Wood Chisels and Their Use - Beginners Woodworking #26

Chisels come in many shapes and sizes and know how and where to use them will help you work more efficiently and safer.

Wood chisels are used in every kind of woodworking from boat building to house construction. They come in all sorts of different shapes and sizes and have both specialty uses and specific designations. Before the age of power tools, chisel were a mainstay because it was one of the main tools in making joints, which in many case was the mortise and tenon joint. Every woodworking shop had a variety of mortise chisels to help the quickly create any size of mortise they wanted. For the most part, that art of creating mortises with chisels is in the past now as machinery has taken over that job, but chisels are still an important tool in the shop. They are used for creating and trimming, for slicing and edging and almost anything one can imagine. Kept sharp and in good shape, a chisel can last a woodworker a lifetime and give outstanding results every time.

[markharris]

Definitely one of the better chisel videos on YouTube, there’s been some posted where I have learnt more from the comments than the video.

[theoberon]

Thanks for taking the time to put this video together Colin. Much appreciated :-)

[MarcenariaAmadora]

tks Colin, you are an excellent teacher. Good tips, very professional. Cheers

[Sebastopolmark]

Thanks Colin.  The illustrations clearly make your point. 
The basics never go out of style and it's always good to get reminded.

[StoneandSonsWorkshop]

Great info, Colin. Thanks for sharing it. I learned the hard way after seven stitches in my thumb to use two hands when using chisels.

[TheShavingWoodWorkshop]

Great video Collin, a lot of really good information.

[alicerosa]

Very cool video and clear instructions, thank you for sharing 👍 👍.

[lovemahunny]

awesome thanks so much. my husband got me a set of chisels as a gift and i was unsure of how to use them. now i just need to find a project to use them on.

[billfromelma]

Hey Colin, great primer . Esp. About safety. Sharp chisels work easy. Yep I did an ouch once also. Great video.

[adryano]

nice illustration about basics i hope someday you will fix your vise workbench or make a workbench thxxx

[joseletelier]

Gracias por la información, excelente tutorial, solo le pido consejos sobre marcas de calidad en cinceles

[timothyfagan]

G'day Colin, Great video I never stop learning and little reminders help, Colin it would've been handy if YouTube was around 30 years ago :) also I find the problem with commonsense is it is not always common.... Keep on keeping on mate, love your stuff, Tim.

[marcelloghessa]

Great lesson Colin...
Ciao continua così! !

[SUNNYMIESE]

Thankyou very much, ur video help my study!~

[superdau]

Cutting not towards yourself is a no brainer you learned when you had your first knife like object. And still I managed to ram a sharpened 20mm chisel into my left thumb. So count me in. Almost knicked the tendon, had 4 stitches and an unuseable thumb for a month (damn and you really need your thumbs I can tell you now).

I was not that dumb that I had my hand in the line of the chisel, but I held a piece of 5x5cm beech wood with my left hand while I tried to clean out a half lap joint a few cm to the right of that. I pulled back (within the joint) and wacked in again (perpendicular to endgrain). At one point (of course on the last of the 8 joints I did) I pulled out the chisel to far (no longer in the joint) and whacked the chisel into my thumb. It was mainly lack of concentration after half a day of work and exhaustion, because testing the fit meant heaving half a corner bench into the other half. I went to the ER, doctor told me I was lucky and maybe I better buy my furniture in the future. Told him no-can-do, and after I went home, I cleaned up the blood (had a nice stain on the table and bench; added a very personla touch) and finished that same damned joint!

So the main thing to take away: don't work if you aren't 100% at doing your work. You will do stupid stuff, no matter how often someone else warned you.

[jamesrawlings]

Are there times when you use the angled (top) of the chisel against the wood? 
Tks

[NYPAULY]

Well bevel me that.  You always learn something.  Good info as always.

[BrettWyrick]

I am learning so much from watching your videos. Sincerely, thank you for the uploads and the wealth of info! It's like you're the wise woodworking grandpa I never had! 😂

[WigWagWorkshop]

Very informative video, thank you Colin.  I am in the process of replacing my cheap and abused chisels that I got for free, with some quality ones.  One question, what are side strike chisels used for?

-Steven

[johnlord]

First watching series.  Thank you for talking about wood working tools and the PROPER use.  Everybody starts whacking on wood and making all kinds of "furniture."  True wood working is learning up, training up, future woodworkers and understanding their tools, and their proper usage.  Again thanks.