# Mortise and Tenon



## gandis (Oct 31, 2014)

Hello all, have been searching this and other forums for the past few days, but can’t seem to find an answer.

I need a chisel to cut out a large mortise (1.5×3.5”) from a 6×6” wooden post. I don’t want to spend much.
But with research it seems like a tedious process just to get a working chisel. I have to buy the chisel, sharpening stones, and a honing jig, and sharpen, hone, and straighten the chisel.
Are there any other solutions? I just want one decent working chisel, without having to buy several other tools and accessories to have the tool work.


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## woodnthings (Jan 24, 2009)

*get a good chisel*

A good chisel that will hold an edge will run about $10.00 or so Marples, or Tekton:
http://www.amazon.com/TEKTON-67557-2-Inch-Wood-Chisel/dp/B00KLY18WE/ref=dp_ob_title_hi

http://www.amazon.com/IRWIN-Marples..._sim_hi_3?ie=UTF8&refRID=0XPDF3S9F3C7MJ2F5EPX

You can use wet/dry automotive sandpaper to sharpen them on a sheet of glass with a little mineral spirits as a lubricant. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qqg0bWb_Gl8


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## epicfail48 (Mar 27, 2014)

If you're going to be woodworking, you need to sharpen tools, there's no way to get around that. As far as chisel go, $50 should be enough to get you started. 20 for a set of decent enough chisels, $1.50 for a few porcelain tiles, $5 for some wet dry paper. Wanna get really fancy, spend an extra $20 and get a sharpening jig.

It's a pretty common misconception that you have to have a couple hundred dollars in various whetstones, diamond stones, platinum stones. Arkansas stones, blade guides, blade guide guides, milling machines to flatten the guide on the blade guise guide, etc just to sharpen a chisel. Any abrasive harder than the steel will sharpen the blade. As mentioned, I like sandpaper. In a pinch, a cinderblock will work


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## gandis (Oct 31, 2014)

Thanks for the advice!


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