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Would this make a good 1/16" parting tool?

Mark Corkern

Mark Corkern

Joined
Jun 5, 2019
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Location
Franklinton, LA
I found this blade in my Daddy's cabinet today, I have been wanting to make a thin parting tool and thought this would work. What do you think?hacksaw blade.jpg
 
I recall that some have made a narrow parting tool with a flea market cook's knife or butcher knife.
 
Don't use it unless you have solid handle attached that is much wider than the thickness of the blade, else it can be lethal. I bought one off the back of a truck at a woodturning conference a few years ago made from an industrial saw blade. The handle consisted of a piece of soft plastic tubing shrunken onto one end. I used it one day to part deeply into a work piece and for whatever reason the blade seized in the kerf. The parting tool and handle were jerked out of my hand and then apparently folded into the kerf far enough for the end of the handle to clear the tool rest. It continued on around, the handle end unfolding again, and painfully bruised my hand. It could just of easily have pulled out of the kerf and launched at my face. This tool subsequently acquired a solid wooden handle.
 
I usually try to have a width of kerf one and a half times the thickness of the parting tool. This prevents tendecy of binding due to wood (and tool) getting hot and swelling fibres. Especially important if going deep.
 
It has about 1/4" of hardened steel, I cut it on a 50 degree angle and ground a small angle on the hardened side. I drilled for and put 2 steel pins in the handle and put it all together with JB Weld, I will post a picture when I finish it. Thanks for all of the comments.
 
Mark Corkern said:
It has about 1/4" of hardened steel, I cut it on a 50 degree angle and ground a small angle on the hardened side. I drilled for and put 2 steel pins in the handle and put it all together with JB Weld, I will post a picture when I finish it. Thanks for all of the comments.
Click to expand...

Just be very careful and don't go very far over the tool rest. I have a thin HSS parting tool and if it is extended too far over the tool rest then you can't control the side to side flexing. I once had a thin HSS parting tool grab and twist like a pretzel. I was lucky that I only got a bruise and minor cut. It could have been a severe laceration.
 
It's the Nick Cook parting tool. If you're not familiar with it, the lower long edge is fluted and you only sharpen the short top edge. Eventually, the top edge will become the longer edge. The purpose of the fluting is to give the tool a bifurcated tip which cuts very cleanly rather than tearing through the wood. The only drawback is that a new tool will have at least 1½" overhang.

I think that Nick's main purpose for the tool is for making honey dippers.
 
I use my thin parting tool mostly when I want to retain a good grain match between the body and lid of a box or canister. Therefore, widening the kerf as I go would defeat the purpose.
 
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