Violin Forum/Message Board

[Henrik Stromberg]

[L P Reedy]

Hot hide glue, of course.

[Mike Shuman]

If I'm right the most popular glue is by Titebond
_________________
I'm student in https://musescore.com/courses/master-the-violin-from-zero-to-advanced-level--LWNVW?lesson=a6xMd

[John Cadd]

Almost 2 months since the dreadful statement that Titebond is used in violin making . That is completely wrong , full stop . Should we even have to say that on this forum ? Use Hot Hide glue which needs to be heated up #########or Fish glue which needs no heating . Both are Reversible.
Why did it take so long for that contradiction ?

[John Cadd]

In high class Chinese furniture they used Fish Glue because it was reversible . So there is a little piece of woodworking history for you .Let`s face it making violins is making boxes . It`s woodwork . Nothing mysterious about that . Use Fish glue if you don`t like heating up glue , because it`s used cold (Just like Titebond but Titebond is not ----Not reversible ). Make the whole instrument with Fish Glue as long as you keep it out of damp cellars . Mandarins never lived in damp cellars .
I made my first violin by fixing the neck with Araldite . Big mistake ! If you sat on it the violin would be destroyed . It should fall apart and be reassembled with hide glue or fish glue . Araldite is worse than Titebond . I made a great sofa with Japanese Oak and Araldite . But you could safely sit on that .

[John Cadd]

Japanese edge tools have been recommended but recently I read that it`s better to avoid using Diamond Sharpening plates with the laminated blades . They clog up the plates with the softer backing steel . That may be true .
I tried the advice on a carpentry forum. Soapy liquid and a nailbrush works well .

[John Cadd]

Lately I have been tackling a long arduous job of hand planing the wooden block floor in our hallway . It`s been there for at least 100 years but the blocks were never levelled when laid . This is old growth Douglas Fir laid in squares with 3 blocks per square . Endless changes of grain direction . I have an assortment of metal and wooden planes and have had a lot of practice of sharpening . I bought a modern blade which is 3mm thick . The Stanley 4 1/2 plane needed the mouth filing wider to allow for the bevel . I was not very impressed with this blade and because I have some spare blades for the wooden planes I learned how to adapt these tapered blades for modern Stanley planes . Apart from the Stanleys I have a Rapier plane which I fitted with a tapered wedge Mathieson blade (made in Glasgow during the Sheffield tool making era ). The Rapier plane has a screw wheel on the top cap instead of a lever .Today I realised the benefit of this combined with the tapered blades . The wheel can reduce the cap tension on the blade with two quick turns .Depth adjustment is then smoother and two turns back the blade is held tighter than the lever system. This works better because the wedge effect holds the blade rather than the tip of the wishbone. Modern chip breakers have to be used for this .To move the blade back , the wheel relieves the tension for the adjusters to move , but with a lever cap the blade will resist moving until the lever is lifted . That makes the process of adjustment much more cumbersome. The point of using these old tapered blades is to enjoy their stellar sharp edges and durability while being easy to sharpen .

[John Cadd]

Scrapers are simple effective tools but I think I have always made hard work of sharpening them . Once they are sharp it takes a long time for them to go blunt.With a simple oblong scraper made by Sandvick I used a diamond coated Japanese saw file yesterday . The squared off edge is better for this .Before I had used a single cut file. This Japanese file is perfect for sharpening scissors .That makes a good start for the scraper .I only turned the edge up and then down with a screwdriver shaft . It was the quickest scraper sharpening I ever did . Just clamped the scraper in the vice for the filing and then laid it flat on the bench to turn the lip up. Then back in the vice to turn the lip down .
All over in a few minutes . Why was it such a nuisance before ?
For violins ,only one side needs to be used and I made a wooden support with a thin handle . It keeps the hands away from the edge which will cut you without you knowing .
I used the oblong scraper to flatten scratch marks on the hallway floor . That was an experiment but worked perfectly .

[John Cadd]

One forum dealing with wood turning has a fundamental point about chisel steel. Comparing High Speed Steel with High Carbon Steel .
-----"The most common myth among wood turners is that HSS needs less sharpening than High Carbon Steel--This is absolutely not true. Most High Carbon Steel will easily outperform M2 --the most common HSS used for Chisels . High Carbon Steel is also easier to sharpen "----
The only advatage with HSS is that if it is overheated it will not lose it`s hardness . High Carbon should not be overheated as it will make it softer .
In the hall of fame for old High Carbon Sheffield steel the names are Sorby, Tyzack ,Ibbotson and one of the very best is Brades . There are several others just as good .
Keep the blades cool when you sharpen them . That may require a tiny bit of patience . So Patience itself can be one of your most important violin making tools .
When I mention Sheffield steel the quality came from all over Britain. For example Brades were making in Oldbury which is 2 hours drive from Sheffield . Mathieson gouges , top quality , were made in Glasgow . Other makers were in Liverpool or Hull . Even London . The exact steel recipe varied between makers .Plane blade makers wanted the finest quality and most thick bevelled blades were laminated like the Japanese . It all has it`s own grand history .
The main useful reason I have compared the newer chisels and gouges with older Sheffield blades is the old (rusty and blunt ) Sheffield tools may pop up on market stalls or left over tool collections. Learning the names of the best Sheffield makers from the internet will save you a lot of cash if you can`t afford modern stuff . Even finding "Made in Sheffield Warranted Cast steel without a name will still give you a reliable tool .

[John Cadd]

The best small palm planes with flat soles must be the German made Kunz planes painted green with HSS blades . I bought a similar sized cast iron plane out of curiosity . It was black with traces of rust . Just a quick brush along the diamond plate showed how woefully wobbly the sole was . The blade support inside was 2 raised pieces at the back and the bottom of the blade had a wobbly mouth surface to rest on. The sole needed plenty of work with a coarse diamond plate to get the sole mouth in a usable state. Filing the inner mouth took some time to get the blade support flat. The side edges were rounded up when cast so there was a gap all across the blade.The screw to hold the blade down was fitted in a kind of chip breaker but too far from the edge to do that job. It had 2 grooves to fit under a cross bar. The bar was higher on one side by a millimetre which does not sound much but effectively stopped the plane working . The "chipbreaker " was tilted in use so the front left corner touched down first with a gap on the right. Having 2 blade supports at the back was a design mistake . In the Kunz design there is just one central rear blade support. That gives a reliable 3 point contact when the screw is tightened .
The resolution was to file the left corner of the "chipbreaker" nose on the left edge and then work that into a tapered edge across the front. Checking with a feeler gauge eventually gave a solid broad contact . The screw is firm but for adjustment a tiny tap at the front will advance the blade and a tap on the back will withdraw it . Tapping for adjustment is the way to make it work and not by using the screw, A metal object for tapping is best. Nothing too heavy . It was fun to get the better of this little demon . A Kunz replacement blade in HSS is the best idea to get it finely tuned .

[John Cadd]

As a contrast to the small metal planes I got a new Chinese wooden plane with a cross bar and a wooden wedge. Just to give it the best chance I gave it the same treatment a Japanese would lavish on a Kanna plane. Both surfaces of the blade were levelled . The wedge was rubbed on the coarse diamond plate to remove any uncertainty. Then the sole was flattened carefully with blade and wedge fitted (backed off a touch ) to equalise any tensions. Amazingly this small plane really impressed with the consistent perfection of the shavings . Such a reliable basic design and just absolutely perfect in use. The whole blade width peeling off cobweb thin shavings . The plane is just 4 1/2 by 1 3/4 inches. Light as a feather and works with gentle taps front or back.Adjustment on this with it`s wooden wedge is easier (finer ) than with the metal planes .

[Michael Darnton]

I bought a junky little wood plane from China on Amazon because it was so cheap. When it arrived I wasn't surprised that the blade was not flat in all of the possible ways. Then I noticed that just the tip was a welded on piece of tool steel and the rest was soft, so I beat on it with a hammer, staying away from the hard end, until it was reasonably flat. Then I refinished the wood, removing an ugly stain and oiling the bare wood. It turns out to be a very nice plane.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07TXH2N7D
_________________
new blog at my site! http://darntonviolins.com/blog
my work sites: http://darntonviolins.com and http://darntonhersh.com

[John Cadd]

Attempting to order a 25mm wide HSS blade for the little cast iron plane the Kunz blades appeared on the Cremona tools site. I filled in all my details and numbers and finally a message pops up. Due to Brexit there are many bureaucratic problems which this firm cannot deal with . I mean , you have to laugh .
For Mr Darnton The little wooden plane you mentioned is exactly the one I found . Snap ! The name on mine was Mujinfang .

[John Cadd]

There are plane blades sold now made of Japanese blue paper steel costing just over £40 .Now that must be the ultimate blade for a Stanley . Made the traditional Japanese way .
Once again the hardness and sharpness and durability run into a problem.The extreme hardness of a blade edge makes it more brittle and liable to chip .So that is a serious bit of sharpening to get through . A chip is more of a nuisance that merely getting a bit dull on an easy to sharpen blade .
There is an excellent and recent site describing the background of old Sheffield steel making ; https://smallworkshop.co.uk/2017/09/08/b...
The articles about plane blades and sharpeningare very well described and logical and also unbiased . Qualities like toughness and brittleness are fairly covered without any attempt to sell a product .
Later on there is an article about the attempts to standardise cross head screws and screwdrivers but we don`t have to worry about that .

[John Cadd]

Sharpening gouges can puzzle people . I made a thing to polish the edges of any shaped gouge . Start with a foot long piece of wood.2 inch x2 inch.Get some thick shoe leather about 8 inches x 6 inches. Glue the rough leather side along the wood an inch from the edge with the rest hanging outside . Clamp the wooden end in a vice .Cover the leather surface with chromium polish. Now the leather hanging off the wood can be bent to the shape of any gouge . That works for in cannel gouges as well as out cannel .The leather going darker shows that metal is being removed. Your hand is behind the leather so it`s very safe. Gouges like to be polished often rather than ground down on a machine once a week .