I have been fortunate enough to assemble and use an array of handplanes – Stanley Bailey bench, block, and specific use planes, oriental woodies of various sizes, Lee Valley Veritas bevel up and scraper planes, and some other assorted types. It took a while, as in 4-5 years of using, fettling, trying various methods of things and different plane designs to form up some conclusions from my experiences. I thought I would pass along these experiences, primarily with the lesser experienced in mind, to help them make better value decisions while getting started. You do not have to have premium planes or blades to get very good results. Pay a visit to Paul Sellers’ website and take in his 40+ years of hand plane use.

I use hand planes to flatten glued up panels (i.e. table tops, cabinet sides, shelves), joint boards, clean up machined surfaces, square up ends on a shooting board, and prep surfaces for finishing instead of sandpaper. I use power tools for the heavy work – table saw, planer, router, circular saw, etc. Hand planes produce a flat surface sanding cannot achieve, and my power tools can’t achieve the squareness of a shooting board. As such, I won’t be discussing jack or scrub planes – that’s too much manual labor for me and setting those planes up is easier. Blades don’t have to be as sharp and soles don’t have to be as flat. Put some camber on the blade if you want, a little or a lot, and go shave some wood.

The most significant aspects of getting a hand plane to perform, more or less in order:
(Stanley bench plane focused, but pertinent to bevel up, block, and most other hand planes)

Iron Sharpness
Sole Flatness
Chip Breaker Flatness/Bevel Angle
Frog Seating
Cap Iron Seating
Rust Prevention

I plan to do a blog entry for each.

Why a Sharp Iron?

More significant than a thicker iron or chip breaker is a sharp iron. Once I used a plane with a truly razor sharp iron, everything else became secondary. All of the hubbub about thicker replacement irons and chip breakers became marketing noise. The standard iron and chip breaker perform just as well as the Veritas replacements in my #7 for quite a while. Yes, the A2 Veritas iron holds its edge longer, and the thicker parts allow me to get results with a bit duller blade. But, I get excellent results in all my Stanley Bailey and block planes with standard irons and chip breakers.

I experienced the chattering, skipping, and difficulty in getting consistent “fluffy” shavings that many new users do, and then I figured out how to get truly sharp edges – an “aha!” moment.

How To Get It Sharp

The majority of this blog post relates to the honing part of sharpening, Because that’s where “sharp” is created. A small entry at the end discusses grinding primary bevels. This method is the same as advocated by Lie Nielsen, but uses different jigs and lapping film vs waterstones. The short jigs require the wheel to roll on the abrasive media and contaminate the next finer abrasives, and waterstones require flattening – that’s why I don’t use them.

There appears to be universal agreement as to what constitutes sharpness – from Ron Hock:

“A sharp edge only exists where two planes (i.e., the back and the bevel of a plane iron or chisel, or the two bevels of a knife) meet with zero radius. “

There does exist, however, significant discussion about how to get there. One of the main areas of discussion is free hand vs. jig use. I was never able to achieve a razor sharp edge (plane or knife) free hand. I’m sure part of that is learning the skill. However, referring to the accepted definition of a sharp edge, it is impossible to get as close to a zero radius free hand vs a jig. One may get close enough for their personal taste/use, and it will be quicker than using a jig. But, the free hand radius will not be as small, and will likely contain several edge lines along the length of the edge, and will therefore not hold a usable level of sharpness for as long. So, over a period of use, the extra time to use a jig is paid back through extended edge life.

Also, the smoother the edge is the longer it will last. The more serrated an edge is the quicker micro fractures of the steel occur and the edge wears down more quickly. Many support the use of stropping edges on leather with one of many compounds. While stropping will produce a sharp edge (I can shave hair and cut paper with it!), I am not aware of any of the compounds having grit as small as the 0.3um film I use. The larger the grit, the more of a serrated edge and the faster the edge wears down. Stropping is typically done freehand, and it is impossible to hold an angle as well as a jig. Wet sharpeners, such as Tormek, Grizzly, Sheppach, at least hold a constant angle, however the stone, even dressed to fine, leaves relatively large scratches, which result in sharp, serrated edges that break down faster. If you can find actual submicron compound, and use it on a fresh leather wheel of a wet sharpener, on a blade that has been honed down to 5um or less, then you might be in business.

Another issue with stropping – what happens to the metal particles that are worn away? The wire edge that may be broken off on the strop? There is no way to clean the metal particles off the strop. They embed in the leather (or mdf or other soft substrate) to continue to scratch up that edge and add serrations to it.

This is one area where I kind of disagree with Paul Sellers – leather stropping is a mainstay of his honing process. I think I understand Paul’s perspective – simple, economical methods that will work that most anyone can do. I think this method is about as economical and produces superior edges.

This method is a bit more involved, perhaps not as easy to fully understand, and will probably take a few minutes longer per edge sharpened vs Paul’s method. It takes me ~ 10 minutes/edge (not counting creating a primary bevel if needed). Choose any method you wish, as there are many that will produce a sharp edge, and last for a while at least. I chose this method because the proof of how and why it is the best method for the sharpest, longest lasting edges exists, and it is not that expensive (<$100 for everything). This method sounds more difficult than it is. It’s no different than any other jig or fixture you make for your shop.

But my edges look like a mirror! We are talking about very small scratches not visible with anything less than maybe 50x magnification, perhaps more. I encourage you to look at Brent Beach’s webpages (http://www3.telus.net/BrentBeach/) where you can see edges at 200x mag.

Method

For most of the following, I credit Brent Beach for getting me started on the path to an economical, sure fire method to get razor sharp edges repeatedly. I’ve made a few changes in the method, as well you may also, but the concept is the same. An example: Brent uses baby oil to lube and wash away particles. After trying many fluids, I have settled on water with some dish soap and a little water emulsion grinding coolant to prevent rust. Window cleaner works well also.

It’s the scary sharp method with a couple of important aspects:

1) Plastic backed abrasives vs paper backed,
2) Micro Bevels Front & Back.

The plastic backed “lapping film” lasts far longer than paper – probably 15 to 20x or more. My experience is that you may get a couple of blades sharpened before having to change the sheet of sandpaper – I can sharpen 15 to 20 or more edges before switching with lapping film. The grit is adhered to the film much more strongly for the film vs sandpaper. But – sandpaper is acceptable to try out this method. It is difficult to find sandpaper with fine enough grit for final polishing. P2500 has 8.4 um grit, 10x above what the final polishing needs to be accomplished with. Any abrasive – waterstones, oilstones, etc. can be used. A challenge with these is getting the jig at the same relative height of each different grit stone, since stones can wear at different rates, and the relative height is very important to create micro bevels. Cost of stones at the very fine end starts getting prohibitive as well. Any mix of abrasives can be used, it just gets difficult to ensure surfaces are at the correct level relative to one another.

I currently use 3M brand lapping film coated with aluminum oxide – 266×30um, 12um, 3um, and 268×0.3 um. The lapping film is PSA backed, and mounted to ¼” thick glass from a local window store. Using a little soapy water, just like window tint film, makes installation (air bubbles) easier. The glass is glued to a piece of masonite, as can be seen in the picture below. I use simple shop made jigs of different lengths and angles (30°) depending on the blade:

Micro Bevels

Micro bevels are simply very narrow bevels across the width of the blade. Their sole purpose is to reduce the amount of surface area which needs to be honed to a smoother finish, reducing the amount of steel removed, honing strokes, time required, and abrasive wear.. Both sides of the blade must be honed, the bevel side and the flat side. See Fig 1 – micro bevel sizes exaggerated. I typically have a primary bevel and 3 micro bevels on the bevel side made in 0.75° to 1° increments. A micro bevel is created with 25um, then a shim is added uner the jig and a micro bevel is made with 12um, then the shim is exchanged for a thicker one and another micro bevel is made with 3um. I then use the same shim and polish further with 0.3um. I use one micro bevel on the back side. This is conceptually the same as the “Charlesworth ruler trick”. Wooden (or any material) shims of varying thickness, topped with sandpaper to hold the bottom of the jig, are used to get the degree increments for the micro bevels. My shims for the 2.7” tall jig are 0.085” & 0.160”, and for the 3-1/2” tall jig are 0.105” and 0.210”. The geometry Law of Sines can be used to calculate shim thicknesses and blade projection for various desired angles. This gets a bit tedious with the math and I may make a separate entry for it. The blade projection can be repeated by using a board with blocks attached at the required distances, or a digital angle gauge can be used. the jigs use 8×32 hanging bolts – machine screw threads on one end, wood screw threads on the other end, and round brass “nuts” from Lowe’s.

Fig 1

I typically create a primary bevel that is ~5° less than the finished bevel angle desired, for both bevel up or bevel down blades. I use a 25um DMT Duosharp to complete the primary bevel, and make a few passes on it first when resharpening to remove enough material to ensure I get any nicks out of the edge. Also, I use a piece of leather to break the wire edge formed by grinding, and an Arkansas stone flat on the back to initially smooth the edge. Generally at least part of the wire edge will bend over to the primary bevel side and will need to be removed. For the first couple of strokes on the first micro bevel, pull the blade toward you vs pushing. This will ensure any wire edge is broken off and not cut into the lapping film. Do the same on the back of the blade.

Back Bevel – I use small pieces of glass with lapping paper adhered. The shim is hi tech – a piece of plastic milk jug plastic about 0.016” thick attached to the back of the blade with masking tape. Each blade is marked with a line etched with a carbide awl at 1-1/2” from the edge. There is nothing magical about the shim thickness or distance. This arrangement gave me enough of an angle and was located far enough away from the jig holding the blade to be able to work the back bevel. I place the glass at the edge of a table, flip the blade/jig over so the top of the jig hangs off the table, and work the blade side to side and some front to back. I will use the 25um and 12um film some, but primarily the 3um and 0.3um do the polishing.

Blade Camber

I “bevel” the blade corners to prevent “plane tracks”. The bottom of the jigs is cut at an angle and the jig is held against the flat on each side to create the bevel (exaggerated in drawing) . Smoother blades get side bevels and a little pressure on the top of each side of the blade to create a very slight camber across the blade.

Primary Bevel Grinding

How the primary bevel is generated isn’t that important as long as the angle is correct, and the edge is square to the blade sides. A grit of ~60um, P220, is sufficient. Going finer requires a little less work in creating the 1st micro bevel. Belt sanders, bench grinders, wet sharpeners, water stones, sandpaper/lapping film all work. For manual work, an extra coarse/coarse diamond bench stone is my preference – they cut fast and don’t need flattening. Notice oil stones are not included. They just cut too slow for the major material removal required here. Wet sharpeners like Tormek, Grizzly, and Sheppac work (I currently use a 10” Grizzly), but only with O1 steel. A2, PM-V11, and HSS blades cut very slow and require frequent dressing with a diamond wheel dresser to keep the cutting rate up. If I were starting from scratch I’d probably go with an 8” bench grinder with friable wheels and a Tormek BGM-100 allowing use of Tormek accessories, or a belt sander with a good shop made jig. But, the Grizzly with Tormek accessories works great for my lathe tools so I’m sticking with it. Here is my review of the Tormek accessories.

Why Sole Flatness?
Convex (bulging out) and concave (hollowed out) soles will cause uneven cut depths and skipping and chattering. For a convex shape, the plane rocks front to back and/or side to side. A concave shape will cause heavier cuts at the start and end of a surface, and possibly no cut in the middle. Different amounts of downward hand pressure can affect each stroke causing more confusion. Even with a very flat sole varying downward pressure will affect the cut. Reduce the variables as much as possible. A smoother should be FLAT – ideally within 0.0005”; a jointer within 0.002-0.003”; a jack within ~0.005”. The flatter the better. Not the entire surface but the areas hilited in the picture:

You can see the faint remnants of magic marker used to measure progress.

How To Get Sole Flatness

Check the sole with a straight edge with a light behind it. I use the ruler from a carpenter’s square, but anything perfectly straight works – the thinner the better. Really, the best check is to mark the sole with a magic marker and stroke the plane on sandpaper on a flat surface. I use plate glass glued to masonite fiber board that is 22” long x 9” wide – 2 sheets of sandpaper just fit. Tables for saws and jointers work, I just don’t like having to remove the sandpaper and clean up the table to use the machine. I leave paper attached to the glass for various lapping activities. A light spray of aerosol adhesive at each end of the sandpaper holds it to the glass. I have found a resin coated type sandpaper is best – similar to sanding belts and just as effective.

The primary concern is flatness, not smoothness or surface finish. If you want to polish the sole to a mirror shine, it won’t hurt anything, but I don’t find it helps. After planing a few boards the sole gets scratched up anyway. P120 is usually good enough – no need to go beyond P220. For a really bowed or twisted sole I may go as low as 60 grit paper, but usually 80 grit until flat, then progress through to 120 and 220. I use furniture paste wax after smoothing the sole. During use I use a crayon, paraffin, or a candle to wax the sole. Some use feeler gauges to check flatness. I find that if the magic marker is getting removed fairly evenly by the sandpaper (see pic above), a 0.0005” feeler gauge won’t fit.

It is important to clamp, or wedge, the blade in place just as it will be in use, but retracted from contact (~0.020” or so) with the sandpaper. All handles should be in place and tight. The points of contact with the plane body do create stress and cause the sole to move. I find holding the tote to push and pull, and using my other hand to apply downward pressure in different spots, depending on where the high spots are, works best. I will apply significant downward pressure initially if quite a bit needs to come off, and let up on the pressure as the sole starts to flatten out. I’ll finish the flattening (and all smoothing/polishing steps) applying light downward pressure, just like planing. I use a shop vac with a brush tip to vacuum the iron dust and loose abrasive particles every few minutes. I have had to spend several hours to get a flat sole, but that was because I didn’t use aggressive enough grit to start. I will usually mark the sole and make a few passes at 120, then decide how aggressive of a grit will be needed.

The edges of the plane sole need to be rounded or tapered a bit (front, back, each side) so the sole doesn’t hit a sharp edge in the wood and stop (such as the misalignment of board edges in a panel glue up) and the sides can glide over sharp edges when skewing the plane. If the sole has fairly sharp corners, I’ll use a file to break the edge and round it over to about 30°. Starting with 120 paper, I hold the plane at different angles over to about 30° as I stroke it on the paper, and sand the ends by hand. It is not a lot of material removal.

I have used large granite inspection tables at work to flatten soles, and find they do not work any better than the glass/masonite setup. The glass does need to be supported on a fairly flat surface for the entire length, such as a workbench. It will bend if not supported. The 22” length will handle up to a #5 length. Longer planes like a #7 or #8 will need a longer surface. You do not want each end extending off the sandpaper more than an inch or so as you stroke it through, as it will cause a concave surface.

Cap iron or chip breaker, blade or iron – Some folks write treatises about which term is “correct”. I use the one that comes to mind, they mean the same thing.

Chip Breaker Function

The chip breaker adds mass to the blade and adds stiffness to the blade, and with the lever cap pushing down, seats breaker & blade flat on the frog, creating more blade stiffness (cap iron). A very important, but lesser known, function of the chip breaker is to create a force down the chip fibers as they curl up from the cutting edge, reducing tear out (chip breaker – although maybe it should be called chip turner or curler? Thin wood shavings curl, not break). A steep bevel, 0.025”-0.060” tall, at an angle of 70°-80° to the blade, will achieve this. Typically chip breakers will have a bevel of 30°-45°, which does not turn the chip abruptly enough to create sufficient force down the fiber to prevent tear out. This doesn’t make a standard 45° bevel down plane equal to a high angle smoother, but it is a definite performance improvement. Always remember a sharp blade is the first step to reducing tear out.

Another method of tear out reduction is to put a relatively high angle bevel (10°-20°) for the blade back bevel (on top of the blade). This works very well, but I find it a real pain to create and maintain that type of back bevel due to the difficulty of honing off the wire edges.

The chip breaker needs to seat to the blade along a single line at the tip of the breaker to prevent chips from getting under the breaker. Also, the lever cap should contact the chip breaker across the entire width so that clamping force is equal. The chip breaker also “carries” the blade, allowing depth of cut adjustments.
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Get The Most From The Chip Breaker

If you have not looked at the research done on cap irons by Kawai and Kato please do. Here is a link to their video (translated) http://vimeo.com/41372857 , and a link to a good explanation with pictures and diagrams by David Weaver: http://www.woodcentral.com/articles/test/articles_935.shtml I put a 70°-80° bevel on the front of the chip breaker. Aftermarket chip breakers can benefit from this as well as thinner factory Stanley or other brands.

I observed far more effect in tear out reduction from a steep chip breaker bevel than a tight plane mouth. In the video, notice Kawai and Kato did not have anything holding the wood fibers down ahead of the blade. Closing up the mouth just frustrated me with clogging. With a steep breaker bevel, the frog will have to be moved back to open up the mouth more than the standard “about chip thickness”. Something else to help clogging is to file an angle at the top front of the mouth – see Dwg 1 below. I use a small file from below, angled as far forward as possible without hitting the stiffening beam running across the plane body. I file down about 1/2 the casting thickness.

The chip breaker set distance from the blade edge is important. I set the chip breaker from ~0.010” to ~0.100”, depending on the cut depth. For more of a jack plane cut, it’s far back. For very fine smoothing it is set very close. Typically softwoods do not require as close of a setting as hardwoods. Because of the force generated by turning the chip so sharply, more force is required to push the plane. For very fine smoothing (0.001”) it’s not really noticeable, but once you get to 0.004”-0.005” thick shavings it is very noticeable.

Shavings generated with this set up vary depending on breaker set distance and depth of cut. They can be fairly straight, wavy or wrinkly, or accordion. Straight is best as long as it controls tear out. Keep moving the breaker closer to the edge to prevent tear out. The shavings will start to get wrinkly and wavy, and eventually take on an accordion look as the breaker is moved closer. The change in the chip is caused by the chip having to change direction more and more abruptly, increasing the force through the shaving. The accordion look is caused by total failure of the wood fibers. This is the same look shavings from my 63° high angle smoother have. Get a piece of wood with changing amounts grain angle and test different settings planing against the grain.

Dwg 1 below shows the various features discussed.
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Dwg 1
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. Illustration by Ellis Walentine
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Below is a pic of the setup I use to create the high bevel on the chip breaker. Make sure front of the breaker above the new bevel is smooth and burr free. Some light sanding after creating the bevel can take care of issues.
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The bottom surface of the breaker that contacts the blade needs to be flattened at an angle that will create line contact with the iron and prevent chips being driven under the breaker (“negative rake”). It only takes the slightest angle. Mine are about 5°. Remember that the breaker gets pushed down and flattened out on the blade, using up some of the angle. Here is a pic:
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The bottom of the lever cap that contacts the chip breaker needs to be flat where the chip breaker contacts. The top of the chip breaker needs to be flat across its width where the lever cap contacts. A lot of the thin Stanley style chip breakers are not flat after stamping, and uneven pressure will be applied to the blade possibly allowing chips underneath even if the bottom of the chip breaker contacting the blade is flat.
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The lever cap, chip breaker, blade, frog, and main casting all need to be held together well to act more or less as a single mass. Major sources of chatter are the frog not seated to the bed well, and the blade not seated on the frog well:
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. • The blade needs to seat flat against the lower 1/3rd of the frog
. • The frog needs to seat well into the main bed
. • The chip breaker needs to seat well to the blade
. • The lever cap needs to seat well to the top of the chip breaker
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Frog
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It is not difficult to get the lower 1/3rd of the frog very flat, so strive for 90% contact. I use a file initially, stroking in all directions to create a flatter surface. I then use sandpaper on glass to flatten and smooth further. In the pictures below I’ve used red layout fluid to enhance contrast. Magic marker works well too.
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Here is the blade seating area with just a few file passes. The center portion of the frog is high.

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Blade seating area after file work. Notice the top of the seating are is untouched. Only the lower 1/3 needs to be flat. In this case, a good 90% of the whole surface is flat – it just worked out that way.

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Blade seating area after a few passes on P120 sandpaper on glass. Picture is a bit fuzzy, but all is very flat and smooth now.

The better the frog seats into the plane bed the better to resist vibration and distortion when tightening everything up and in use. Below is a picture of the frog bottom at the start. I rubbed the frog on the plane bed support points. The small areas of contact show up faintly in the picture.

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Here they are after a few minutes work with a file

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To get the best frog seating, the frog should be lapped to the bed. I use automotive valve grinding compound, available for ~$4 at parts stores. Just place some on the pad areas and move the frog around over the areas. It only takes a few minutes to get the parts lapped together. All the pad surfaces were covered with layout fluid before lapping. The frog is upside down at the bottom of the picture.

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Lever Cap
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It’s debatable how much flattening the seating area of the lever cap helps, but it certainly doesn’t hurt and is quick and easy to do. If you have dressed the top and bottom of the chip breaker as described previously, and have issues with chips getting under the chip breaker or maybe some vibration, this is worth trying. Here is a cap with a few light file passes. You can see there’s not much contact.

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Here is the same cap after a few minutes work with a file and a few passes on P120 sandpaper.

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If you follow the performance tuning tips presented through this blog, you will be able to get just about any old plane to work pretty well. Make sure nothing is cracked and no bolt holes are stripped. Thanks for taking the time to read this series, and good luck!

A lot of folks use electrolysis for rust removal, which works great and if you are going to do a lot of rust removal, I recommend it. I don’t do a lot of it, and find Evapo-Rust works spectacularly to clean up even pitted parts. The product is reusable, so a gallon jug lasts quite a while. I have some different sized plastic containers depending on the size of parts, and completely submerge the parts. I cover the container to limit evaporation (Saran Wrap works great if you don’t have a lid). Every few hours I take a look. For light rust a few hours can do the trick.

The parts should be cleaned and degreased before being put in the Evapo-Rust. I use a power wire brush on pitted areas, and then wash the parts with dish soap. During rust removal I use a brass or stainless brush, or Scotchbrite pad, to rub the heavy black oxide build up areas, just leaving the parts in the container.

Some have commented they don’t like the gray color the Evapo-Rust leaves. Using a brass or stainless brush, Scotchbrite, or steel wool, while the parts are still in the Evapo-Rust, will remove most, if not all, of the grayish color. A little buffing with Scotchbrite, steel wool, or other abrasive after the parts are dry will brighten the cast iron up further.

When satisfied the rust is gone, I rinse the parts with water with some emulsion type grinding coolant added to prevent flash rust. I fill a container with water/coolant to dip rinse the parts. The first time I used Evapo-Rust, and rinsed with plain water, the parts flash rusted before I could spray something on them.

Rust Prevention
I used Remoil and various waxes for rust prevention with reasonable effectiveness. Wax is difficult to get into every nook and cranny. Remoil works pretty good, but I found an even better solution. Researching rust preventives turned up a product called Alox, a calcium based rust preventive originally developed back around WWII for naval ships. Lee Precision, maker of many ammo reloading products, has a product called Liquid Alox. It’s designed use is lubrication of cast lead bullets, but it is an excellent rust preventive. I reduce it about 20:1 with naptha, and use it in a spray bottle. I spray a little on a part and use fingers or paper towel to spread it around. It dries as a thin, hard film with a bit of a haze. It can be buffed with a cloth if desired. Previously something might get some water overspray on it and get rust spots. The Alox treated parts have had water spots from minerals left behind but no rust. I treat all my hand tools with it, including blades after sharpening. Works well on any cast iron or steel. Part of the Alox will settle out of the mixture when it sets for awhile, so it needs to be shaken before spraying.

First Handplane
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A very common question – “What planes do I start with?” – and a plethora of opinion out there to answer it! So, I thought I’d throw mine out there as well. It’s possible you are at the stage I was when I started – I didn’t know brands, sizes, types, uses – basically zip. I spent months researching – in part because I like to research and understand something I’m interested in, and because there is a lot of information and opinion about handplanes and what they’re all about. Perhaps I will provide something unique to your handplane quest.

I tend to be a pragmatic type. I got started with handplanes because I had a need that handplanes addressed that typical machines couldn’t address. As such, I’ll approach the question from a use perspective – not nostalgia, historical correctness, exact identification (type), etc. This blog entry is my opinion about which handplanes to start with (and why) to help you in woodworking, opinion formed from my personal experiences. I am not associated with any companies, experts, etc.
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Handplane Categories
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Bench planes – primarily used to dimension, flatten, and smooth lumber, and can be used to do other operations, such on a shooting board to square up ends. You may have heard of the Stanley #4. This area will be our main focus.
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Block Planes – kind of like a utility knife or utility infielder – master of none but used for a lot of things. For planing with one hand. Great for trimming pieces to fit.
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Joinery Planes – for making the joints to put boards together, like mortise and tenon (shoulder plane), rabbet joints (rabbet plane), grooves (router or combination plane), etc. Not the place to start unless that’s your only area of interest.
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Specialty Planes – all sorts of more specialized stuff – moulding, circular, compass, luthier, the list is almost endless. Not the place to start unless you’re making instruments or just work with small items.
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I will assume you know little to nothing about handplanes. There is a need to delve into a little history just to put things in perspective. If you don’t know what a Stanley Bailey #4, #5, #7, 60-1/2 are (too many to list), go to this site http://www.supertool.com/StanleyBG/stan1.htm, the bench plane page of Patrick Leach’s “The Superior Works: Patrick’s Blood and Gore” Planes #1 – #8C. Start with the 4, 4-1/2, 5, & 7. Navigate around and find the 60-1/2 block plane. These are the mainstays of handplanes. Spend some time here (it’s easy to get lost and/or confused – Stanley made a lot planes). Next find his entries on the #602-608 Stanley Bedrock series (I agree with Patrick’s opinion of bedrock planes). All of the other types of planes are included in Patrick’s site. Gaining an understanding of the different planes, their parts, uses, etc. will be helpful to you.
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I have nothing against other brands, many are as good, it’s just that Stanley was the most prolific manufacturer with the most complete catalog, and therefore the easiest to find and buy. We will discuss buying old vs new later.
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I will attempt to take you through a selection process. If you haven’t done so yet, now is a good time to visit Patrick Leach’s website and familiarize yourself with planes by the numbers. You’ll need to answer two questions to help guide the process:
. 1. What do you want to do?
. 2. How much money do you want to spend?
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“What do you want to do?” – anticipated responses:

Period Woodworking / Historical Collecting / Plane Typing

Umm, this blog is not the place. Many of the folks wishing to do this want to cover all aspects and be historically correct. While I do enjoy the history of it all, I don’t concern myself with historical accuracy. I “collect” handplanes to use, not for the sake of collecting or trading, etc. I’m not too concerned with which type I own, other than to stay away from the expensive stuff.

What’s a handplane? What’s this handplane business about?

A handplane is a hand tool that provides a way to hold a sharp edge at a set cut depth to provide controlled material (wood) removal. A couple of generations ago the smaller planers and jointers many have today weren’t as available. Handplanes were used to work wood. They come in many shapes and sizes, especially once you delve into the more specialized types. The following information may help explain what they are about.

I want to woodwork with all hand tools like the old days

Knock yourself out! Dimensioning lumber by hand in this day of relatively cheap power planers and saws is not my cup a tea – it’s a HELL OF A LOT OF WORK! But…..maybe you want to use some very wide slab lumber and not cut it down to pass through a typical 12”-13” bench planer. For whatever reason you want to do this, you’ll need a scrub plane and a Stanley #5 jack plane to start. A #5 with the front of the mouth opened up with a file and a heavy cambered blade will work as a scrub. The #5 is used to clean up after the scrub plane. These are your cheaper and easier to tune planes. There are bevel up jack planes (I have one) and I do not recommend them just for rough dimensioning of lumber – they are expensive and their real benefits are elsewhere, but they will do dimensioning. A Veritas Low Angle Jack will do about all things needed, but I wouldn’t recommend you start with one unless you’re just flush with cash.

Using handplanes to do all the work will be cheaper, right?

Yeah…….not really. You’ll need a Stanley #5 jack plane ($75) and a #7 jointer plane ($140) at a minimum. I’ve given some average prices of what I’ve seen these planes going for (including shipping) on ebay over the past couple of years (Feb 2014 now). On top of this you will need a way to sharpen the blades razor sharp. There are lots of methods but probably $200 minimum realistically, maybe more. Since you’ll be using the planes a lot, you really need something other than the “scary sharp” method. Another $25-$50 for some decent files, sandpaper, and glass or granite to tune the planes with. You really need a jointer fence, another $55 or so shipped. Up to about $500. This can take the place of a planer and jointer, which you could get for $500 and up, depending on what you buy. You will still need a smoothing plane or random orbit sander. Time to complete a project will go up 10x. I highly recommend a planer and table saw if you want to do furniture/cabinet woodworking.

There are good ways around not having a power jointer. A #7 plane is needed to flatten large panels and table tops, and is a “jointer” plane. With a fence attached, it joints boards almost as quickly, and at least as accurately, as a powered jointer. I straighten cupped and twisted boards in my planer by laying the board on a “moving bed” board and shimming the high spots. Get one side flat, flip the board over and plane normally.

I want to hack down really rough lumber before I run it through my planer

The best choice might be a drawknife, depending on the width of the lumber. They will remove a lot of wood quickly (faster than a handplane), and provide enough control for the task. About any old scrub plane not cracked and with a decent blade will do. The same with an old Stanley #5. A Stanley 12-404 can be had for under $20 new and will function well as a scrub plane.

I just want to check it out

The toughest part of this category is that to really “check it out”, you need a way to get the blade truly razor sharp. The typical “scary sharp” method will work up to a point. Check out my blog entry here http://lumberjocks.com/OSU55/blog/39391 for what I consider the best sharpening method. Once over the sharpening hump, there’s no question in my mind a Stanley #4 (or 4-1/2) is the place to start. The reason is simple – it can be used for about anything, the design is available from many manufactures, as such they are cheap, and work the same as the other bench planes – so they make excellent “learner planes”. I still use the first one I bought, a no-name knock-off. Visit my blog (see above) for how to performance tune a handplane.

I fooled around with a few planes and different sharpening methods for several years “just checking it out”. It was a fairly frustrating experience, one that led me to write these blogs to help others shorten or possibly bypass that frustration.

What can handplanes do that machines can’t?

I’m speaking to the typical weekend wood warrior (not professionals) who have a 12”-13” planer, an average table saw, etc. Planes can provide very flat surfaces, even large dining room table sized ones. They can eliminate or dramatically reduce the amount of sanding required. With a proper shooting board, they can square up the ends of stock. They are great for cleaning up machined features – router plane for dados & grooves, shoulder plane for tenons, etc., and trimming parts to fit. Yes, there’s some skill involved to get good results, obtained through practice, but you don’t have to be an artisan.

I had a need. I was struggling with how to get wide glued up panels, like table tops, truly flat. I had tried various sanding routes – not flat. Planing with a router – flat, but lots of grain tear out and still a lot of sanding to remove the cut lines. It worked, but not to my satisfaction. Handplanes solved the issue. They have also dramatically reduced sandpaper use. I typically only use P320 before staining/finishing, and depending on the project and/or wood type, sometimes none at all.

So where should I start?

Augment your power tools with handplanes. Use them where machines fall a bit short. If you’re satisfied with the work your machines produce, then possibly one of the “typical responses” above answered your question.

I recommend a Stanley Bailey #4 or 4-1/2 bench plane (or equivalent) and a low angle Stanley 60-1/2 block plane (or equivalent). My reasoning is anyone remotely interested in handplanes can use a smoother to clean up machining marks and level a panel glue up, and a block plane to break sharp edges and trim a bit here and there. That’s a start, and with experience one can branch out in many directions.

I throw the 4-1/2 in because it uses a 2-3/8” width blade, the same as the #7, which is the next plane I recommend. This way you can have several blades that will fit both of your primary planes and not have to stop to sharpen during a project. I recommend a #7 instead of a #8 because of availability, blade size (#8 is 2-5/8” wide), and a #8 is BIG & HEAVY. The #7 is for jointing boards for glue ups or getting straight edges and flattening large panels.

If you do only small work – small boxes, knick knacks, etc. the planes above are way too large. I have a set of small “bench” planes, about 3” long with ½” wide blades, a set of small brass spokeshaves, and a small Kunz “squirrel tail” pocket plane (~3-1/2” long) appropriate for this work. There are many others. There are many luthier (musical instrument) tools that you should research. The plane should not be longer than the board you are planing.

If you don’t have much strength, you might start with a #3. I’m a little hesitant on this recommendation because plane sizing is determined by the work to be done, not the worker (The “rules” are not absolute – a #4 can be used as a jointer, etc.). Working with handplanes can be strenuous, so you may need to think about building strength up by using the “standard“ sizes (and other activities). While different sized planes have different weights, I find cut depth (shaving thickness), cutting angle of the blade, and blade sharpness actually drive the level of exertion more than plane weight. I’m in the camp of heavier planes provide momentum to power through tough areas in a cut.

Block planes – standard angle block planes aren’t needed, today anyway. Perhaps years ago there were manufacturing issues with the 12° beds of low angle planes causing the mouth or bed to crack. A low angle block plane blade can have any bevel angle put on the blade to handle a given task, from 25° for a cutting angle of 37° (end grain) up to 50° for a cutting angle of 62° (unruly grain), or more. A standard angle block (20°-21° bed) can really only go down to a 45° cut angle, which will work but is not the best for end grain. For this reason I have multiple LA block planes with varying bevel angles.

What about wooden planes? I have several and I use them, however for the novice I recommend the “gold standard” cast iron planes because they are easier to adjust, cheaper, have better ergonomics for hands and wrists, and don’t “move” with temperature and humidity changes. I find woodies especially hard to adjust for very fine (0.0005”) smoothing cuts. ECE makes some very fine wooden planes with screw type adjusters, but they are 3-4x the cost of a Stanley #4.
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Money
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Who wants to spend several hundred on one plane and decide handplanes ain’t for them? Especially when the low end planes can perform very well?
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You can join the fray on ebay and pick up old ones, or you can buy lower end new ones. Both will need similar tuning to perform correctly. You might luck into one at a garage, estate, or farm sale, or antique store, but in Missouri and Oklahoma (my brother lives there) stumbling across good ones is very rare these days. Another alternative is tool dealers, online and locally. When I’ve looked at dealers, I’ve found what I considered very high prices – as high as the “mid-tier” new planes we will discuss later. The dealers are selling nostalgia, history, collector’s items, and they have to make a buck. Several folks on Lumberjocks repair/restore and sell planes, and are a good source, but it may take a while.
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You’ve probably read a lot of comments that the 1910 up to WWII planes are the ones to have, and all the newer Stanley stuff is junk. Well, I disagree – that the newer Stanley stuff is junk. I have the following “newer” Stanley planes that with proper tune up, work perfectly well with the factory blades and chip breakers:
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• standard angle block 12-920 ($36)
• low angle block 12-960 ($30)
• type 20 #7 Stanley Bailey (with the stamped skew lever) ($145 with shipping, ebay)
• no name #4 Stanley Bailey knock off from Grizzlies (~$50)
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Each of these required significant time to tune up. These were my test beds to learn how to tune. Guess what – all the older Stanley’s I’ve purchased required the same tuning. Throughout time Stanley planes were manufactured to a low price point, so it would’ve been a surprise if the older ones had been better. I really don’t see a big difference in manufacturing quality or performance. The plastic handles on new ones aren’t attractive, but with a little sanding of the mold lines they are serviceable (all of mine have been replaced with my own design now). If a friend asked me what the best value is for a first plane, I would steer them to the current Stanley 12-904 contractor grade smoothing plane ($50-$60) if I couldn’t find a cheap one on ebay, and then coach them through the tune up process. Stay away from the Stanley “handyman” versions.
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As a side note (and you will read this in my other blog entry), properly tuned planes with properly sharpened “thin” blades and chip breakers will work very well. If you get significant improvement with an aftermarket blade and or chip breaker (other than edge life), something is not properly tuned (or broken). I know all the magazines and “experts” (except Paul Sellers) recommend thick aftermarket blades and new planes that come with thick blades – just remember they are in business to sell magazines and product.
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ebay – can be hit and miss. I don’t see the $20 good plane deals as some folks claim – prices have probably doubled in the last 5 years. Three of the planes I purchased were useless – cracked mouths, and I had to deal with the sellers and prove I didn’t crack them. I believe the sellers didn’t know they were cracked, but that they didn’t know what they didn’t know about planes. Now, I also got some good deals, and so it evened out.

To summarize – don’t be afraid of newer planes (post WWII to now). They are cheaper and can be tuned to work very well with factory thin blades and chip breakers. This will probably be the most budget friendly route unless you luck into something.
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I don’t want to tune, I want to go to work
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My opinion is: Learn how to make a standard Stanley style #4 or 4-1/2 (or equivalent) sing, and you can probably get about any plane to sing. It provides excellent handplane education and you will continue to use it if this handplane thing is for you. Even the high end planes need to be re-sharpened, should have the chip breaker bevel properly dressed, and will need the sole touched up occasionally.
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If you have cash and little time, maybe handplanes aren’t for you. It takes time to learn how to use them and keep them working well. Maybe a drum sander is a better tool for you? You can go the tool dealer route for an already tuned older plane, or go the premium plane route. I would not recommend the mid-tier planes because they do require some time to tune them in.
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If you have cash and time, I still think learning about tuning with a #4 (or 4-1/2) is the place to start. You haven’t spent much money, and you will get an education. Follow my tuning blog (or others), and if you can’t get one to work, send me a PM on Lumberjocks and I’ll help you.
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Quick Word On Bevel Up Bench Planes – There aren’t any low cost bevel up bench planes. If you can find one, the Stanley #62 will probably go for more than the Veritas or LN versions, which for actually using are far superior.

If you just have to have a top of the line plane for your first one, more for finishing type work and not dimensioning, I’d recommend the Veritas Low Angle Jack Plane, with all three blade angles, and the magnetic jointer fence (it will work with the LAJ with minor modification). You now have an excellent shooting board plane, a long but extremely good smoother that can handle tough grain with a steeper bevel, and a somewhat short but good jointer.

Summary

Low end planes will perform very well when properly tuned. Premium planes are easier to use. The premium advantages are: less tuning time (a one-time thing per plane), tighter manufacturing tolerances that result in easier adjustments (blade depth and skew, mouth opening), and extended sharpening intervals due to better blade materials and the thicker blades and chip breakers let you plane with a duller edge. Once you learn your way around a Stanley Bailey, the premium version won’t really give you much better results.

Where the premium planes stand above is in their ability to deal with tear out in unruly grain, however this is limited to LN high angle frog bench planes and Veritas or LN bevel up bench planes with high angle blades. I would not include high angle wooden planes because this concerns a first plane purchase, and as I’ve mentioned woodies are a little more difficult to deal with.

Some are concerned that if they buy a low end plane, it will be made obsolete by better premium planes they might buy in the future. Even though I have premium planes, including bevel up bench planes, I still use my Stanley Bailey bevel down bench planes. As you get further down this slippery slope (easy to do), planes can be set up for particular tasks to make your work go faster. One thing I’ve noticed: Once folks figure out how to get a plane to work, they go through an exponential growth period. Low cost planes allow this phenomena to occur at a lower financial stress level.

The next blog entry will cover mid-tier and up planes.

I want a better plane

We’ve covered the lower end in the previous blog. There are mid-tier, premium, and art object categories remaining. Three features get pushed a lot as shortcomings of the Stanley Bailey design – thin blades, thin chip breakers, and frog to bed seating/contact area. The more expensive plane makers, and aftermarket parts sellers, claim their thicker blades and chip breakers and the increased frog contact area will solve all your problems. This is marketing hyperbole to sell product. I will reiterate again – if your plane won’t cut right, it’s a tuning issue (or something’s broken), and thicker parts just mask the real problem.

The better materials (A2, PM-V11, etc.) will improve edge life, and a thicker blade will continue to cut longer before chattering and stuttering compared to the thin counterparts. The increased frog contact area helps here as well. While I have aftermarket blades and chip breakers, I elected to get more factory blades and breakers and have them ready to go so I don’t get in the middle of a project and need to sharpen. This is a very expensive proposition with aftermarket blades.

Tighter tolerances (less tuning, better adjustment control, easier to use), ductile cast iron (if dropped on a hard surface it won’t crack), longer intervals between sharpening, and bevel up planes are the main things you get with the more costly planes. Another is handling grain tear out in unruly wood.

The task that standard bevel down bench planes struggle with is planing reversing grain without tear out. Even the premium BD bench planes struggle with it – why does LN offer steeper angle frogs? My handplane performance blog has tuning methods to help, but the plane design can only do so much. High angle planes are designed for this task, but are more difficult to push so you only want to use them when you really need to. I bring this up because many folks think going to a premium plane will solve this issue. While a 45° bedded bevel down premium plane may do a little better than a low cost one, it won’t be an order of magnitude better. The blade cutting angle has to be increased to get the improved results.
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Mid-Tier Planes

I put the WoodRiver planes from Woodcraft and the “new” Stanley Sweetheart planes in this category. One of the Stanley’s is a bevel up bench plane. Less money than premium planes, not quite the manufacturing tolerance control, looser adjustments, some tuning and burr cleanup required vs the premium planes. They will perform well once tuned up.
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Premium Planes

For North America, there is Lie Nielson and Veritas by Lee Valley of Canada. Europe has Clifton, which are imported to the USA. I have read, but do not have any experience, that Clifton quality can be a bit hit or miss. Since I have no direct experience with them I will leave them out of the discussion.

Lie Nielson and Veritas are a toss-up from a quality and results perspective. Both manufacture high quality tools that will last several life times, with great customer service. For all planes except the bevel down bench planes, I prefer Veritas because they offer additional features and cost less than equivalent LN planes. Features like lateral blade set screws and mouth adjustment stop screws make the LV planes easier to use. If you like nostalgia and/or a little more bling on your tools, then LN is probably your choice – the classic Stanley designs with tight manufacturing tolerances, and they are dressed nicer than LV planes (for tools I focus on how they work, not how they look – my brother prefers LN). Also, some folks just don’t like the less curvy and more vertical rear tote on Veritas planes. I prefer my own design over both the Stanley/LN and Veritas tote designs.

Bevel down planes – Veritas uses a Norris style blade adjustment on their BD planes (see below). The same arm with knob control blade depth and skew, and you cannot reach the knob with your fingers with your hand on the tote like the Stanley design. I don’t have an issue with it, and the design works very well. However, kind of like the rear tote, some folks just don’t like it. The design will change habits that were formed with the Stanley design, and I suspect this is where the “no” votes come from – “it’s different and I don’t like it”. All the other additional design features Veritas has in their BD bench planes make them superior to the Stanley design, but this is enough of a difference in how the tool functions that it can be a deal breaker.
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Bevel Up Planes

If you are not familiar with bevel up (BU) bench planes, visit this site http://www.leevalley.com/US/Wood/page.aspx?p=45864&cat=1,41182,52515. The primary advantage of this plane type is versatility – the ability to vary the blade cutting angle by regrinding the blade or having extra blades already prepared at different angles. Angle of attack is everything when handplaning. The standard bevel down plane has a cutting angle of 45°, which is a compromise. End grain is best handled at 37° (12° bed + 25° bevel – less bevel degrades too quickly), straight grain at ~45°, and reversing or burled grain up to 62° or even higher.
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Veritas Low Angle Jack
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Art Object
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Included just in case you were not aware of them. A couple of extremely high end planes: from Bridge City Tool Works on the top and Marcou Planes on the bottom. I’m sure there are others. I don’t even know what they cost – if you have to ask don’t bother. I’ve never used one, but I’m sure they are good. I think they’re intended to sit in a glass lighted case.
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Summary

Lots a choices ain’t there? The only quick fix is a premium plane at a $150 or more cost adder, which could buy you 2-3 more low cost planes. A lot of the decision process comes down to money, as with many things. If you have the money, go for that LN or Veritas. If you don’t, my recommendation is to find someone with well tuned low cost planes you can try out so that you know how one acts and feels. It’s worth the gas money to drive a couple of hours if needed. Perhaps a tool dealer would allow a test drive – take your own wood and a broom and dust pan. Make sure the blade is sharp enough to shave with. Take oak, hard maple, something with some difficulty. Soft stuff like fir, pine, poplar is too easy. A well tuned plane will sail through hardwood. They might even have a plane at reasonable cost that you take home.

If these aren’t options, start with the low cost Stanley design 4 or 4-1/2 and follow my tuning blog (or others) to get it humming. Yes, it can take hours upon hours to educate yourself on tuning and use. I view the time I spent learning about handplanes as some the most interesting, frustrating, and best time I’ve ever spent woodworking, and some valuable education. Maintain faith that many have been successful at getting those Stanley planes to work.

The Church of ‘Leave me Alone, Please’

By: Christopher Schwarz | May 1, 2014

During the last 17 years that I have been using a honing guide to sharpen, I’ve been approached (sometimes nearly assaulted) by people who want to teach me to sharpen freehand.

My response: “I sharpen freehand all the time.”

They don’t believe me, and so they spend an hour or so to show me how they hone their edges. Then they want me to try their technique and say: “That’s fantastic! I’m throwing away my guide.”

So far, that hasn’t happened.

Some backstory: When I first learned to sharpen in 1993, instructor Lynn Sweet insisted we learn to do it freehand. He didn’t even tell us that honing guides existed. Later, when I joined the magazine staff in 1996, I asked then-Associate Editor Jim Stuard to show me his sharpening regimen. It was freehand. And so that’s how I learned how to do it.

After reading Leonard Lee’s book “The Complete Guide to Sharpening” (Taunton Press), I decided to try an inexpensive Eclipse guide (what we now call the side-clamp honing guide). It gave me edges that were consistent, less-prone to error and (with apologies to the freehanders) faster.

And so during the last 10 years, I have taught both freehand sharpening and sharpening with a guide. I think it’s useful to know both techniques. I like to use a side-clamp jig for edges that are straight or slightly curved. And I like to sharpen freehand for edges that are skewed, curved, V-shaped or weirder.

I’ve also spent a lot of time observing the sharpening routines and edges produced by freehanders, both professional and amateur. While they tell me they can produce a good edge from a completely dull edge in less than a minute, I have yet to see someone do this before my eyes and let me use their edge. Either it takes them five or six minutes, or the finished edge is sub-optimal compared to what I use.

But these are just my observations. I’m sure there are people out there who can do this; I just haven’t encountered them yet.

So I’m going to ask you one last time: Please don’t try to convert me, and I won’t try to convert you. And why are we discussing something that is as enjoyable as taking out the garbage? Making tools dull is far more fun than making them sharp.

— Christopher Schwarz

I don’t like Stanley or Veritas factory totes. I made modifications to the drawings provided by Lee Valley. The result is kind of in between the two designs. I start with stock about 1-1/4” thick and end up slightly less. The designs adjust the tote angle, making the Stanley more upright and giving the LV tote a little more angle. The front lower and rear upper radii are smaller and the positions adjusted to affect the hand angle and provide more vertical room for larger hands. My size 10 hands just don’t fit into Stanley totes. The LV totes were given a bit more angle, and made slightly wider, to improve ergonomics for me. They do extend past the cast base, especially in the back, but I’m more concerned with ergonomics vs looks. I made my totes from crotch walnut with matching knobs. Edited drawings are included after the pictures below.

I made router table templates and jigs, cut blanks on the bandsaw, trimmed the blanks with a router trim bit, curved the edges with a 3/8” roundover bit (taking about three passes at increasing depth to prevent tearout), and blended everything with files and sandpaper to get the final shape. All holes were drilled with a drill press using forstner and brad point bits. I used a digital angle gauge to determine the angle for each plane, and used the angle gauge to set the angle on the drill press. I also made vice “jigs” for the Stanley and LV designs that clamp through the tote long bolt holes to hold the totes for shaping. I made several oak prototypes to work out the process and final shape, including practice with handfiles since I hadn’t done much carving previously. A lot of time and effort, but I was making a dozen totes, and now I have the templates and jigs for any I want or need to make in the future.
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.Stanley, Modified Stanley, LV, Modified LV
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. Modified Stanley, Stanley, Modified LV, LV

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. Modified Totes on planes – Stanley in back, LV in front – about the same angle

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. Stanley 3&4

Stanley 5 & up

Lee Valley/Veritas – this doesn’t look like that much of a change, but it will surprise you.

This tutorial is about the process I use to create a segmented bowl, or about any segmented turning item. After researching many methods and trying many of them, I’ve been able to put together a fairly simple and robust process that uses as few specialty tools or jigs as I could. Where possible I used existing jigs and tools that I already had and others may also have.

#1 – Design

Once you have the approximate size, shape, and feature designs of the end item to build, the number of ring layers and segments need to be determined. There are several approaches to this, but I like to use the software program Segmented Project Planner (SPP – I did a review here). I find it allows me to change the design all I want very quickly (compared to manual methods). Ring layer thickness and the number of segments are variable, and the program generates a cut list with all pertinent data to know material thickness, width, and segment length. I will mention that if you want rings less than ½” tall, glue the thinner material to the material for an adjacent ring prior to cutting segments (allow for a little trimming in the material width for post glue clean up). Trying to glue segments less than ½” is just too much of a pita.

Think through what your process will be at each step and make sure your equipment can handle the size (if you plan to use a 12” disc sander to flatten ½ ring ends, then the largest ring is limited to ~12”). If it’s a long/tall item, such as a vase or lamp, it probably needs to be made into upper and lower halves, inside turning completed, then assembled prior to OD turning. You also need to determine how the bowl will be held to the lathe spindle and accommodate the design and process for it. I used a ¼” deep tenon cut into the base layer of the bowl in this tutorial.

#2 – Material Prep

SPP provides a cut list by layer for the material. I find that my planer leaves an adequate top and bottom surface and I don’t need to plane or sand them, but that’s going to be an individualized decision based on planer knife condition. Those surfaces will be worked again after the rings have been glued up. The sides of the material do need to be straight so they register properly against a fence when cutting segments, but surface finish is irrelevant – it will all be turned off on the lathe. I usually run a hand plane down each side of the table saw ripped surface to check straigntness. Perpendicularity to the top and bottom surfaces is not critical. I generally cut the stock a few inches longer than the cut list value to allow for a safe distance from the table saw blade, and add a bit to the width to allow for any clean up needed.

#3 – Segment Cutting

There are plenty of places to find details and equations to determine angles, lengths, etc. online. I use the SPP info. I’m a big TS sled user and not much of a miter gage user. For the 1st segmented bowl I did, I thought I would give the miter a try, and then build a sled if needed. I didn’t need to. In the picture below is the Bosch 4100 OEM miter with a shop made fence, with the angle being set with a giant protractor. This gets me very close, and I’ll make tiny adjustments if needed as I cut layers. I never get it perfect, but so close that an adjustment throws it out the other way. I did come across a “wedgie” that someone makes that is for a double fence sled. I’m sure it works, and it would take out the step of straightening ½ rings (covered later), but I’m not running a production shop. In the overall scheme of a project it isn’t a great time saver.
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The picture below shows setting cut length on the saw. I take the SPP generated segment length and multiply it by the Cosine of the segment angle and add the saw kerf in, then measure with calipers. The “stop” in the picture is a thin rip guide with the bearing removed (I already had the guide). The adjustable “fence” can be snugged in place and the miter guide will still move in the slot. A piece of wood with double stick tape works as well, just put a mark on the table inline with the blade to measure from.
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Picture below shows everything set to cut a segment. After each cut, the material is flipped upside down, resulting in angled cuts on each end like a pie. This is using the “economy” method. There is another method for grain matching that I won’t cover here – it can be researched online.
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I find I do not need to sand the ends of the segments. With a sharp blade and the blade set perpendicular, the ends are flat and “square” enough for gluing. I just knock off any tear out on the segment ends so it doesn’t end up in a glue joint. After the 1st layer, lay the rings out and butt them together to check the cut angle. It will rarely be perfect and doesn’t have to be. I will usually go with ~0.020” gap between ½ rings without angle adjustment. I find I start chasing the gap from inside to outside trying to get closer, and it doesn’t really matter unless you are making 48 or 96 segment rings

#4 – Segment & Ring Glue up

I glue up ½ rings first, then the whole. Reference the pic below. This method ensures tight joints, and accumulates angle error at the ½ ring gaps, which is addressed in the next step. The small amount trimmed from the segments at the end of each ½ ring is not noticeable – don’t tell the admirer of your project and they will never know.

I lay out the segments, 12 in this case, with a ½” dowel to separate the ½’s. Use hardwood dowels – softwood can collapse, unevenly, giving a poor glue up. I apply glue to each segment end for the entire ring at one time. I go around the ring twice, in order, to apply glue. It is end grain and will absorb more glue. The ½ ring ends are left dry. I then assemble the ring with dowels in place using stainless hose clamps. I use a cordless drill and set the clutch on 4, not a real tight clamp. Many use rubber bands or inner tubes. Have a soft blow hammer or a mallet ready to tap/hammer segments in to final position. Segments need to be level on top/bottom and the outer corners aligned. Sometimes I have to let off clamp pressure to get things lined up, which is why I like the hose clamps. All of the hose clamps get a good coating of wax to prevent glue from sticking. I use Titebond III, and any quality wood glue will work. I like the longer open time. I use freezer paper, with plastic on one side, under the rings to keep the glue from sticking and to make clean up easy – throw it away instead of scraping glue off the bench. Glue will get everywhere, and that’s ok. It will all be machined off the piece.
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After a couple of hours the glue has set enough to make the ½ ring ends parallel. Many use a disc sander, which I don’t have. I have used a shooting board and plane, but easiest method I have found is to use a sled on the table saw. I already had the sled in the pic below, a Charles Neil design taper leg sled, available on his website. Just line the ends up, clamp, and cut.
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The two ½’s are then clamped in hose clamps again to make a whole ring. The pic below shows a full ring, except for the center. If your base ring will be segmented like this one, DO NOT try to get the points to come out perfectly. It is an exercise in futility. This ring has about a ¼” hole left in the center, which will be drilled out to a ½” for my clamping fixture. You can see how it is not perfectly round. The hole is plugged prior to turning. I don’t have a picture of it, but on one side of this base ring I cut a ¼” deep rabbet on the lathe, creating a tenon, to grip in a chuck.
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. #5 – Flattening Rings
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The top and bottom surfaces need to have the glue cleaned off and need to be flat enough to make a good glue joint (you decide how flat that is, everyone has their own opinion). I try for ~0.10” on each surface determined by a straight edge across the ring. There are several methods, such as disc sanders and sanding discs on the lathe. I use a couple of methods depending on ring wall thickness.

For full rings like above, or rings with wall thickness more than ~1-1/2”, I use a planer. First though, using flat jaws, I will flatten one side of the ring on the lathe so it won’t rock on the sled. I am not good enough to get them flat enough for gluing directly off the lathe so I will plane the lathe turned side also. I’ve used sandpaper on the lathe, but since I’m going to plane anyway, it’s cleaner and just as fast to plane them. For thinner rings, I can get them flat enough on the lathe using scrapers and sanding.

Planing does create a little chip out when exiting a segment with grain parallel to the blades, but 1) it’s minimal, 2) I locate the ring with a joint perpendicular to the planer blades, so the grain is at a slight angle. I use a sled made of coated particle board for shelving. I use double sided turning tape to hold the rings down. About 4 x 1” long x ¾” wide pieces of type have been enough to hold the rings. I use 4×4” long “rails” (pieces of wood), 2 at the front and 2 at the back, overlapping a ring by ~1”, to set the planer cutter head entering before and leaving after the rings. These are also held by turner’s tape. I will plane multiple rings at one time that are within `1/16” thickness, but they need to overlap one another or snipe will put a dip in the rings. Sometimes I’ll use “rails between rings. I allow the rings to dry overnight before flattening.

#6 – Bowl Glue Up

You want the least amount of run out of the bowl after glue up. There are several methods used for aligning the rings concentrically, one being to use the lathe and a cone, as well as several approaches to shop made presses. I didn’t want the lathe tied up for gluing, and wanted something effective but cheap. After a few iterations, here is what I came up with.

I used a couple of 1’ square pieces of the coated shelving material for the press, with a ½” hole in the center. A 12” piece of ½” allthread rod is secured in the center hole of one piece with nuts and washers, making it perpendicular to the board. The pic below shows the press with an 8 layer glue up. On top the small square pieces of wood are just spacers so the nut doesn’t have to be ran down all the threads. The bowl is positioned upside down when built up on the press, one layer at a time. The small pieces of wood located on the bowl rim and sitting on the bottom board of the press are to hold the 1st ring in position as the other layers are added. They are held in place with turner’s tape.
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Below is a pic of the cones used to radially align the layers for concentricity. These are made from ¾” MDF. For each cone, I marked and rough cut two discs of each size with a jigsaw, then glued them together. I then used a circle jig on the bandsaw, with the table tilted 45°, to cut each cone to size. Each cone was then mounted on the lathe, and the cone cleaned up, sanded, and well sealed with shellac to harden the surface and resist absorbing liquid. A coat of wax helps them slide and prevent glue sticking to them. A ½” hole was drilled in the center of each to locate on the allthread shaft in the press, and a larger hole drilled halfway through the disc to clear the nut holding the shaft to the lower board of the press when locating the 1st layer.
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The pic below shows the press with a cone in place. You can just see the upper rim of the cone sticking out under the upper board of the press. I mark each layer with the outline of the mating layers to know where glue needs to be applied, and then 2 segments, 180° apart, are marked in the middle. Each layer is offset a ½ segment, aligning the ½ way segment marks with a glue seam, to give a “brick layering” construction. This provides a lot of structural integrity to the shape. I apply glue to both surfaces of the joint, lay the ring layer on the press, put the cone on, the upper board, spacers, washer, nut, then turn the layer being glued back and forth to spread glue and start seating the layer. I use levels set perpendicular to each other on top of the upper press board to make sure the cone is level and properly centering the ring. It’s an iterative process as I tighten the nut on top. Once the nut is snugged up, I let it sit for at least 5 minutes, then move on to the next layer. By the time the next layer is added and being moved around, the previous layer has been in contact for over 10 minutes, has taken a good set, and doesn’t move. You can stop at any level and wait for a later time, but put the press together and apply pressure to all the layers assembled to that point before leaving it. After all the layers are assembled, I snug the press down well and leave it at least an hour. I do like to let the glued up assembly sit out of the press unrestrained for 8-10 hours minimum (overnight) to let the glue dry and stresses to relieve.
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. #6 – Turning The Bowl

Here is the glue up mounted on the lathe ready for turning. I didn’t have much vibration at all from this glue up. It was well within 1/8” run out, not bad for 8 layers about 6” tall and 13-1/2” in diameter. As you can see, I don’t worry about excess glue. It all gets turned off in the process, so I don’t waste any time concerning myself with it. I highly recommend wearing a face shield during the roughing process. The glue chips can hurt when hit in the face with them. While bowl gouges can be used for roughing, with the interrupted cuts and the dried glue, I prefer carbide inserts (reviewed here and here). Scrapers can also be used.
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Here are pics of the finished turning, and the finished bowl. I use a combination of bowl gouges and scrapers once the glue is gone, and power sanding as needed. The wood is Walnut and Soft Maple. The bowl was dyed with Transtint dye in Target EM4000 stain base, and finished with a light coat of thinned oil based poly on the lathe.
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Clamping cauls are superior to dowels and biscuits for aligning panel glue ups. No, they don’t align the ends of the boards, but biscuits have too much play to do so, and have too much play to align the board edges. Dowels will align the ends, but you need one every 10-12 inches to get the edges to align, and good luck hammering all your pieces together. Various router bit profiles can align the board edges, provided you set the bit exactly right, but provide no end alignment. Granted, you have to buy or make clamping cauls, but they are easy to make and you will have them ready. Once made, they are much easier and quicker to use than the other methods listed. Cauls can also be used to clamp plywood edge banding, shelves into case work, anywhere you need even clamping over a distance. The picture below is an example of using them for panel glue ups.
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Cauls can be made out of any wood any size. For simplicity, we will deal with standard construction lumber grade Douglas fir 2×4 studs here. It’s cheap, readily available, and almost as strong as oak in bending. Select the best you can find – straight grain no knots preferred. I find a 36” length makes for a good general size. It will work for panels up to 36” wide without alignment dowels, and ~32” with alignment dowels, just depending on where you put the dowels (located at each end of the bottom caul – see below).
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First I’ll discus design elements, then the process. The inside surfaces (that touch wood) need to be radiused so that force is applied from the center out to the edge of the panel. This force keeps the boards across the panel aligned. Plastic packing tape is applied to these surfaces and waxed to prevent glue sticking. One F style clamp is placed on top and bottom of the cauls at each edge of the panel being glued (not the end of the cauls which would cause the center to actually lift when tightened). The alignment dowels at each end simply keep the cauls aligned while tightening the clamps. Trying to keep them aligned by hand while clamping is not as easy as you might think. The “feet” on the bottom caul lift the caul off the work surface so the F clamp can be easily put in place without having to lift the caul and panel. I just screw them to the bottom and they can pivot to align with the caul for storage.
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Now for the process to make them. I rip pieces down to ~ 1-1/2” wide on the Table saw. The width of the piece becomes the vertical “thickness” of the caul. I find that with 1-1/2” thick fir, this width provides the right amount of stiffness to provide the right amount of clamping across the panel. 2” wide material required too much clamp force to bring the edges together, and thinner pieces didn’t provide enough clamp across the piece. The ripped surfaces become the top and bottom of each caul. I plane or joint or hand plane all surfaces to get them somewhat flat. The surfaces that will touch wood should be as flat and straight as you can get them. Next is creating the radius. I found a lot of interesting, complicated methods to do this while contemplating how I wanted to do it. This is a very simple method using a machine or hand plane.
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Refer to the drawing below. In the center of the top caul, counter bore a hole part way through. Then drill a pilot hole for the screw size (I use a #8) all the way through both top and bottom pieces. Now drill a screw thread clearance hole in the top piece, from the counter bore through the board.
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Refer to the picture below. Spacers are placed between the boards at each end. Depending on the length of the cauls, the spacers vary to provide the right amount of radius.
24” ~3/8”
36” ~9/16”
48” ~ 3/4”
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The screw is put through the counterbore in the top piece and then screwed into the lower piece and tightened until the boards touch in the center (the clamp in the picture represents the screw). The curved outside surfaces are now planed down to be flat and parallel. Back to the screw – the screw length and counterbore depth are selected such that when the screw has collapsed the gap, the screw tip does not protrude to screw up whatever planing method you choose. Use a clamp to help the screw pull the pieces together. I use a hand plane to flatten the curve, starting at the center of each board, and alternating direction every few passes, and finish with a few light passes the length of the board.
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Remove the screw, and you now have perfectly curved radii on each board. The holes for the alignment dowels and clearance holes in the other caul can be drilled at any time, but wait to insert the dowels until now. I make the dowels a slip fit and put a screw through the side to hold them in place. The dowels can be removed for clamping long surfaces, and just in case a dowel breaks it is easy to replace.
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This could be done a couple of ways on a jointer. One is using a screw and spacers as described above, alternately passing each end over the cutter until the surface is flat. The other method doesn’t use a screw. For each board, start with the center of the board at the cutter, making passes until the appropriate amount of material is removed at each end of the board. I haven’t tried either method so perhaps someone can comment on the things to watch out for. I’m sure there is a way to do it with a planer, but I didn’t bother figuring out how to keep it from flopping over.
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I like to radius all edges with a round over bit in a router. The feet can also be added to the caul with the dowels. I lightly sand all surfaces and give them a couple of shellac sealing coats. The packing tape is put on the curved surface, and all surfaces get a coat of wax to prevent glue sticking. The packing tape can be replaced anytime glue builds up.

Blotching is uneven coloring on the substrate, and wood is the substrate I am discussing here. There are many ways to change the look of wood – dyes, dye stain, pigment stain, and variations of both (paint, glazes, and pigment only stains primarily sit on top of the wood and obscure it some or completely, and are not relevant to this discussion). I will simply refer to using all of these as coloring the wood, since the best method to control all of them is the same. I will discuss readily known and available products. There may be some commercial/industrial products and methods that I am not familiar with, and would not be readily available to weekenders/hobbyists.

Here is a great example of blotching (on the right) vs “fully” conditioning the wood first (on the left). You may want something in between, and that will be discussed. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, right?

Why does blotching occur?

Very simply, different species of wood, and different areas of a given board of the same wood, will absorb liquid different amounts. The more colored liquid absorbed, the more color retained in that area after the carrier has evaporated (the carrier is the liquid – water, alcohol, mineral spirits, etc. that carries the coloring agent, which is dye. The pigment stain particles are too large to travel into the wood and sit on top of it.)

There can also be uneven coloring from pigment stain, but I consider that a different from blotching. Uneven coloring from pigment is due to an uneven surface finish. The rougher areas grab more pigment particles, which causes more color to be seen by the eye. This is controlled by wood selection and surface preparation. in a porous, grainy wood like oak, the negative grain will capture a lot of pigment and typically be darker than the other areas. If you don’t like the contrast of the grain, you have two options – use a different. less porous wood, or use dye instead of pigment for coloring. Uneven sanding, or sanding with different grits in different areas of the same board, creates somewhat the same issue as a grainy wood like oak – uneven capturing of the pigment, giving an uneven coloring to the surface.

How do you control blotching?

By controlling absorption, either stopping it completely or equalizing/balancing it across the wood substrate. Either method should use a clear sealer, otherwise the unequal absorption of the coloring of the sealer will simply show through as unequal coloring of the surface, which is what you are trying to stop in the first place.

Completely sealing the surface requires all color to be on top. Very little coloring will be accomplished with dye unless it is used as a toner in a carrier, such as any top coat finish. Shellac is good as a toner carrier since it bonds to other finishes well, and a very light shade of shellac can also be used as a sealer. Pigments in stains will adhere to the scratched up surface of the sealer coat. There are various oil and water based sealers readily available for 100% sealing. It will be very difficult to get an even toner coat except by spraying. Wiping or brushing will show plenty of markings and not result in a very nice looking finish. This method tends to obscure or even obliterate the natural grain and coloring of the wood. Most of us want to enhance the look of the wood, not “paint” it out of the picture.

So, to even out the absorption across the wood surface, something needs to partially block absorption, and ideally in relation to the absorbency of the changing wood surface. One way is to flood the surface with liquid, let’s say water or mineral spirits, until absorption stops, then let some of the liquid evaporate, then apply the coloring. This method has serious drawbacks, yet there are products marketed that work this way. For a large piece, it’s impossible to insure the right timing of absorption or subsequent evaporation. The chosen liquid must be compatible with the colorant carrier, and that can then play havoc with diluting the color in some areas and not others, and it limits the colorant carriers.

A better method is to use a liquid that can be spread on the surface, and has a solids content, where after the liquid evaporates, the solids are left behind to provide the blocking of absorption in relation to the wood’s original level of absorbency. I will call this liquid with solids content a conditioner. There are three broad categories of conditioners, determined by the solvent or carrier: oil based (Stoddard, naptha, mineral spirits, etc.), alcohol (shellac), water.

Use of a wood conditioner will reduce the amount of color that stays in/on the wood vs no conditioner. Because a conditioner reduces the variation in absorption, and color, across the surface, and all or some this variation may be pleasing to your eye (grain pop, character, whatever you want to call it), there is not a “always do it this one way” process to handle all situations. Mixing ratios and # of coats can dramatically effect the outcome. Test, test, test before committing the process to a project.

Desired properties of a conditioner are:

> Long open time to allow the wood to absorb the conditioner fully, then be wiped from the surface so that no film is left preventing later absorption of the color.
> Reasonable dry/cure time. 2-6 hours vs overnight or longer.
> Clear when dry so it won’t adversely effect the coloring
> Compatible with oil, water, alcohol based chemicals when dry.

Shellac appears to be a popular choice. The issue is the short open time. It is impossible to get full absorption by the wood surface and then wipe off the excess before shellac sets up. The almost clear type works great as a 100% sealer, but not as a conditioner. Any solvent based lacquer is the same – great as a 100% sealer, no good as a conditioner (not as compatible with other products as shellac).

Oil Based – I am familiar with the Minwax, Gerneral Finishes, and Varathane products. None recommend using with water based stain or dye. I believe the Minwax and General Finishes products are 100% solvent – refer to the discussion above. The Varathane product is ~32% alkyd soya solids by volume, the same oil used in their stains. It provides a long open time and will work just fine. You can also make your own by diluting an oil based poly, alkyd, or phenolic varnish by ~75% (1 part finish to 1.5 parts thinner). Experimentation is needed with DIY or Varathane on different woods to find the mixing/# of coats process. Varathane quotes a recoat time of 30 minutes, so I think an oil based colorant could be applied at that time. Alcohol based will need to wait for full drying, probably 6-8 hrs. Both the Varathane and DIY versions will put a lot of vapors into the air as all of the solvent evaporates. A shop should be ventilated with outside air during this time.

Water Based – as far as I know, these products and methods are compatible with oil, alcohol, or water based dye and stain. I have used all three types with thinned WB topcoats and pva glue sizing without issue. The downside is that all of these products and methods do raise the grain. My method is to lightly sand the raised grain with the next higher grit than what was used to initially prep the surface.

General Finishes, Minwax, Target Coatings, and Charles Neil have products on the market. I have not used any of them, but they are all essentially an acrylic solids content with a water carrier, similar to a thinned WB topcoat or stain base. The Target product (WR4000 stain base) is a BLO emulsion and has significantly different characteristics than the others, including not drying clear (looks like a coat of BLO). The actual solids chemical make up is irrelevant as long as it doesn’t interact with topcoats or stains. They all still work by limiting absorption as previously described. I think most of these have hit the market in the last 4-5 years. I had found thinning WB topcoats did the trick, so I never had reason to try them. Thin the WB finish 50-75% (1 part finish to 1 to 1.5 parts) with water, flood the wood till absorption stops, wipe off the excess, let dry. Don’t let it pool and dry on the surface. Testing is required to determine the best thinning ratio/# of coats for the wood and application. More than two coats will begin sealing the surface and limiting the ability to color. If the finish is $50/gal, a blotch control mix would run ~ $6/qt depending on the strength.

Neil’s comments about the ingredients in his product fully support use of acrylic solids content in water, i.e. reducing a WB finish to use as a blotch controller:

Glycol ethers are commonly used in WB finishes, in the base product to set the proper curing, and are sold as retarders for the WB finishes. No new science there.

My preferred conditioner is glue sizing, made with Elmer’s Glue All mixed 1 part glue to 4-8 parts water, depending on the application. Mixed 1 to 4, a quart is ~$2, compared to as much as $25/qt for the commercial products. It’s also cheaper than using WB finish, has a long open time, in my experience dries in the same amount of time, and dries clear (sometimes I see a bit of white haze. After sanding the raised grain and applying dye, it does not appear to me to effect the color). Application is as described in the previous paragraph. Again, test, test, test to determine the right mixing percentages etc. before using on your next project.

Neil comments about glue not being a surface treatment (flaking) and refers to crackle painting. Yes to both. Using glue sizing as described, it is not a surface treatment. Properly wiped down, the remaining glue is what has been absorbed into the wood. Neither glue sizing or any reduced finish can be allowed to pool and dry on the treated surface. Using glue sizing for blotch control is not new – it’s been around for a century or 2.

With any of these methods, take it easy on the sanding. I recommend doing it by hand with the grain. It needs to be as even as possible on all surfaces. Over sanding will open up the wood in that area and create the blotching you want to control. Typically a surface is sanded up to at least 220 before coloring/finishing. Sanding, different grits, # of passes, etc. is included in the testing I know you will do.

I’ll “finish” with this – the commercial products work. The intent is to expand the knowledge base of those interested, remove some of the mystery and confusion about wood finishing, and save someone a few $’s. Buying a relatively expensive product solely for blotch control is not necessary, but if you’re uncomfortable with diy, been convinced by the snake oil salesmen that their elixir is somehow different and better, don’t want to mess up the project you put 100’s of hours in, or whatever the case may be, by all means use a commercial product. All of the same testing, running through the complete finish schedule with exactly the products and spraying, brushing, etc. still needs to be done.

Lots of questions come up concerning various “oil” and poly finishing mixtures and methods. Below are links to two articles by Bob Flexner that provide a great deal of information on the subject. The first is from 2008, the second from 2011.

http://www.popularwoodworking.com/techniques/finishing/the_basics_of_wiping_varnish2
http://www.popularwoodworking.com/techniques/finishing/oil-finishes-their-history-and-use

The short and sweet version is plain old varnish, poly/alkyd/phenolic (poly is about all that can be found these days) thinned ~1:1 with mineral spirits (or any ratio you desire) actually works as good or better than all these other magic potions because it dries hard, not soft. As Bob says, there are different “levels” that can be achieved with a wiping varnish determined by the amount left on the surface: wipe off completely, leave a thicker film, or anywhere in between. Given 5 minutes or so to fully soak into the wood, and then wiped off almost dry, wiping varnish will have the same look as BLO, but because it dries hard, provides some protection to the wood. The only thing mixing BLO with varnish accomplishes is to making a softer, less durable, slower drying finish.

I’ve found quartering the blue shop towels and folding into a “brush” makes a good applicator, as do old t-shirts etc. If you find the surface too sticky to wipe off, simply add some wiping varnish mix to the surface. This will thin it and allow it to be wiped off.

XYZ Finish looks Better

One thing Bob doesn’t discuss is color. Some of the different finishes have more color to them, and impart more color to the wood, which many people like (me included). In the picture below are the following 3 finishes in order left to right: Minwax Poly, BLO, Deft Danish Oil.

Below are each of these applied to soft maple. A heavy black line separates each one. Each was applied for ~ 5 minutes, continually keeping the surface wet, then wiped off “dry”. The poly and BLO were thinned 1:1 with MS, the Deft was not.

There isn’t much difference between the poly and BLO, but more difference may occur with more coats. The Danish Oil is noticeably darker, just as it is in the plastic cup above, though notice to a lesser degree when applied to the wood.

Below is a picture of the same piece of wood, but now showing a reddish-orange color at the far right. This was created using Minwax poly thinned 1:1 with MS, with W.D. Lockwood oil soluble dye added. This mix was applied the same as the others. As you can see, quite a bit of color can be added this way – this is just one application. You may not like the color, but this was some mixture I had left over from a project. Just about any color to varying intensities can be created this way.

Below is a picture of poly with yellow dye added on the left next to BLO on the right. Pretty close match.

All of your wipe on finishing requirements could be addressed using the same base finish, an oil based varnish, poly/alkyd/phenolic. Varying the amount of thinner will vary the application and end result, and coupled with how much is wiped off, the finished film thickness. Varnish can be purchased in different glosses, or gloss can be rubbed down in gloss with steel wool or synthetic steel wool. Oil soluble dyes, or the dye (liquid portion after settling) of oil based stains can be used to tint the varnish to the desired level. If a lot of color is desired, it’s better to use a dye or stain. Mixing color into the varnish is for a more subtle enhancement.

I like it because I can sand a surface to smooth it out or fill the grain and not have to be concerned with sanding through the film – the tinted varnish will just blend it right in, no different than all of the store bought finishes that have more color to them. Depending on the project, sometimes I will do a coat or two of highly thinned varnish with dye to get the color and surface I want by sanding or steel wool, then use just thinned varnish without added color to build a film. Dry or wet sanding works. There are many varied approaches in using wiping varnish and a little color.

There are two big advantages to this approach: 1) cost, 2) about any color can be achieved. A quart of Minwax poly is ~$11-$12, which can make 2+ quarts of wiping varnish when thinned. A gallon of MS is ~$14. The Lockwood dyes are ~$7.50-$12.50 per ounce package, that will make ~ 8 oz of intense dye (I use naptha and store in glass canning jars to prevent evaporation). That 8 ox of dye will last a long time. I get the little 2 oz plastic cups with lids at Walmart and mix up the wiping varnish in them for small projects. A set of stainless kitchen measuring spoons handle all of the measuring activities.

A lot of the bowls I have posted in my projects were finished this way.

As an engineer I’m always curious about claims of big improvements. When it comes to turning tool steel, there are a lot of marketing claims that some of the newer tool steels can get 3x to 10x more cutting time vs standard M2 HSS between sharpenings. There’s also plenty of users claiming the same type of extended life. Thing is, none of the claims by users or companies are supported by factual, objective data. Before I spent my hard earned $ on tools costing 2-5x more than common M2 HSS, I wanted something more than claims.

James T, Staley, Adjunct Prof. in the Dept. of Materials Science and Engineering at North Carolina State
University, Raleigh, conducted a scientific test of tool steels found in today’s turning tools. His findings confirm the claims of extended wear life. However, they also confirm gross exaggeration. The report is “Ranking Wear Resistance of Tool Steels for Woodturning”. A copy of the complete report can be found here (there are some other sites as well):

http://nmwoodturners.org/files/ZerbySharpening/Tool%20Wear%20Testing%20by%20Jim%20Staley.pdf

Below is his final summary chart, showing predicted relative comparative wear of the different tool steels:

His study conclusions:

> Relative wear resistance of tool steels when turning hard, dry wood rank similarly using
either measurements of corner wear or average current of a motor driving the tool into the
wood at a constant rate.

>These measures of resistance to wear increase linearly as the product of Vickers hardness
and the ratio of the volume fraction of carbides to volume fraction of the steel matrix
increases.

> Using this criterion, wear resistance of any tool steel can be calculated if these values are
known.

> All of the steels advertised as being more wear resistant than M2 are truly more resistant.
However, the relative wear resistance is less than claimed.

> Cryotreatment applied to triple tempered tool steel has no effect on wear resistance.

The report contains the methodology and test data utilized to support the conclusions. This is the only objective test I have been able to locate regarding the subject. It’s not surprising that companies make unsubstantiated claims, and it’s not surprising users support the company claims. For the companies, it’s simply called marketing. For the users, it’s called confirmation bias, which is the opposite of buyer’s remorse. In psychology and cognitive science, confirmation bias is a tendency to search for or interpret information in a way that confirms one’s preconceptions. It suggests that we don’t perceive circumstances objectively. We pick out those bits of data that make us feel good because they confirm our prejudices. We spend our hard earned $’s on something that is 5x better, and by golly, it is 5x better!

I have been fortunate enough to assemble and use an array of handplanes – Stanley Bailey bench, block, and specific use planes, oriental woodies of various sizes, Lee Valley Veritas bevel up and scraper planes, and some other assorted types. It took a while, as in 4-5 years of using, fettling, trying various methods of things and different plane designs to form up some conclusions from my experiences. I thought I would pass along these experiences, primarily with the lesser experienced in mind, to help them make better value decisions while getting started. You do not have to have premium planes or blades to get very good results. Pay a visit to Paul Sellers’ website and take in his 40+ years of hand plane use.

I use hand planes to flatten glued up panels (i.e. table tops, cabinet sides, shelves), joint boards, clean up machined surfaces, square up ends on a shooting board, and prep surfaces for finishing instead of sandpaper. I use power tools for the heavy work – table saw, planer, router, circular saw, etc. Hand planes produce a flat surface sanding cannot achieve, and my power tools can’t achieve the squareness of a shooting board. As such, I won’t be discussing jack or scrub planes – that’s too much manual labor for me and setting those planes up is easier. Blades don’t have to be as sharp and soles don’t have to be as flat. Put some camber on the blade if you want, a little or a lot, and go shave some wood.

The most significant aspects of getting a hand plane to perform, more or less in order:
(Stanley bench plane focused, but pertinent to bevel up, block, and most other hand planes)

Iron Sharpness
Sole Flatness
Chip Breaker Flatness/Bevel Angle
Frog Seating
Cap Iron Seating
Rust Prevention

I plan to do a blog entry for each.

Why a Sharp Iron?

More significant than a thicker iron or chip breaker is a sharp iron. Once I used a plane with a truly razor sharp iron, everything else became secondary. All of the hubbub about thicker replacement irons and chip breakers became marketing noise. The standard iron and chip breaker perform just as well as the Veritas replacements in my #7 for quite a while. Yes, the A2 Veritas iron holds its edge longer, and the thicker parts allow me to get results with a bit duller blade. But, I get excellent results in all my Stanley Bailey and block planes with standard irons and chip breakers.

I experienced the chattering, skipping, and difficulty in getting consistent “fluffy” shavings that many new users do, and then I figured out how to get truly sharp edges – an “aha!” moment.

How To Get It Sharp

The majority of this blog post relates to the honing part of sharpening, Because that’s where “sharp” is created. A small entry at the end discusses grinding primary bevels. This method is the same as advocated by Lie Nielsen, but uses different jigs and lapping film vs waterstones. The short jigs require the wheel to roll on the abrasive media and contaminate the next finer abrasives, and waterstones require flattening – that’s why I don’t use them.

There appears to be universal agreement as to what constitutes sharpness – from Ron Hock:

“A sharp edge only exists where two planes (i.e., the back and the bevel of a plane iron or chisel, or the two bevels of a knife) meet with zero radius. “

There does exist, however, significant discussion about how to get there. One of the main areas of discussion is free hand vs. jig use. I was never able to achieve a razor sharp edge (plane or knife) free hand. I’m sure part of that is learning the skill. However, referring to the accepted definition of a sharp edge, it is impossible to get as close to a zero radius free hand vs a jig. One may get close enough for their personal taste/use, and it will be quicker than using a jig. But, the free hand radius will not be as small, and will likely contain several edge lines along the length of the edge, and will therefore not hold a usable level of sharpness for as long. So, over a period of use, the extra time to use a jig is paid back through extended edge life.

Also, the smoother the edge is the longer it will last. The higher the grit of the abrading material (sandpaper, oil or water stone, film, etc.), the deeper the scratching in the edge, creating a serrated edge like a knife. The more serrated an edge is, the quicker micro fractures of the steel occur and the edge wears down more quickly. Many support the use of stropping edges on leather with one of many compounds. While stropping will produce a sharp edge (I can shave hair and cut paper with it!), I am not aware of any of the compounds having grit as small as the 0.3um film I use. The larger the grit, the more of a serrated edge and the faster the edge wears down. Stropping is typically done freehand, and it is impossible to hold an angle as well as a jig. Wet sharpeners, such as Tormek, Grizzly, Sheppach, at least hold a constant angle, however the stone, even dressed to fine, leaves relatively large scratches, which result in sharp, serrated edges that break down faster. If you can find actual submicron compound, and use it on a fresh leather wheel of a wet sharpener, on a blade that has been honed down to 5um or less, then you might be in business.

Another issue with stropping – what happens to the metal particles that are worn away? The wire edge that may be broken off on the strop? There is no way to clean the metal particles off the strop. They embed in the leather (or mdf or other soft substrate) to continue to scratch up that edge and add serrations to it.

This is one area where I kind of disagree with Paul Sellers – leather stropping is a mainstay of his honing process. I think I understand Paul’s perspective – simple, economical methods that will work that most anyone can do. I think this method is about as economical and produces superior, longer lasting edges.

This method is a bit more involved, perhaps not as easy to fully understand, and will probably take a few minutes longer per edge sharpened vs Paul’s method. It takes me ~ 8-10 minutes/edge (not counting creating a primary bevel if needed). Choose any method you wish, as there are many that will produce a sharp edge, and last for a while at least. I chose this method because the proof of how and why it is the best method for the sharpest, longest lasting edges exists, and it is not that expensive (<$100 for everything). This method sounds more difficult than it is. It’s no different than any other jig or fixture you make for your shop.

But my edges look like a mirror! We are talking about very small scratches not visible with anything less than maybe 50x magnification, perhaps more. I encourage you to look at Brent Beach’s webpages (http://www3.telus.net/BrentBeach/) where you can see edges at 200x mag.

Method

For most of the following, I credit Brent Beach for getting me started on the path to an economical, sure fire method to get razor sharp edges repeatedly. I’ve made a few changes in the method, as well you may also, but the concept is the same. An example: Brent uses baby oil to lube and wash away particles. After trying many fluids, I have settled on water with some dish soap and a little water emulsion grinding coolant to prevent rust. Window cleaner works well also.

It’s the scary sharp method with a couple of important aspects:

1) Plastic backed abrasives vs paper backed,
2) Micro Bevels Front & Back.

The plastic backed “lapping film” lasts far longer than paper – probably 15 to 20x or more. My experience is that you may get a couple of blades sharpened before having to change the sheet of sandpaper – I can sharpen 15 to 20 or more edges before switching with lapping film. The grit is adhered to the film much more strongly for the film vs sandpaper. But – sandpaper is acceptable to try out this method. It is difficult to find sandpaper with fine enough grit for final polishing. P2500 has 8.4 um grit, 10x above what the final polishing needs to be accomplished with. Any abrasive – waterstones, oilstones, etc. can be used. A challenge with these is getting the jig at the same relative height of each different grit stone, since stones can wear at different rates, and the relative height is very important to create micro bevels. Cost of stones at the very fine end starts getting prohibitive as well. Any mix of abrasives can be used, it just gets difficult to ensure surfaces are at the correct level relative to one another. In his video “The Perfect Edge”, Ron Hock uses lapping film to demonstrate sharpening techniques, and advocates the use of them for beginners as a less expensive method to get started.

I currently use 3M brand lapping film coated with aluminum oxide – 266×30um, 12um, 3um, and 268×0.3 um. The lapping film is PSA backed, and mounted to ¼” thick glass from a local window store. Using a little soapy water, just like window tint film, makes installation (air bubbles) easier. The glass is glued to a piece of masonite, as can be seen in the picture below. I use simple shop made jigs of different lengths and angles (30°) depending on the blade:

Micro Bevels

Micro bevels are simply very narrow bevels across the width of the blade. Their sole purpose is to reduce the amount of surface area which needs to be honed to a smoother finish, reducing the amount of steel removed, honing strokes, time required, and abrasive wear.. Both sides of the blade must be honed, the bevel side and the flat side. See Fig 1 – micro bevel sizes exaggerated. I typically have a primary bevel and 3 micro bevels on the bevel side made in 0.75° to 1° increments. A micro bevel is created with 25um, then a shim is added uner the jig and a micro bevel is made with 12um, then the shim is exchanged for a thicker one and another micro bevel is made with 3um. I then use the same shim and polish further with 0.3um. I use one micro bevel on the back side. This is conceptually the same as the “Charlesworth ruler trick”. Wooden (or any material) shims of varying thickness, topped with sandpaper to hold the bottom of the jig, are used to get the degree increments for the micro bevels. My shims for the 2.7” tall jig are 0.085” & 0.160”, and for the 3-1/2” tall jig are 0.105” and 0.210”. The geometry Law of Sines can be used to calculate shim thicknesses and blade projection for various desired angles. This gets a bit tedious with the math and I may make a separate entry for it. The blade projection can be repeated by using a board with blocks attached at the required distances, or a digital angle gauge can be used. the jigs use 8×32 hanging bolts – machine screw threads on one end, wood screw threads on the other end, and round brass “nuts” from Lowe’s.

Fig 1

I typically create a primary bevel that is ~5° less than the finished bevel angle desired, for both bevel up or bevel down blades. I use a 25um DMT Duosharp to complete the primary bevel, and make a few passes on it first when resharpening to remove enough material to ensure I get any nicks out of the edge. Also, I use a piece of leather to break the wire edge formed by grinding, and an Arkansas stone flat on the back to initially smooth the edge. Generally at least part of the wire edge will bend over to the primary bevel side and will need to be removed. For the first couple of strokes on the first micro bevel, pull the blade toward you vs pushing. This will ensure any wire edge is broken off and not cut into the lapping film. Do the same on the back of the blade.

Initially you will probably cut the film a few times – I certainly did. I haven’t cut a piece of film in a long time. You learn how to handle the blades and not slice the film. It is my long term solution rather than fussing with the mess of water stones and the unending hassle of keeping them flat.

Back Bevel – I use small pieces of glass with lapping paper adhered. The shim is hi tech – a piece of plastic milk jug plastic about 0.016” thick attached to the back of the blade with masking tape. Each blade is marked with a line etched with a carbide awl at 1-1/2” from the edge. There is nothing magical about the shim thickness or distance. This arrangement gave me enough of an angle and was located far enough away from the jig holding the blade to be able to work the back bevel. I place the glass at the edge of a table, flip the blade/jig over so the top of the jig hangs off the table, and work the blade side to side and some front to back. I will use the 25um and 12um film some, but primarily the 3um and 0.3um do the polishing.

Blade Camber

I “bevel” the blade corners to prevent “plane tracks”. The bottom of the jigs is cut at an angle and the jig is held against the flat on each side to create the bevel (exaggerated in drawing) . Smoother blades get side bevels and a little pressure on the top of each side of the blade to create a very slight camber across the blade.

Primary Bevel Grinding

How the primary bevel is generated isn’t that important as long as the angle is correct, and the edge is square to the blade sides. A grit of ~60um, P220, is sufficient. Going finer requires a little less work in creating the 1st micro bevel. Belt sanders, bench grinders, wet sharpeners, water stones, sandpaper/lapping film all work. For manual work, an extra coarse/coarse diamond bench stone is my preference – they cut fast and don’t need flattening. Notice oil stones are not included. They just cut too slow for the major material removal required here. Wet sharpeners like Tormek, Grizzly, and Sheppac work (I currently use a 10” Grizzly), but only with O1 steel. A2, PM-V11, and HSS blades cut very slow and require frequent dressing with a diamond wheel dresser to keep the cutting rate up. If I were starting from scratch I’d probably go with an 8” bench grinder with friable wheels and a Tormek BGM-100 allowing use of Tormek accessories, or a belt sander with a good shop made jig. But, the Grizzly with Tormek accessories works great for my lathe tools so I’m sticking with it. Here is my review of the Tormek accessories.

Why Sole Flatness?
Convex (bulging out) and concave (hollowed out) soles will cause uneven cut depths and skipping and chattering. For a convex shape, the plane rocks front to back and/or side to side. A concave shape will cause heavier cuts at the start and end of a surface, and possibly no cut in the middle. Different amounts of downward hand pressure can affect each stroke causing more confusion. Even with a very flat sole varying downward pressure will affect the cut. Reduce the variables as much as possible. A smoother should be FLAT – ideally within 0.0005”; a jointer within 0.002-0.003”; a jack within ~0.005”. The flatter the better. Not the entire surface but the areas hilited in the picture:

You can see the faint remnants of magic marker used to measure progress.

How To Get Sole Flatness

Check the sole with a straight edge with a light behind it. I use the ruler from a carpenter’s square, but anything perfectly straight works – the thinner the better. Also, mark the sole with a magic marker and stroke the plane on sandpaper on a flat surface without much downforce. I use plate glass glued to masonite fiber board that is 22” long x 9” wide – 2 sheets of sandpaper just fit. Tables for saws and jointers work, I just don’t like having to remove the sandpaper and clean up the table to use the machine. I leave paper attached to the glass for various lapping activities. A light spray of aerosol adhesive at each end of the sandpaper holds it to the glass. I have found a resin coated type sandpaper is best – similar to sanding belts and just as effective.

The primary concern is flatness, not smoothness or surface finish. If you want to polish the sole to a mirror shine, it won’t hurt anything, but I don’t find it helps. After planing a few boards the sole gets scratched up anyway. I start with 50-60 grit paper, and maybe work up to 120. Anything beyond that looks better, but doesn’t help friction after the sole is waxed. I use furniture paste wax with no silicone. During use I use a crayon, paraffin, or a candle to wax the sole. Some use feeler gauges to check flatness. I find that if the magic marker is getting removed fairly evenly by the sandpaper (see pic above), a 0.0005” feeler gauge won’t fit.

It is important to clamp, or wedge, the blade in place just as it will be in use, but retracted from contact (~0.020” or so) with the sandpaper. All handles should be in place and tight. The points of contact with the plane body do create stress and cause the sole to move. I find holding the tote to push and pull, and using my other hand to apply downward pressure in different spots, depending on where the high spots are, works best. I will apply significant downward pressure initially if quite a bit needs to come off, and let up on the pressure as the sole starts to flatten out. Check the sole often with the straight edge so you know you are addressing the correct area. I’ll finish the flattening (and all smoothing/polishing steps) applying light downward pressure, just like planing. I use a shop vac with a brush tip to vacuum the iron dust and loose abrasive particles every few minutes. I have had to spend several hours to get a flat sole, but that was because I didn’t use aggressive enough grit to start. I will usually mark the sole and make a few passes at 120, then decide how aggressive of a grit will be needed.

The edges of the plane sole need to be rounded or tapered a bit (front, back, each side) so the sole doesn’t hit a sharp edge in the wood and stop (such as the misalignment of board edges in a panel glue up) and the sides can glide over sharp edges when skewing the plane. If the sole has fairly sharp corners, I’ll use a file to break the edge and round it over to about 30°. Starting with 120 paper, I hold the plane at different angles over to about 30° as I stroke it on the paper, and sand the ends by hand. It is not a lot of material removal.

I have used large granite inspection tables at work to flatten soles, and find they do not work any better than the glass/masonite setup. The glass does need to be supported on a fairly flat surface for the entire length, such as a workbench. It will bend if not supported. The 22” length will handle up to a #5 length. Longer planes like a #7 or #8 will need a longer surface. You do not want each end extending off the sandpaper more than an inch or so as you stroke it through, as it will cause a concave surface.

Cap iron or chip breaker, blade or iron – Some folks write treatises about which term is “correct”. I use the one that comes to mind, they mean the same thing.

Chip Breaker Function

The chip breaker adds mass to the blade and adds stiffness to the blade, and with the lever cap pushing down, seats breaker & blade flat on the frog, creating more blade stiffness (cap iron). A very important, but lesser known, function of the chip breaker is to create a force down the wood fibers as they curl up from the cutting edge, down into the wood before the edge cuts it, reducing tear out. A steep bevel, 0.020”-0.030” tall, at an angle of 70°-80° to the blade, will achieve this. Typically chip breakers will have a bevel of 30°-45°, which does not turn the chip abruptly enough to create sufficient force down the fiber to prevent tear out. This doesn’t make a standard 45° bevel down plane equal to a high angle smoother, but it is a definite performance improvement. Always remember a sharp blade is the first step to reducing tear out.

Another method of tear out reduction is to put a relatively high angle bevel (10°-20°) for the blade back bevel (on top of the blade). This works very well, but I find it a real pain to create and maintain that type of back bevel due to the difficulty of honing off the wire edges.

The chip breaker needs to seat to the blade along a single line at the tip of the breaker to prevent chips from getting under the breaker. Also, the lever cap should contact the chip breaker across the entire width so that clamping force is equal. The chip breaker also “carries” the blade, allowing depth of cut adjustments.
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Get The Most From The Chip Breaker

If you have not looked at the research done on cap irons by Kawai and Kato please do. Here is a link to their video (translated) http://vimeo.com/41372857 , and a link to a good explanation with pictures and diagrams by David Weaver: http://www.woodcentral.com/articles/test/articles_935.shtml I put a 70°-80° bevel on the front of the chip breaker. Aftermarket chip breakers can benefit from this as well as thinner factory Stanley or other brands.

I observed far more effect in tear out reduction from a steep chip breaker bevel than a tight plane mouth. In the video, notice Kawai and Kato did not have anything holding the wood fibers down ahead of the blade. Closing up the mouth just frustrated me with clogging. With a steep breaker bevel, the frog will have to be moved back to open up the mouth more than the standard “about chip thickness”. Something else to help clogging is to file an angle at the top front of the mouth – see Dwg 1 below. I use a small file from below, angled as far forward as possible without hitting the stiffening beam running across the plane body. I file down about 1/2 the casting thickness.

The chip breaker set distance from the blade edge is important. I set the chip breaker from ~0.005” to ~0.100”, depending on the cut depth and wood grain. For more of a jack plane cut, it’s far back. For very fine smoothing in tough grain, it is set as close as possible, 0.004-0.005”, and depth is 0.001” – tissue thin. Typically softwoods do not require as close of a setting as hardwoods. Because of the force generated by turning the chip so sharply, more force is required to push the plane. For very fine smoothing (0.001”) it’s not really noticeable, but once you get to 0.004”-0.005” thick shavings it is very noticeable.

Shavings generated with this set up vary depending on breaker set distance and depth of cut. They can be fairly straight, wavy or wrinkly, or accordion. Straight is best as long as it controls tear out. Keep moving the breaker closer to the edge to prevent tear out. The shavings will start to get wrinkly and wavy, and eventually take on an accordion look as the breaker is moved closer. The change in the chip is caused by the chip having to change direction more and more abruptly, increasing the force through the shaving. The accordion look is caused by total failure of the wood fibers. This is the same look shavings from my 63° high angle smoother have. Get a piece of wood with changing amounts grain angle and test different settings planing against the grain.

Dwg 1 below shows the various features discussed.
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Dwg 1
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. Illustration by Ellis Walentine
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Below is a pic of the setup I use to create the high bevel on the chip breaker. Make sure front of the breaker above the new bevel is smooth and burr free. Some light sanding after creating the bevel can take care of issues.
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The bottom surface of the breaker that contacts the blade needs to be flattened at an angle that will create line contact with the iron and prevent chips being driven under the breaker (“negative rake”). It only takes the slightest angle. Mine are about 5°. Remember that the breaker gets pushed down and flattened out on the blade, using up some of the angle. Here is a pic:
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The bottom of the lever cap that contacts the chip breaker needs to be flat where the chip breaker contacts. The top of the chip breaker needs to be flat across its width where the lever cap contacts. A lot of the thin Stanley style chip breakers are not flat after stamping, and uneven pressure will be applied to the blade possibly allowing chips underneath even if the bottom of the chip breaker contacting the blade is flat. Also, poor mating of the lever cap to the CB can allow the blade to vibrate (light cuts). The surface does not have to be perfectly flat or smooth – a straight file and hand sanding works.
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The lever cap, chip breaker, blade, frog, and main casting all need to be held together well to act more or less as a single mass. Major sources of chatter are the frog not seated to the bed well, and the blade not seated on the frog well:
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. • The blade needs to seat flat against the lower 1/3rd of the frog
. • The frog needs to seat well into the main bed
. • The chip breaker needs to seat well to the blade
. • The lever cap needs to seat well to the top of the chip breaker
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Frog
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It is not difficult to get the lower 1/3rd of the frog very flat, so strive for 90% contact. I use a file initially, stroking in all directions to create a flatter surface. I then use sandpaper on glass to flatten and smooth further. In the pictures below I’ve used red layout fluid to enhance contrast. Magic marker works well too.
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Here is the blade seating area with just a few file passes. The center portion of the frog is high.

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Blade seating area after file work. Notice the top of the seating are is untouched. Only the lower 1/3 needs to be flat. In this case, a good 90% of the whole surface is flat – it just worked out that way.

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Blade seating area after a few passes on P120 sandpaper on glass. Picture is a bit fuzzy, but all is very flat and smooth now.

The better the frog seats into the plane bed the better to resist vibration and distortion when tightening everything up and in use. Below is a picture of the frog bottom at the start. I rubbed the frog on the plane bed support points. The small areas of contact show up faintly in the picture.

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Here they are after a few minutes work with a file

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To get the best frog seating, the frog should be lapped to the bed. I use automotive valve grinding compound, available for ~$4 at parts stores. Just place some on the pad areas and move the frog around over the areas. It only takes a few minutes to get the parts lapped together. All the pad surfaces were covered with layout fluid before lapping. The frog is upside down at the bottom of the picture.

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Lever Cap
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It’s debatable how much flattening the seating area of the lever cap helps, but it certainly doesn’t hurt and is quick and easy to do. If you have dressed the top and bottom of the chip breaker as described previously, and have issues with chips getting under the chip breaker or maybe some vibration, this is worth trying. Here is a cap with a few light file passes. You can see there’s not much contact.

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Here is the same cap after a few minutes work with a file and a few passes on P120 sandpaper.

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If you follow the performance tuning tips presented through this blog, you will be able to get just about any old plane to work pretty well. Make sure nothing is cracked and no bolt holes are stripped. Thanks for taking the time to read this series, and good luck!

A lot of folks use electrolysis for rust removal, which works great and if you are going to do a lot of rust removal, I recommend it. I don’t do a lot of it, and find Evapo-Rust works spectacularly to clean up even pitted parts. The product is reusable, so a gallon jug lasts quite a while. I have some different sized plastic containers depending on the size of parts, and completely submerge the parts. I cover the container to limit evaporation (Saran Wrap works great if you don’t have a lid). Every few hours I take a look. For light rust a few hours can do the trick.

The parts should be cleaned and degreased before being put in the Evapo-Rust. I use a power wire brush on pitted areas, and then wash the parts with dish soap. During rust removal I use a brass or stainless brush, or Scotchbrite pad, to rub the heavy black oxide build up areas, just leaving the parts in the container.

Some have commented they don’t like the gray color the Evapo-Rust leaves. Using a brass or stainless brush, Scotchbrite, or steel wool, while the parts are still in the Evapo-Rust, will remove most, if not all, of the grayish color. A little buffing with Scotchbrite, steel wool, or other abrasive after the parts are dry will brighten the cast iron up further.

When satisfied the rust is gone, I rinse the parts with water with some emulsion type grinding coolant added to prevent flash rust. I fill a container with water/coolant to dip rinse the parts. The first time I used Evapo-Rust, and rinsed with plain water, the parts flash rusted before I could spray something on them.

Rust Prevention
I used Remoil and various waxes for rust prevention with reasonable effectiveness. Wax is difficult to get into every nook and cranny. Remoil works pretty good, but I found an even better solution. Researching rust preventives turned up a product called Alox, a calcium based rust preventive originally developed back around WWII for naval ships. Lee Precision, maker of many ammo reloading products, has a product called Liquid Alox. It’s designed use is lubrication of cast lead bullets, but it is an excellent rust preventive. I reduce it about 20:1 with naptha, and use it in a spray bottle. I spray a little on a part and use fingers or paper towel to spread it around. It dries as a thin, hard film with a bit of a haze. It can be buffed with a cloth if desired. Previously something might get some water overspray on it and get rust spots. The Alox treated parts have had water spots from minerals left behind but no rust. I treat all my hand tools with it, including blades after sharpening. Works well on any cast iron or steel. Part of the Alox will settle out of the mixture when it sets for awhile, so it needs to be shaken before spraying.

First Handplane
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A very common question – “What planes do I start with?” – and a plethora of opinion out there to answer it! So, I thought I’d throw mine out there as well. It’s possible you are at the stage I was when I started – I didn’t know brands, sizes, types, uses – basically zip. I spent months researching – in part because I like to research and understand something I’m interested in, and because there is a lot of information and opinion about handplanes and what they’re all about. Perhaps I will provide something unique to your handplane quest.

I tend to be a pragmatic type. I got started with handplanes because I had a need that handplanes addressed that typical machines couldn’t address. As such, I’ll approach the question from a use perspective – not nostalgia, historical correctness, exact identification (type), etc. This blog entry is my opinion about which handplanes to start with (and why) to help you in woodworking, opinion formed from my personal experiences. I am not associated with any companies, experts, etc.
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Handplane Categories
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Bench planes – primarily used to dimension, flatten, and smooth lumber, and can be used to do other operations, such on a shooting board to square up ends. You may have heard of the Stanley #4. This area will be our main focus.
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Block Planes – kind of like a utility knife or utility infielder – master of none but used for a lot of things. For planing with one hand. Great for trimming pieces to fit.
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Joinery Planes – for making the joints to put boards together, like mortise and tenon (shoulder plane), rabbet joints (rabbet plane), grooves (router or combination plane), etc. Not the place to start unless that’s your only area of interest.
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Specialty Planes – all sorts of more specialized stuff – moulding, circular, compass, luthier, the list is almost endless. Not the place to start unless you’re making instruments or just work with small items.
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I will assume you know little to nothing about handplanes. There is a need to delve into a little history just to put things in perspective. If you don’t know what a Stanley Bailey #4, #5, #7, 60-1/2 are (too many to list), go to this site http://www.supertool.com/StanleyBG/stan1.htm, the bench plane page of Patrick Leach’s “The Superior Works: Patrick’s Blood and Gore” Planes #1 – #8C. Start with the 4, 4-1/2, 5, & 7. Navigate around and find the 60-1/2 block plane. These are the mainstays of handplanes. Spend some time here (it’s easy to get lost and/or confused – Stanley made a lot planes). Next find his entries on the #602-608 Stanley Bedrock series (I agree with Patrick’s opinion of bedrock planes). All of the other types of planes are included in Patrick’s site. Gaining an understanding of the different planes, their parts, uses, etc. will be helpful to you.
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I have nothing against other brands, many are as good, it’s just that Stanley was the most prolific manufacturer with the most complete catalog, and therefore the easiest to find and buy. We will discuss buying old vs new later.
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I will attempt to take you through a selection process. If you haven’t done so yet, now is a good time to visit Patrick Leach’s website and familiarize yourself with planes by the numbers. You’ll need to answer two questions to help guide the process:
. 1. What do you want to do?
. 2. How much money do you want to spend?
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“What do you want to do?” – anticipated responses:

Period Woodworking / Historical Collecting / Plane Typing

Umm, this blog is not the place. Many of the folks wishing to do this want to cover all aspects and be historically correct. While I do enjoy the history of it all, I don’t concern myself with historical accuracy. I “collect” handplanes to use, not for the sake of collecting or trading, etc. I’m not too concerned with which type I own, other than to stay away from the expensive stuff.

What’s a handplane? What’s this handplane business about?

A handplane is a hand tool that provides a way to hold a sharp edge at a set cut depth to provide controlled material (wood) removal. A couple of generations ago the smaller planers and jointers many have today weren’t as available. Handplanes were used to work wood. They come in many shapes and sizes, especially once you delve into the more specialized types. The following information may help explain what they are about.

I want to woodwork with all hand tools like the old days

Knock yourself out! Dimensioning lumber by hand in this day of relatively cheap power planers and saws is not my cup a tea – it’s a HELL OF A LOT OF WORK! But…..maybe you want to use some very wide slab lumber and not cut it down to pass through a typical 12”-13” bench planer. For whatever reason you want to do this, you’ll need a scrub plane and a Stanley #5 jack plane to start. A #5 with the front of the mouth opened up with a file and a heavy cambered blade will work as a scrub. The #5 is used to clean up after the scrub plane. These are your cheaper and easier to tune planes. There are bevel up jack planes (I have one) and I do not recommend them just for rough dimensioning of lumber – they are expensive and their real benefits are elsewhere, but they will do dimensioning. A Veritas Low Angle Jack will do about all things needed, but I wouldn’t recommend you start with one unless you’re just flush with cash.

Using handplanes to do all the work will be cheaper, right?

Yeah…….not really. You’ll need a Stanley #5 jack plane ($75) and a #7 jointer plane ($140) at a minimum. I’ve given some average prices of what I’ve seen these planes going for (including shipping) on ebay over the past couple of years (Feb 2014 now). On top of this you will need a way to sharpen the blades razor sharp. There are lots of methods but probably $200 minimum realistically, maybe more. Since you’ll be using the planes a lot, you really need something other than the “scary sharp” method. Another $25-$50 for some decent files, sandpaper, and glass or granite to tune the planes with. You really need a jointer fence, another $55 or so shipped. Up to about $500. This can take the place of a planer and jointer, which you could get for $500 and up, depending on what you buy. You will still need a smoothing plane or random orbit sander. Time to complete a project will go up 10x. I highly recommend a planer and table saw if you want to do furniture/cabinet woodworking.

There are good ways around not having a power jointer. A #7 plane is needed to flatten large panels and table tops, and is a “jointer” plane. With a fence attached, it joints boards almost as quickly, and at least as accurately, as a powered jointer. I straighten cupped and twisted boards in my planer by laying the board on a “moving bed” board and shimming the high spots. Get one side flat, flip the board over and plane normally.

I want to hack down really rough lumber before I run it through my planer

The best choice might be a drawknife, depending on the width of the lumber. They will remove a lot of wood quickly (faster than a handplane), and provide enough control for the task. About any old scrub plane not cracked and with a decent blade will do. The same with an old Stanley #5. A Stanley 12-404 can be had for under $20 new and will function well as a scrub plane.

I just want to check it out

The toughest part of this category is that to really “check it out”, you need a way to get the blade truly razor sharp. The typical “scary sharp” method will work up to a point. Check out my blog entry here http://lumberjocks.com/OSU55/blog/39391 for what I consider the best sharpening method. Once over the sharpening hump, there’s no question in my mind a Stanley #4 (or 4-1/2) is the place to start. The reason is simple – it can be used for about anything, the design is available from many manufactures, as such they are cheap, and work the same as the other bench planes – so they make excellent “learner planes”. I still use the first one I bought, a no-name knock-off. Visit my blog (see above) for how to performance tune a handplane.

I fooled around with a few planes and different sharpening methods for several years “just checking it out”. It was a fairly frustrating experience, one that led me to write these blogs to help others shorten or possibly bypass that frustration.

What can handplanes do that machines can’t?

I’m speaking to the typical weekend wood warrior (not professionals) who have a 12”-13” planer, an average table saw, etc. Planes can provide very flat surfaces, even large dining room table sized ones. They can eliminate or dramatically reduce the amount of sanding required. With a proper shooting board, they can square up the ends of stock. They are great for cleaning up machined features – router plane for dados & grooves, shoulder plane for tenons, etc., and trimming parts to fit. Yes, there’s some skill involved to get good results, obtained through practice, but you don’t have to be an artisan.

I had a need. I was struggling with how to get wide glued up panels, like table tops, truly flat. I had tried various sanding routes – not flat. Planing with a router – flat, but lots of grain tear out and still a lot of sanding to remove the cut lines. It worked, but not to my satisfaction. Handplanes solved the issue. They have also dramatically reduced sandpaper use. I typically only use P320 before staining/finishing, and depending on the project and/or wood type, sometimes none at all.

So where should I start?

Augment your power tools with handplanes. Use them where machines fall a bit short. If you’re satisfied with the work your machines produce, then possibly one of the “typical responses” above answered your question.

I recommend a Stanley Bailey #4 or 4-1/2 bench plane (or equivalent) and a low angle Stanley 60-1/2 block plane (or equivalent). My reasoning is anyone remotely interested in handplanes can use a smoother to clean up machining marks and level a panel glue up, and a block plane to break sharp edges and trim a bit here and there. That’s a start, and with experience one can branch out in many directions.

I throw the 4-1/2 in because it uses a 2-3/8” width blade, the same as the #7, which is the next plane I recommend. This way you can have several blades that will fit both of your primary planes and not have to stop to sharpen during a project. I recommend a #7 instead of a #8 because of availability, blade size (#8 is 2-5/8” wide), and a #8 is BIG & HEAVY. The #7 is for jointing boards for glue ups or getting straight edges and flattening large panels.

If you do only small work – small boxes, knick knacks, etc. the planes above are way too large. I have a set of small “bench” planes, about 3” long with ½” wide blades, a set of small brass spokeshaves, and a small Kunz “squirrel tail” pocket plane (~3-1/2” long) appropriate for this work. There are many others. There are many luthier (musical instrument) tools that you should research. The plane should not be longer than the board you are planing.

If you don’t have much strength, you might start with a #3. I’m a little hesitant on this recommendation because plane sizing is determined by the work to be done, not the worker (The “rules” are not absolute – a #4 can be used as a jointer, etc.). Working with handplanes can be strenuous, so you may need to think about building strength up by using the “standard“ sizes (and other activities). While different sized planes have different weights, I find cut depth (shaving thickness), cutting angle of the blade, and blade sharpness actually drive the level of exertion more than plane weight. I’m in the camp of heavier planes provide momentum to power through tough areas in a cut.

Block planes – standard angle block planes aren’t needed, today anyway. Perhaps years ago there were manufacturing issues with the 12° beds of low angle planes causing the mouth or bed to crack. A low angle block plane blade can have any bevel angle put on the blade to handle a given task, from 25° for a cutting angle of 37° (end grain) up to 50° for a cutting angle of 62° (unruly grain), or more. A standard angle block (20°-21° bed) can really only go down to a 45° cut angle, which will work but is not the best for end grain. For this reason I have multiple LA block planes with varying bevel angles.

What about wooden planes? I have several and I use them, however for the novice I recommend the “gold standard” cast iron planes because they are easier to adjust, cheaper, have better ergonomics for hands and wrists, and don’t “move” with temperature and humidity changes. I find woodies especially hard to adjust for very fine (0.0005”) smoothing cuts. ECE makes some very fine wooden planes with screw type adjusters, but they are 3-4x the cost of a Stanley #4.
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Money
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Who wants to spend several hundred on one plane and decide handplanes ain’t for them? Especially when the low end planes can perform very well?
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You can join the fray on ebay and pick up old ones, or you can buy lower end new ones. Both will need similar tuning to perform correctly. You might luck into one at a garage, estate, or farm sale, or antique store, but in Missouri and Oklahoma (my brother lives there) stumbling across good ones is very rare these days. Another alternative is tool dealers, online and locally. When I’ve looked at dealers, I’ve found what I considered very high prices – as high as the “mid-tier” new planes we will discuss later. The dealers are selling nostalgia, history, collector’s items, and they have to make a buck. Several folks on Lumberjocks repair/restore and sell planes, and are a good source, but it may take a while.
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You’ve probably read a lot of comments that the 1910 up to WWII planes are the ones to have, and all the newer Stanley stuff is junk. Well, I disagree – that the newer Stanley stuff is junk. I have the following “newer” Stanley planes that with proper tune up, work perfectly well with the factory blades and chip breakers:
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• standard angle block 12-920 ($36)
• low angle block 12-960 ($30)
• type 20 #7 Stanley Bailey (with the stamped skew lever) ($145 with shipping, ebay)
• no name #4 Stanley Bailey knock off from Grizzlies (~$50)
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Each of these required significant time to tune up. These were my test beds to learn how to tune. Guess what – all the older Stanley’s I’ve purchased required the same tuning. Throughout time Stanley planes were manufactured to a low price point, so it would’ve been a surprise if the older ones had been better. I really don’t see a big difference in manufacturing quality or performance. The plastic handles on new ones aren’t attractive, but with a little sanding of the mold lines they are serviceable (all of mine have been replaced with my own design now). If a friend asked me what the best value is for a first plane, I would steer them to the current Stanley 12-904 contractor grade smoothing plane ($50-$60) if I couldn’t find a cheap one on ebay, and then coach them through the tune up process. Stay away from the Stanley “handyman” versions.
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As a side note (and you will read this in my other blog entry), properly tuned planes with properly sharpened “thin” blades and chip breakers will work very well. If you get significant improvement with an aftermarket blade and or chip breaker (other than edge life), something is not properly tuned (or broken). I know all the magazines and “experts” (except Paul Sellers) recommend thick aftermarket blades and new planes that come with thick blades – just remember they are in business to sell magazines and product.
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ebay – can be hit and miss. I don’t see the $20 good plane deals as some folks claim – prices have probably doubled in the last 5 years. Three of the planes I purchased were useless – cracked mouths, and I had to deal with the sellers and prove I didn’t crack them. I believe the sellers didn’t know they were cracked, but that they didn’t know what they didn’t know about planes. Now, I also got some good deals, and so it evened out.

To summarize – don’t be afraid of newer planes (post WWII to now). They are cheaper and can be tuned to work very well with factory thin blades and chip breakers. This will probably be the most budget friendly route unless you luck into something.
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I don’t want to tune, I want to go to work
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My opinion is: Learn how to make a standard Stanley style #4 or 4-1/2 (or equivalent) sing, and you can probably get about any plane to sing. It provides excellent handplane education and you will continue to use it if this handplane thing is for you. Even the high end planes need to be re-sharpened, should have the chip breaker bevel properly dressed, and will need the sole touched up occasionally.
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If you have cash and little time, maybe handplanes aren’t for you. It takes time to learn how to use them and keep them working well. Maybe a drum sander is a better tool for you? You can go the tool dealer route for an already tuned older plane, or go the premium plane route. I would not recommend the mid-tier planes because they do require some time to tune them in.
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If you have cash and time, I still think learning about tuning with a #4 (or 4-1/2) is the place to start. You haven’t spent much money, and you will get an education. Follow my tuning blog (or others), and if you can’t get one to work, send me a PM on Lumberjocks and I’ll help you.
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Quick Word On Bevel Up Bench Planes – There aren’t any low cost bevel up bench planes. If you can find one, the Stanley #62 will probably go for more than the Veritas or LN versions, which for actually using are far superior.

If you just have to have a top of the line plane for your first one, more for finishing type work and not dimensioning, I’d recommend the Veritas Low Angle Jack Plane, with all three blade angles, and the magnetic jointer fence (it will work with the LAJ with minor modification). You now have an excellent shooting board plane, a long but extremely good smoother that can handle tough grain with a steeper bevel, and a somewhat short but good jointer.

Summary

Low end planes will perform very well when properly tuned. Premium planes are easier to use. The premium advantages are: less tuning time (a one-time thing per plane), tighter manufacturing tolerances that result in easier adjustments (blade depth and skew, mouth opening), and extended sharpening intervals due to better blade materials and the thicker blades and chip breakers let you plane with a duller edge. Once you learn your way around a Stanley Bailey, the premium version won’t really give you much better results.

Where the premium planes stand above is in their ability to deal with tear out in unruly grain, however this is limited to LN high angle frog bench planes and Veritas or LN bevel up bench planes with high angle blades. I would not include high angle wooden planes because this concerns a first plane purchase, and as I’ve mentioned woodies are a little more difficult to deal with.

Some are concerned that if they buy a low end plane, it will be made obsolete by better premium planes they might buy in the future. Even though I have premium planes, including bevel up bench planes, I still use my Stanley Bailey bevel down bench planes. As you get further down this slippery slope (easy to do), planes can be set up for particular tasks to make your work go faster. One thing I’ve noticed: Once folks figure out how to get a plane to work, they go through an exponential growth period. Low cost planes allow this phenomena to occur at a lower financial stress level.

The next blog entry will cover mid-tier and up planes.