We may receive a commission when you use our affiliate links. However, this does not impact our recommendations.
The best sharpening advice I ever heard was from Tony Konovalov: Grind, hone and get back to work.
Or, to put it another way: Which is more fun? Making your tools sharp or making your tools dull?
When it comes to sharpening tools, I am not meditative. I am not slow. I am not interested in opening my spleen chakra. I just want to get back to my workbench with an edge that will strike fear into the nucleus of every wood fiber in my shop.
So why, for the love of corn, would I clutter up the world with another DVD on sharpening tools?
Because I think I can make it easier for you if you will just tune out all the marketing noise and focus on what a sharp edge is and what it takes to transform any edge into a glittering scythe for murdering cellulose. So this DVD is a little different. Why?
• I don’t care what grinder you have.
• I don’t care what you hone your edges with.
• I don’t care if you use jigs or not.
What I do care about is that you understand how sharpening works at a gut level. That you have the information you need to pick a sharpening system that suits you. And that you know how to tell sharp from dull.
We finished filming this DVD today, and our video editor is already hard at work piecing together the chapters. When we have a release date, I’ll let you know.
— Christopher Schwarz
• Need a sharpening book? I recommend Ron Hock’s “The Perfect Edge.” While editing this book I learned a lot, and I’m an involuntary sharpening nerd. It’s good stuff. Promise.
Photos above by Ajax Alexandre
Here are some supplies and tools we find essential in our everyday work around the shop. We may receive a commission from sales referred by our links; however, we have carefully selected these products for their usefulness and quality.
Chris, please help me find the link you referenced to a man who has accumulated a 70 “White Page” log of his sharpening experience.
It was a post that occurred no earlier than March this year, but I can’t find it, nor do I find your previous “sharpening” category on your home page.
I am interested in you book, but also want to explore this guy’s technique of adhering PSA backed abrasive sheets to glass in various micron sizes.
Many thanks for all your contributions.
Bruce Powers
I’ll certainly buy it, only after I’ve spent a relative fortune on sharpening systems to do just that–get back to the fun stuff quickly. After diligent study of the Charlesworth DVD, I could get moderately sharp tools but never as sharp as the wet grinders. Maybe this new DVD will help me get past that.
Good idea. I’m all for a sharp edge, but edge obsession is part of the tool cult that never made sense to me. I have some really great Arkansas stones, and I cherish them, but it’s not about making the tools sharp, it’s about making them dull (as you said).
Chris will this DVD by chance include a “buy” list or at least recommendations. I use the lee valley Mk. II system but would like to look into hand methods but get quickly lost with all the suggestions and options. Hocks book is great so far but my notes are already getting scrambled. A part time hobbyist new to this would appreciate a trusted, simplified guide.
The anarchist’s toolchest and the empiricist’s grindstone!
If the content of the dvd is inline with the your presentation at NWA, it should be a winner.
ps. does video cover historical selection quenching fluids?
Excellent! Now my old ceramic stones, luther grinder,etc. will feel wanted and appreciated.
Is the DVD hand cranked or powered?
When the DVD is ready, make us a deal for BOTH “The Perfect Edge” and the DVD.
How about $5 for the both of them (with free shipping).
Or, make your best offer.
I guess I have a different outlook than other folks. Whose marketing noise am I supposed to tune out? Yours or everyone else?
I know, I know, Christopher Schwarz’s woodworking adventures have no marketing noise attached. Geesh.
Tim
I usually strike fear in to the nucleus of the wood fibers in my shop daily, but not in a good way like you…
This is a DVD I will order.
Thanks Chris.
What will the sponsors think? If you’re going to bring common sense into the game, you’re going to shine the light of obsolescence onto most of the sharpening crap that gets shilled every day.
You got some nerve.
Keep it up.