Millers Falls cigar shave. Any users please?

[David C]

I have just sharpened a nice reproduction of a Millers Falls cigar shave,

Very perplexed by depth of cut control, or the lack of it.

Should the bevel on the inside of the blade be kept as fine as possible or am I barking up the wrong tree?

Best wishes,
David

 

[Racers]

Hi,

I have one.

You should have NO bevel on the inside of the blade.
Hers a picture on mine from the last time the question came up.

Pete

 

[David C]

Thanks Pete.

This is strange as it came from the maker with one and will require quite a lot of grinding on the flat to remove.

I notice that yours has a small flat filed ahead of the blade edge. Do you find this useful or not, and do you think it is original?

David

 

[bugbear]

millers-fall-no1-spokeshave-t23095.html?hilit=millers

BugBear

 

[David C]

Thanks BugBear, still not sure there is a definitive answer there, but it sounds like a very low angle flat with no bevel on interior?

David

 

[Racers]

Hi, David

Mine was second-hand with odd handles, the flat in front of the blade is original or it has been there a long time and was made very well.
I find it very useful for tight curves, once you have the feel for it, my larger handles help you to roll it keeping it cutting, its a nice finger tip control type of tool that once you get it works very well.

That and my Hock blade flat spoke shave are the first ones out of the cupboard (some times the Prestons)


Pete

 

[Racers]

Hi, David

I could lend you mine if you need to compare angles mouth opening etc.

Are you doing an article about it?


Pete

 

[David C]

Pete,

It looks like I will have to grind a lot off the blade to remove the internal small bevel. Also file the flat which is missing from mine. How wide is it please?

All this very odd as I think it is from the Kelly Tool Works. Unfortunately all the links I try seem to have expired.

No article yet I need a lot more time with this beast.

David

 

[Racers]

Hi, David

I will measure the flat and bevel tonight.

You are welcome to borrow mine, for comparison, they are tricky little things.


Pete

 

[Racers]

Hi, David

O/K here are the results.

The flat is 5.5mm wide and 0.42mm deep at its maximum.
The blade had a bevel that is 7.2mm in length.

The gap between the edge of the blade and the back of the flat needs to be 0 to 1.5mm, the flat seems to be a cord of the body of the shave, its also at 90deg to the cutaway that forms the mouth.

I can't clamp my blade in backwards to properly test it with out a flat, but holding it in place and dragging a pencil across it I can’t get it to cut unless the mouth is 3-4mm wide.
That’s on a straight edge so a curved one will harder to cut.

Mine clogs if the blade covers the edge of the flat. the picture shows the gap at about 1.5mm.

Pete

 

[Alf]

fwiw, I hunted down Ralph Brendler's page on the cigar shave here. As he claims to have never had any trouble using one (unlike so many), I reckon he must know what he's doing.

 

[David C]

Thank you Alf and thank you Pete.

Pete, I thing a glimpse of your shave would be very useful. My drawings and tracing paper modelling, and the links, do not answer some crucial questions. PM sent

David

 

[Handrubbed]

Despite what Mr. Smith says in his sharpening instructions, there is a way to use your Eclipse guide to sharpen the MF cigar shave cutter. I will have to get some photos together and post them here, but I can say that what I read in the post made my Alf is similar to my experience with the shave. This tool is great for small-radius work, but I prefer something like one of the Lie-Nielsen curved sole shaves for gentler curve work.[img]http://i234.photobucket.com/albums/ee300/finefettle/Augustsale012.jpg[/img]

 

[Handrubbed]

As I posted above, you can put the cutter from a MF #1 shave into an Eclipse jig, but you need to make a simple fixture to do it. This is my original design: I used a scrap of oak 1/2" thick and 3"x4", with the 3" wide end grain rounded over so that it is similar to the metal section of the shave in profile. I placed two flat head screws in the rounded section of the wood at the same spacing as the screws that hold the cutter in the shave. What you have now is a way to hold the cutter on the rounded-over end of the wood block much the way it is held in the shave. This wood block is then inserted into the upper jaws of the Elipse jig, with the wood fixture serving as a proxy for what would be a 1/2" thick plane iron. You can adjust the block or rotate the shave cutter until the flat of the bevel aligns properly with the sharpening stone. Go through your regular schedule of grits. I went all the way through 8000 grit on mine. As said before in this thread, you have to sharpen the whole bevel...no microbevel...or the shave will not stay in the cut due to its very small radius.

I would say that my #1 shave sharpened this way is as easy to use as any small radiused shave I have used. The steel in that cutter is very nice quality.