sled straddles the stone rather than riding on top of it. This wide stance makes it easy to control.

Another feature of the Mk II Honing Guide is that you can quite easily add micro bevels. Thanks to the eccentric shape of the roller, you can add a few degrees to your bevel with the twist of a knob. Synopsis: Some folks prefer to sharpen their plane blades and chisels freehand, but Chris Gochnour is a proponent of using a honing guide. These guides hold blades at a consistent angle while you sharpen and are essential to getting keen, repeatable results. He tested a variety of guides with different blades, focusing on ease of setup, accuracy of setup, versatility, and consistency. This review focuses on guides that sharpen on the stone. Models reviewed include the Lie-Nielsen, Veritas Mk.II Deluxe Honing Guide Set, generic side-clamping guides, the Kell No. 2, Nano Hone’s Sharp Skate 4, Trend, and the Veritas Sharpening System.honing guide wins the Rube Goldberg award for the most complex design. Unlike all the other guides, this one doesn’t use rollers. Instead, the tool is held in a sled that rides in a pair of rails.

For holding very short blades, such as those found on many spokeshaves, see our small blade holder. The Veritas Honing Guide Mk II is an excellent tool, and a class above most cheaper guides. It can be a bit fiddly to set up at first, but when you know how to use it, you can get your blade ready to hone within a minute.

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One improvement that has been added to this honing guide over the years is a plastic, flip-down gauge (see photo below) that helps you to position the edge of your tool for one of three commonly used bevel angles. honing guide is one of the less expensive models on the market. But I think there are better options available. It is easy to set the angle you want, easy to align your blade to be square, and comfortable to use. It is also not too expensive, being about half the price of the more barebones Lie-Nielsen honing jig. All-in-all, the Veritas Honing Guide offers great value for money, and is a great help especially to beginning woodworkers who find freehand sharpening daunting. Where to buy the Veritas Mk. II Honing Guide The guide features a range of adjustments that enables you to hone the primary bevel at 5° increments, and then position the guide for a 2° secondary (micro) bevel.

While some may prefer to sharpen freehand, I’m a big proponent of honing guides, and I recommend one for anyone looking to get sharp edges. Intended to hold blades at a consistent angle while you sharpen, these guides are essential to getting keen, repeatable results. honing guide is a simple and elegant design. Made in England by craftsman Richard Kell, it’s beautifully machined and is silky smooth in operation. Rather than positioning the roller at the rear, this guide uses a pair of rollers on the sides of the jig. It’s hard to find fault with this guide, but if I had to, I’d say that it’s a bit large and heavy compared to some of the other guides. This can make it a little harder to control when sharpening narrow chisels. Still, it remains my favorite in the mid-price range.

A 1:3-scale version of the Veritas sharpening system, it consists of a honing guide and an angle jig. The honing guide has a die-cast aluminum body that rides on a brass roller and accepts blades up to 19 mm wide; the stainless-steel clamping knob holds the blade against a pad in the guide. The angle-setting jig has a 63.5 mm long base and a 5-sided wheel that you can turn to a selected facet. You can use it to set your blade angle to one of the five most common bevel angles (15°, 20°, 25°, 30° and 35°). With the blade loosely held in the honing guide, simply roll the guide up to the wheel and clamp the blade. You can return to exactly the same angle each time you want to hone a blade, ensuring accuracy and reducing sharpening time. The second downside is that if your chisels or plane blades are either very short, or are tapered, like is the case with Japanese chisels, they won’t stay put in the clamp head. Due to tapered top of Japanese chisels, the clamp head can only put pressure on one very thin line, allowing the chisel to move when you sharpen it. It seems only natural that a company known for its hand planes and chisels would also make a tool for sharpening them. The Tip: If you enjoyed this review, be sure to also read my review of the Veritas Router Plane and Veritas Cabinet Scraper!