Alf
Established Member
Well kinda animated anyway. One bit of it at least... Oh, just read the blasted thing. :roll:
Question: What's the major drawback to the MkII?
Answer: That wide roller.
What? I hear you protest. But that's what makes my blades nice and square. P'shaw, say I. (Yes I do, really.) But then I'm heavily in favour of using a cambered or crowned iron in the majority of my bench planes. If you are too, this is an addition to the MkII you're going to want to have. If you don't know what in blazes I'm talking about, you don't need it. Yet. Move along, nothing to see here.
The cambered roller comes already mounted in a separate lower assembly, so it's simply a matter of removing the one with the wide roller and mounting the cambered one instead. 10 second job. Nice. Apart from the camber-iness, the rest is identical as you can see below. From left to right, the original straight roller, production cambered roller and the tester one I've been using for the past months.
Except, no, wait, the knob for adding a degree or two of micro bevel is shorter. Hmm, now why...? :-k A quick trial on the workbench reveals the old tester roller won't tilt to its full extent to the right 'cos the longer knob hits the benchtop first. Now why didn't I have any trouble with that? Ah ha, because I use narrow stones. For the Scary Sharp-ists and the like, that could be a problem. So the production roller is improved – good catch someone (irritating that it wasn't me... #-o :lol
A close look at the roller reveals it's a normal “flat” cylinder in the middle section, like the wide roller, before it curves away. This is handy, 'cos it makes honing straight with the cambered roller really a doddle too. Observe proper honing guide use, applying the pressure to the tip of the blade and not the roller, and it's easy peasy. The only problematic blades are the narrow chisels, but as they're problematic with the MkII anyway...
What can I say? It works. Look:
<Homer> Guide goes straight. Guide goes tilt. Guide goes straight. Guide goes tilt.</Homer>
That was the animated bit, btw...
You don't have to fight the wide roller problem when you want to tip your blade to create the camber of your desires, making Camber Creation much more controlled. And that's also why I haven't bothered you with pics of “Cambers I Have Made”; it's still down to the user to provide the control, and that's exactly what I like. This isn't going to make a perfect camber with no effort on your part, so don't delude yourself on that score. I've been using it these past, ooo, six months? and the original roller's been gathering dust pretty much the whole time. To sum up then:
Want to easily create cambers on your plane irons while using the MkII?
Get a MkII camber roller unit doodah.
Sheesh, I could have just said that at the beginning and saved us all some time really, couldn't I? :roll:
When's it coming out? – No idea
What's it going to cost? – No idea of that either
Next week's lotto numbers? - You're just being silly now...
Question: What's the major drawback to the MkII?
Answer: That wide roller.
What? I hear you protest. But that's what makes my blades nice and square. P'shaw, say I. (Yes I do, really.) But then I'm heavily in favour of using a cambered or crowned iron in the majority of my bench planes. If you are too, this is an addition to the MkII you're going to want to have. If you don't know what in blazes I'm talking about, you don't need it. Yet. Move along, nothing to see here.
The cambered roller comes already mounted in a separate lower assembly, so it's simply a matter of removing the one with the wide roller and mounting the cambered one instead. 10 second job. Nice. Apart from the camber-iness, the rest is identical as you can see below. From left to right, the original straight roller, production cambered roller and the tester one I've been using for the past months.
Except, no, wait, the knob for adding a degree or two of micro bevel is shorter. Hmm, now why...? :-k A quick trial on the workbench reveals the old tester roller won't tilt to its full extent to the right 'cos the longer knob hits the benchtop first. Now why didn't I have any trouble with that? Ah ha, because I use narrow stones. For the Scary Sharp-ists and the like, that could be a problem. So the production roller is improved – good catch someone (irritating that it wasn't me... #-o :lol
A close look at the roller reveals it's a normal “flat” cylinder in the middle section, like the wide roller, before it curves away. This is handy, 'cos it makes honing straight with the cambered roller really a doddle too. Observe proper honing guide use, applying the pressure to the tip of the blade and not the roller, and it's easy peasy. The only problematic blades are the narrow chisels, but as they're problematic with the MkII anyway...
What can I say? It works. Look:
<Homer> Guide goes straight. Guide goes tilt. Guide goes straight. Guide goes tilt.</Homer>
That was the animated bit, btw...
You don't have to fight the wide roller problem when you want to tip your blade to create the camber of your desires, making Camber Creation much more controlled. And that's also why I haven't bothered you with pics of “Cambers I Have Made”; it's still down to the user to provide the control, and that's exactly what I like. This isn't going to make a perfect camber with no effort on your part, so don't delude yourself on that score. I've been using it these past, ooo, six months? and the original roller's been gathering dust pretty much the whole time. To sum up then:
Want to easily create cambers on your plane irons while using the MkII?
Get a MkII camber roller unit doodah.
Sheesh, I could have just said that at the beginning and saved us all some time really, couldn't I? :roll:
When's it coming out? – No idea
What's it going to cost? – No idea of that either
Next week's lotto numbers? - You're just being silly now...
