An intrigued Bugbear wrote;

2)	Practical/Experience Would any long standing mortice cutter care
to comment on what works best in practice?
 
	BugBear (intrigued)

We suppose there's always more than one 'correct' way to do any job.
Having promised myself
a decent place [other than my workshop] to hide and eat my fish'n'chips,
a conservatory sprang
to mind. Whilst building this thing I had to decide which methods I
should use. Quick 'an dirty, i.e.
all those metal bits/joiners etc or go the 'traditional' way. Well, it's
my conservatory [until it's
finished, then it becomes the property of SWMBO and 'ettes'] so
tradition won. Whacking damn
great 2" by 1" mortices looked daunting, so I took the easy route to
start and drilled a few out
finishing with the chisel. Now this is probably the first time I've done
this in a long while 
and is not to be recommended.  After a while I went back to my usual
method 
which is to start in the middle of the mortice with the chisel back to
me, chopping 
out small chips and gradually working towards the end of the required
mortice leaving
a suitable amount at the end for leverage. I say 'suitable' because
softwood compresses
easily and needs more left than most hardwoods.

When you get to one end, turn the job around or move ya butt and keep
that back  
facing you when you cut the other way. If you don't, you'll end
up doing what I did and lose some of the accuracy that mortice chisels
give as when the
bevel faces me I seem to wander in the mortice.

Of course, the bottom needs tidying up which is where the swan neck or
lock mortice
chisel comes in. Most joiners I've spoken too, don't bother with
cleaning the bottom up as
long as the mortice is deep enough to clear the tenon. 

Drilling holes, either to clear the waste or provide a starting point
always seems to
twist the chisel out of line.

Steve Forman.