Traditional
Tools
___________
Home
Lyn Mangiameli
ALF's Reviews 
Articles
Forums
| |
         
Lee Valley
Spokeshaves
By ALF
June 14, 2004
Continuing this epic journey, we reach stage three - A
Close Shave (groaning at this point is optional but strongly advised)
Fairly recent newcomers to the Lee Valley Veritas stable are these two bevel
down spokeshaves, round and flat soled, to join their already popular low angle
cousin. Once more the butter-fingered amongst us have a chance of getting
through the day without sobbing over a tool in more pieces than the designer
intended, viz; a ductile iron body, nicely poised between two rather elegant
rosewood handles. That’s what the blurb tells me, but I think I’m right in
saying they’re bubinga, if that sort of precise info is important to you. 
The irons are A2 steel, 54mm wide, or 2 1/8” in old money. Packing is a long,
white cardboard box and the instructions do double duty as protection for the
tool inside. The latter are clear and helpful, and as before the miracle of the
‘Net means you can check them out for your very self on the L-V
site. The plastic shims are protected in a little paper envelope, which is
how small parts always used to be packed, so it appeals to my galootish soul. So
far, so good.
Now stop and cast an aesthetic eye over these tools. Of course you’ve got one,
every woodworker has. No? Well jolly well go and acquire one and then come back.
Got it? Okay then… Pretty, ain’t they? Now these
tools don’t give me the urge to build a darkened cupboard in order to hide
them away from the light. No sir, they’re very classy in appearance indeed, in
my opinion.  The
machining of the blade bed, front edge of the lever cap and sole is all fine,
while the lacquered finish on the handles seems to have managed to avoid looking
gloopy or too shiny and is pleasant to the touch.
The lever cap itself is a pretty thick casting, and the polish on the top of the
front edge where the shavings have to exit is a nice feature. The fairly rough
casting texture is left on the body but L-V seem to have dug up some finer sand
or whathaveyou for the lever cap, and the finish on them both is good. These
shaves have one unusual feature; the handles will unscrew from the body. This
gives L-V the opportunity to sell a kit to enable to make your own handles to
your own preferences, but it also means you can amaze your friends and family by
producing a full size working spokeshave out of quite a small pocket, if that’s
your idea of a good time…
Luckily for me and my sole testing phobia, the flatness or roundness of shave
soles isn’t a matter for squares and straight edges, so I ignored them with
some relief and turned instead to the irons. Now innovation and Veritas are
practically synonymous, but anyone with a Record or Stanley shave will be
familiar with the guts of these tools. Loosen the lever cap screw, push the
lever cap up, and then lift it off the blade screw and remove. Then just hoick
the blade off its twin adjusters and behold, I have another two irons to sharpen…
By some
quirk of coincidence the flat shave hade a hollow backed blade, while the round
had a convex one, which struck me as rather neat and tidy.
Left: straight from the fine diamond stone.
Right: Pesky secondary, or micro bevel
When it came to flattening them though, I’d have preferred two concave ones,
but the grinding of them was good enough to make it pretty painless. That pesky
secondary bevel on the other hand, I could do well without. Short spokeshave
blades of any make are tiresome enough to sharpen anyway, but I’d sooner round
over the secondary bevel of my choosing,
given the choice.
Never mind, it’s a small grumble in the big scheme of things, and eventually I
got an adequate enough sharpening job done for the purposes of review.
So back the blades went, the notches in the top slipping over the depth
adjusting screws. As suggested in the instructions, having just sufficient
pressure on the lever cap while still allowing blade adjustment was the best
technique. That cuts out all the loosening and tightening of the lever cap
between depth adjustments. This was just as well because the adjusters and I
didn’t exactly embark on a life-long love affair… In the blurb from Brimarc
I read the comforting assurance that “The twin blade-adjust screws fit snugly
in the blade recesses with minimal lost motion…”. Oh, if only. There was
fully half a turn of slack unfortunately, and it’s more than enough to make
blade adjustment on these shaves just as painful as it is on a similar Stanley
or Record. I must admit, I was really disappointed. If truth be told I’ve been
spoilt by my exposure, albeit a brief one, to the precise adjustments on the
other Veritas goodies I‘ve looked at, and the adjustment here isn’t any
worse than any other spokeshave of this type. Not to worry, with two adjusters
you can set the blade on the skew, one side taking a deeper cut than the other,
so when you don’t need the whole width of the blade for a cut that’d seem to
be the best solution rather than fiddling with the adjustment anyway. A nice
addition is the two plastic shims to close down the mouth. The usual mouth size
isn’t exactly gaping, but with both shims in place on the bed (held in place
with the blade screw) it’s virtually invisible. Just the job for those light
cuts in difficult grain.
Left: Round sole, unshimmed. Right: Flat sole,
where'd that mouth go anyway?
Now we come to the section that is so entirely my opinion as to be virtually
worthless. Yes, it’s
ergonomics time once more. The instruction booklet helpfully gives four
suggestions for how to hold these shaves, three of them for a pulling grip. Now
I’m more of a pushing style of spokeshave user; a lot of the work I do with
them is to fair up curves across the thickness of a board for cabinet work (the
curve of a shaker candle stand leg, that sort of thing) rather than shaving a
spindle on a drawhorse, and I find I get better control that way. So I tried the
suggested pushing grip first, which placed my grip rather more to either side of
the blade than I’m used to.
Suggested grip, round soled shave
Unfortunately I didn’t feel I was getting the control or feedback that I
usually do, and to a certain extent the shave tended to tip back off the work. I
also ran out of room on the handles to rest my hands, which was surprising;
possibly because the elegant cigar shape slopes away at the ends. After some
head scratching, I came to the conclusion a more traditional paddle style of
handle might have helped with the two latter problems, suggesting the
make-your-own-handle option might be a benefit. In lieu of that, I tried
something more like my usual grip in the hopes that‘d be better.
More like my usual grip, but the thumb wanted
to get in the picture, so moved round...
Obviously not a good grip in this case ‘cos my forefingers rested on the thin
edge of the front of the body while my thumbs made painful contact with the
sharp edges of the flat areas where the depth adjuster threads enter the rear of
the body. Ho hum. The suggested grip wasn’t so bad when it came to chamfering
an edge or shaping a spindle, mainly because I didn’t need to put so much
pressure on my thumbs to get the tool through the narrower cut I think. While my
digits recovered their sang froid I tried a pulling grip instead, which was much
better. My thumbs naturally rested on the depressions provided and the handles
were particularly comfortable for the fingers to wrap round. It almost felt like
a different tool; so much so I got carried away and forgot to take any pictures.
 After all
this rigourous testing, I came to the conclusion these spokeshaves are made much
more with chairmakers and their ilk in mind than cabinetmakers, at least as far
as my hands are concerned. But perhaps that do-it-yourself handle option might
help, should it become available over here.
My main test material for these were three reject cherry leg blanks from the a
previous project. As far as performance goes once the blade was set, they were
flawless. No chatter to be seen, whether they were wispy shavings or thick. ‘Nuff
said I think. 
Flat sole doing a fine job
So what’s the conclusion then? The woodworking world has really needed a
well-made, reasonably affordable, bevel
down spokeshave for a while now, and this could well be the answer for the
majority. Not perfect mind, but streets ahead of the modern Stanleys and Records
of this world for the precisely machined bedding of the blade alone, never mind
the A2 blade and excellent lever cap. It’s not, worst luck, the solution for
me, but for the craftsperson more into spindle-making and the like, just happier
with pulling spokeshaves rather than pushing them or who simply finds them more
comfortable to use than I do, I think they must be a winner.
Flat and Round Soled Spokeshaves £36.00
each, available in Blighty from mid July.
|
