Nice. I am doing the Colonial in 54. My very first build ever! Kibler does an amazing job on the kit. I am very impressed by how everything fits together so well.
Ordered my Kibler kit
- Thread starter GregCSarver
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In addition I would add, get a bench vise. Vice jaws that can be lined with wood or leather so as to hold irregular shapes and nonparallel sides are better. I bought a pattern vise from Woodcraft to finish my .58 Colonial.
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Y’all are gonna love your Kiblers... they shoot as good as they look!
When I built my kit I purchased a new diamond stone, a world of difference compared to my Dad's stone from WWII.
Everybody is right, you have to have sharp tools, go for it you'll be fine!
Waiting on my 54 Colonial in Cherry. I month down, couple more to go!
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I would focus on the two chisels Kibler recommended in the one post and learn how to sharpen and use those. It's better to have a few tools that you are intimately familiar with than to have a whole bench full of stuff you don't know how to use.
The basic chisel has two working faces and a dozen or more applications can be performed with it, here are the 4 most common:
1. Horizontal cuts: Primary bevel facing the wood for shaving off bottom surfaces. If you have the back of the chisel facing the wood then it will dig in and hog out wood.
2. Vertical cuts and stabs: Back of the chisel facing the wood for shaving downward cuts and stabs into the side of an inlet.
3. Using the edge to scrape surfaces.
4. Pushing at a 45 degree angle for shearing cuts. Convenient for wrapping around the bottom of inlets particularly ones with curved borders.
There are many many many many more things one basic chisel can do, this should just get you started.
Don't look at the mallet as something to hog out huge chunks of wood, that is one of the things an experienced builder will use it for, but think of it as something that you use to drive the chisel slower but with more control than pushing it by hand. Really light, gentle taps using your wrist to drive it and not your shoulder. This is surgery, you're not shoeing a horse. Again, use the mallet to give you more control, not more speed.
I use a skew chisel a good bit but I build from a blank. They're handy, but not one of my more common ones. The skew helps facilitate a shearing cut, think of a pair of scissors and how the blade on them achieves full contact with the paper gradually instead of all at once. This same thing can be achieved with a standard chisel so I wouldn't worry about it. Just get really familiar with the two already recommended.
The best thing any of you can do is get a scrap block of maple and practice sharpening and inletting stuff into it while you are waiting for your kits. Clamp the scrap block into your vice and just grab a piece of scrap metal or whatever and keep inletting the heck out of it until you are confident with making very clean, tight inlets. Get confident doing that and when the kit arrives you will laugh and say "now this is easy" and build an outstanding rifle, which is better than opening up the box and picking up a chisel for the first time and saying "how does this thing work?".
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Kmcmichael
45 Cal.
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Kmcmichael
45 Cal.
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What is the scrap metal for?
Hatchet-Jack
54 Cal.
Great information from someone with experience! Thanks for this!!!
GANGGREEN
45 Cal.
Yep, I got a new set of Stanley Sweetheart chisels (acceptable, but not the best quality available) and started using the scary sharp system on them and I've had a smile on my face ever since. I still don't know how to properly sharpen gouges and V-tools, but I finally feel confident that my chisels will always be sharp and make this sort of work much easier.
Google 'scary sharp.' It's a method of sharpening using different grades of sandpaper over an extremely flat surface (such as glass), instead of using stones. After I started using it, I was embarrassed by what I had considered sharp most of my life. It takes my planes and chisels to a whole new level.
add: and congrats on ordering your Kibler. I'm totally in love with my .40 Southern Mountain rifle; I'd probably marry it if I didn't already have a wife.
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You are definitely going to need those two chisels Kibler mentioned. You can buy the pfeil or if you know how to dress up a chisel you can save a lot of money by purchasing them on ebay, flea markets, or garage sales. Do a search for "vintage chisel", here are some brands I really like (I edited down a list I found online, removed the ones that I was unfamiliar with):
Addis
Buck Bros The old vintage buck bros chisels, not the modern home depot variety
Butcher
D.R Barton
Berg
Herring
Bartlett
Ray Iles
Witherby
Miller Falls
James Swan
I'm probably missing a bunch of them, but these are the ones that come to mind. Some of them are ludicrously expensive so you may not find a good deal on them but you can usually find vintage Buck Bros for between 15 and 20 dollars shipped.
The old vintage Stanley chisels are also really good (the ones made in England or the US), but the ones you'll find are probably going to be bench chisels more suitable for heavier tasks than a kit.
As far as brand new chisels, there are many other good options but the ones I prefer:
Pfeil/Swiss Made - These are probably about as good as it gets but they are very expensive.
Dastra - I like them.
Ramelson - I really like these, the palm chisels in particular, very affordable, good quality and very slender for doing delicate work.
Keep in mind that you are building a kit, not cutting dovetails, so think of most of your work as shearing, shaving, paring, really delicate work so select the chisels accordingly.
As far as a mallet goes, I like the "Wood is Good" mallet, the heaviest variety they have which is 30 ounces. A heavier mallet works best, you don't have to work it as hard as a lighter one to get the same results so you have more control over what you are doing and when you get more confident down the road you can use it to really send it home.
The piece of scrap metal is just something you can inlet into the wood for practice while you are waiting for your kit to arrive. Maybe you have some sheet brass and you can cut out a small rectangle out of it or some odd bit of steel in the garage or anything really. It would be better if you had some sort of muzzleloading part like an escutcheon but if you don't then any small odd bit of scrap metal will work just as well. It's just to get you familiar with how to sharpen and use your tools, how they will react to grain patterns, and how to accomplish nice, tight inlets.
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I use the rolling method for gouges, the figure of eight makes my brain hurt, and I have no idea what veiners are used for.
GANGGREEN
45 Cal.
Not sure I have any real confidence in myself rolling my gouges without some sort of guide system. David Price uses a cool system with steel bars that keep your gouge at a consistent angle and I may have to look into building myself something like that.
On a different topic, has anyone used the Schaaf tools yet? I think that they're sourced in China, which is a big no no for me, but they're very inexpensive and they seem to get rave reviews. I need a few more profiles of gouges, but Schaaf only sells them in kits if I'm not mistaken. They're inexpensive enough that you can buy the kit to get one or two gouges though (their set of 4 fishtail gouges costs $48.95 for instance). I'll probably just stick with better tools since I probably only need to add a few to my ever-growing collection, but this might be a decent option for someone who simply can't afford Pfeil tools or something. I think you can also order the tools professionally sharpened for a little bit more. Yeah, some/most chisels and gouges come somewhat sharp when new, but I don't know that any come professionally sharp and it may be a good option for someone that doesn't know how to do it themselves (like me).
On a different topic, has anyone used the Schaaf tools yet? I think that they're sourced in China, which is a big no no for me, but they're very inexpensive and they seem to get rave reviews. I need a few more profiles of gouges, but Schaaf only sells them in kits if I'm not mistaken. They're inexpensive enough that you can buy the kit to get one or two gouges though (their set of 4 fishtail gouges costs $48.95 for instance). I'll probably just stick with better tools since I probably only need to add a few to my ever-growing collection, but this might be a decent option for someone who simply can't afford Pfeil tools or something. I think you can also order the tools professionally sharpened for a little bit more. Yeah, some/most chisels and gouges come somewhat sharp when new, but I don't know that any come professionally sharp and it may be a good option for someone that doesn't know how to do it themselves (like me).
