Head Knife Vs. Skiving Knife

[MonicaJacobson]

Yin, interesting. I do think that would help - scary sharp would help any blade. My problem was more that the end of the blade was four inches away from my hand. My clicker knife was a remarkable relief after the dexter knife from a leverage point of view. I think I would feel the same about a huge head knife, as well. I prefer something smaller and more controllable.

It also could be that I just want one of the very pretty knives shown on this thread, and that I'm being completely unreasonable. Certainly could be that.

[Wicked Welts]

Unreasonable, maybe, but it makes sense to me.

I have this uncanny ability to make perfectly straight freehand cuts as long as the blade is somewhat close to my (control hand) fingertips, like a box cutter for example, but beyond that, all bets are off! I think that's the main appeal (to me) with the smaller knives and probably what allowed for such a good first skiving impression with the tiny cheese knives. Also, after reviewing some of the links posted here, I really like the idea of a smaller round knife with an angled head/handle arrangement. I think I could rock the mini Sam from LW and others as an all-arounder combo tool;

Oh, and what's a 'clicker' knife?

Edited April 15, 2015 by Wicked Welts

[rawcustom]

Well if we're going to share pictures....

[Wicked Welts]

oh garsh, now did you really have to do that?

[MonicaJacobson]

Nice knives, Reid. I'm glad you post your knives on LW, it's fun to see what you come up with.

@WW - I misspoke - as it turns out there is a clicker knife, and my knife isn't one. I meant a box cutter, basically.

Disposable blade... cop out... I know...

[Wicked Welts]

I gotcha, but don't see it as a cop-out at all if it works for you. I use the smaller snap-off disposables for all sorts of detail stuff including working with thinner leathers, and yesterday I was thinking about trying the kind you show, only with the carpet hook style blade in it. I think that might be pretty handy too.

Edited April 16, 2015 by Wicked Welts

[Tannin]

Wicked Welts, I've seen quite a lot of vintage woodworking tools, including many old sets & boxes of such on ebay (in the UK) and at car boot sales, but yours looks particularly good/old/consistent. The various cabinet scrapers in the middle can be quite pricey. The classic #80 is common and still made by several companies (e.g. Stanley & Faithfull) yet secondhand they often sell for more than their current new price (current new price ~£15-£28). The right-hand scraper looks like it might be an early #80; it looks to me like it has oval thumb nuts on both sides - those are earlier, rarer & slightly more desirable and so usually sell for a bit more than normal. The other 2 cabinet scrapers in your picture are, I think earlier designs than the #80, rarer and consequently more valuable (at least they are in England) - although, from a practical perspective, the US Woodworker/Editor/Author Chris Schwarz reckons the #80 is all anybody should ever need.

The nice old wooden spoke shave in the image above those (more angular than the usual ones I often see) could likely be used to skive leather - I use mine for wood & leather.

At the top of the picture featuring the collection of cabinet scrapers is a Routing Plane - these went out of fashion but are now very much back in vogue, mainly I suspect due to the influence of Paul Sellers on youtube. Consequently complete or near complete ones normally achieve prices in the £28-£78-ish sort of range in the UK for the metal ones, rather less for wooden ones ("old woman's tooth") unless they are "special" (e.g. a lot of good brass work & crisp lines).

The dado-planes/router-planes (whatever they are called), often sell individually and in sets on ebay - usually cleaned & waxed, prices vary. I can't help thinking there are more of these in the world than people who want to use them. Ditto the big wooden plane: they look as if they should be valuable but I regularly see them not selling for £2-£6 at car boot sales - nobody wants them or knows how to use them anymore. That might change though: Paul Sellers has a youtube video showing how to tune them and basically he reckons they are as good as modern planes, they've been in use for a millennium and were really only replaced by modern metal planes because of industrialized production, product promotion & consumerism - rather than any actual problem with them! :D

That last tool looks familiar. I'm pretty sure I saw something like that recently on youtube.- most likely on an old Woodwright's Workshop episode - I recall thinking how odd, complicated, rare and expensive it looked, although for the life of me I cannot now recall what it was used for. Some kind of early plough-plane (US: plow plane) perhaps.

Part of me thinks those tools should be kept together for a museum but, even though old, there are many much older woodworking tools still in regular use. And I can't help thinking you would get more money (and perhaps the tools would get more use) if they were sold/auctioned off individually. There are folk who will restore, fettle and use those tools, and keep them working for another generation. There is a little "magic" in using old tools, especially if they have been used by several generation before.

Edited July 13, 2015 by Tannin

[Ironhyde]

On 4/7/2015 at 10:48 PM, DavidL said:

I wouldn't get the vegez knife for one reason. HSS steel is difficult to sharpen, only diamond stones can sharpen HSS. Some ceramic stones can sharpen HSS. If diamond stones are something you already have that would be a good choice.

I have a japanese skiving knife that works well for skiving. Would prefer a left handed version so the bevel is on the right side of the blade. When held vertically on a left handed blade, flat side is on the left, bevel is on the right creating a 90 degree angle cut (cutting on the right side of pattern always). The labelling of left hand and right hand knives are switched around for some reason.

A japanese skiving knife from leathercrafttools.com Nobuyoshi 38mm- right hand (Super blue steel according to a reviewer - known to have long lasting edge, can be sharpen to a beyond keen edge).

yujin left handed knife 38mm - don't know much about the steel but is japanese steel. \

Youtuber under leathertoolz who is one of LW member has a review of the knife.

Link/video on the knife David mentioned.