
Marples for cutting a mortise.

I don't know about you, but I don't use a 3/4" chisel to cut a 3/8"
mortise or vice versa.

I decimated the edge on
the Marples in just a few moments. I didn't even get past 3/16" deep
into the wood. That's pretty pathetic.

I have several recent-vintage Stanleys that I keep ground to fairly
steep angles. They work great for pounding into things. I keep my Blue
Chips sharpened at pretty low bevel-angles. Guess what? They don't
work so great for pounding into things. But they do work well for
paring cuts.


Chuck Vance