My Favorite Tool

I have many tools I really love. Normally my favorite tool is the one which best suits the work I’m doing, or which I enjoy using, but there is one tool which I constantly turn to where other tools would require too much set-up time to use or where no other tool could do the job. Yes, it is the lowly chisel which has earned a well deserved place in my heart (does that sound gruesome?).

So if enjoyment using it isn’t my reason for making this my favorite, then what is it? Here is a long list of my reasons.

Versatility

• Can accurately do just about any kind of joinery imaginable
• Great for taking shavings to adjust sizes on joinery and all other sorts of things.
• Can get into hard to reach places where other tools cannot.
• Great for small jobs to avoid time consuming set-up of other tools for joinery, grooves, dados, decorative edges, chamfering , etc.
• Makes a nice cut line to create a knife wall for precision hand sawing.
• Can even plane a surface in a pinch (in the right hands).
• Can also be used for chip carving

Maintenace

• Simple to sharpen and hone
• Lightweight and easy to have on the wall, in a tool cabinet or a in a tool tray/chest.

Other Points

• No electricity required.
• It would be hard to find a woodworker who does not have a least one chisel in their tool collection and most have many, further attesting to their general usefulness.