pfiel to henry taylor conversion

The first number is the sweep, which is the amount of curvature of the gouge.  With Pfeil, a #1 is a straight gouge with a #10 being a bit more than semicircular.   I recommend that you get a Woodcraft catalog (Woodcraft is the major American distributor for Pfeil) or the Lee Valley catalog (for Henry Taylor) to see what sizes and sweeps they offer.  There are a large number of gouges available and people usually acquire them as they need them.  I would be happy to give you a list of gouges to get started with, but it really depends on what kind of carving you plan to do.  I can tell you that you won't need a macaroni or fluteroni at this stage.  I'd skip the back-bents, long-bents, heavy duty and wing-V tools as well.  Both Pfeil and Henry Taylor offer "starter sets," but they may or may not offer what you need.  I would recommend that you stick with straight gouges to start with.  Bent gouges are good for recessed areas, but you won't need them right away.  Fishtail gouges are always handy because they allow you to get into tighter places than the same sweep non-fishtail gouge.  I would recommend getting a V-parting tool.  You will use this when outlining relief carvings.  Pfeil offers two sizes of gouges,,, the "standard" and the "Intermediate" which are 2" shorter than the "standard."  I would stick to the standard unless you have small hands.  Good luck and feel free to contact me if I can help.

Jim