[salmo]

I do almost all hand tool woodworking, but not purist. My main smoothing plane is from 1910ish. My most new fangled hand tool is a Japanese Shinto rasp.

And you’re 100% right. I’ve changed my chisel and plane iron sharpening method twice in the last 12 months.

There’s oil stones, wet stones, diamond stones, and sandpaper. Plus a leather strop with pick-your-compound. I’ve used 2 different jigs on stones to get a more consistent bevel than by hand. There’s high speed grinders with a lot of pauses and cooling to not lose the temper. There’s expensive water cooled low speed grinders. Then there’s debate on the angle, microbeveling, and how much of the back you should flatten.

I’m now using a new jig from TayTools that uses a 3M Cubitron II sandpaper disk on a drill press when they get bad. I freehand on diamond and a strop after and between resetting the bevel. It’s the laziest way I’ve found so far.

Claiming any choice is best is likely to result in fisticuffs. And don’t start a conversation on workbench design or vice choices.