how-to

There are many ways to ebonize wood, which is the process of turning something like oak into a pitch black stained wood using the tannins and reaction to iron oxide. In this short post, I show the basic steps to make the solution that reacts with wine tannins (also called bark tea) in order to produce this effect.

At his point, I want to get closer to what Maguire does. When I look at the Soft Arkansas Stone it is not as expensive as the Black Stone, and I order one. I fully vest into oil stones and sell the diamond stones. Selling the diamond stones covers for the cost of the soft oil stone and leaves me with a chunk of cash for future tool investments - Because in woodworking, we all have a Tool Acquisition Disorder (TAD).

Evolution #5: Re-Introducing the strop. I decide it is time for me to stop resisting the strop, and learn to use it right. Sharpening through a completely unnecessary number of stones to get sharp, and diamond paste makes re-adding the strop a clear option.

Reintroducing An Ohishi Water Stone. Diamond stones are fine, but I continue to reach for that shiny edge, because after all if the edge is shiny, it lasts much longer (or so I think). The finest available diamond stone doesn't get me to shiny, and I still don't like stropping.

By this point, I know woodworking is the thing I love to do. My routine is to now spend 3 hours a night in the shop creating things, learning, building, sharpening, going through tutorials, and documenting all this work on my log at the <a href="https://www.handtoolschool.net" rel="noopener">Hand Tool School</a>.

These are a series of posts to discuss sharpening stones as I learned their benefits and drawbacks through my beginner woodworking journey, and how I came to my preferred stones and way to sharpen.