Which smoothing plane to buy

[Jared Hendrix]

UPDATE: I bought a #4 on ebay


I currently have a #6 and a 5 & 1/2 in my hand plane arsenal. These tackle most tasks with ease, however, I still have issues planing figured wood and wood with grain direction changes. I've set the 5 &1/2 up to take very fine shavings, adjusted the frog to close the throat down, and set the chip-breaker as close to the edge of the blade as possible, however i still get tear-out in the walnut and African mahogany i'm planing.


I now have the budget to buy one plane, from the wood river line, and i cant decide which to get. I want this plane to be my smoothing plane and to be able to smooth walnut and mahogany without tear-out.


Should i Get the 4 & 1/2 or the 62 with a 40 degree bevel blade?


..on a side note, if i buy the 4 & 1/2 i'll have some extra money to buy a couple new chisels as well.. but don't let that influence your suggestion.


Thanks!

[glenn bradley]

Hold onto your hat, you are sure to get answers galore. Bevel Up and Bevel Down conversations aside, why not another iron for your 5-1/2? For example, I went the Veritas BU route. The irons are interchangeable between the jointer, the shooting plane, the low angle jack and the bevel up smoother (possibly others). The Veritas design also allows you to change blades quickly and with little fuss. With my combination of planes and irons I rarely find a task in their range of operation that I cannot accomplish with good result. I use irons from 25* through 50* in several of the bodies based on the material and the task. A second iron for your 5-1/2 could be the first step for you towards making fewer planes do more.

[Patrick Chase]

Hold onto your hat, you are sure to get answers galore. Bevel Up and Bevel Down conversations aside, why not another iron for your 5-1/2? For example, I went the Veritas BU route. The irons are interchangeable between the jointer, the shooting plane, the low angle jack and the bevel up smoother (possibly others). The Veritas design also allows you to change blades quickly and with little fuss. With my combination of planes and irons I rarely find a task in their range of operation that I cannot accomplish with good result. I use irons from 25* through 50* in several of the bodies based on the material and the task. A second iron for your 5-1/2 could be the first step for you towards making fewer planes do more.

The 5-1/2 is BD. Unless you're talking about back-beveling (which is somewhat incompatible with a close-set cap iron) there is no option to change the angle with an iron. But as I noted in a previous reply, 45 deg should be adequate with a properly set cap iron.

A question for the OP: What make is your 5-1/2? I'm asking because I'm wondering if there's an option to use a high-angle frog with that plane.

[glenn bradley]

The 5-1/2 is BD. Unless you're talking about back-beveling (which is somewhat incompatible with a close-set cap iron) there is no option to change the angle with an iron. But as I noted in a previous reply, 45 deg should be adequate with a properly set cap iron.

A question for the OP: What make is your 5-1/2? I'm asking because I'm wondering if there's an option to use a high-angle frog with that plane.

I was not talking about back beveling. I was not talking sense . . . at all . Wandered right off the reservation . . . doh! Thanks Patrick

[Rob Luter]

I use a low angle jack like the 62 along with a high angle blade for tough grain. I went with the Veritas version. It works well. I'd spend the extra $40 on the Lee Valley/Veritas over the Wood River.

[steven c newman]

Is it too late to pop the popcorn?

Only "low angle" planes I have, have numbers....60-1/2....56B.....1455...
Smoothers...well been using this one, lately
no. 4c.jpg
Stanley No.4c type 20? Made in England..battling Curly Maple
shavings.jpg
Doesn't do too bad of a job....
IMG_0902 (640x480).jpg

Now...salted, or un-salted....buttered, or non-buttered?

[Pat Barry]

You can buy the LN 4 1/2 in Bronze and solve that problem of having extra money in one fell swoop. See recent thread on that topic.

[Hasin Haroon]

If you can fettle a plane, go for the woodriver #4, and save even more money for chisels!
You asked for woodriver, so I suggest a #4 (which I have, and with very little fettling it is an excellent plane), but if you are willing to try a different maker, the Veritas Bevel Up Smoother or a Custom 4 at a higher angle (50 or 55) would be my first choices. Since you are having issues with tearout, maybe a Custom 4 would be your best bet so you can use a chipbreaker. The quality is the same as a Lie Nielsen (but costs a bit less) and better than a Woodriver.

Also, the interchangeability of blades only makes sense on bevel up planes, so I don't see how getting a new iron for your 5 1/2 would help at all.

[Patrick Chase]

You can buy the LN 4 1/2 in Bronze and solve that problem of having extra money in one fell swoop. See recent thread on that topic.

I'm still holding out for depleted Uranium.

[Pete Taran]

Patrick,

U238 is dense, but if you want the really dense stuff, hold out for Iridium. Nothing denser!

[Mike Kreinhop]

U238 is dense, but if you want the really dense stuff, hold out for Iridium. Nothing denser!

...except for Osmium.

[Patrick Chase]

You'd might as well retitle this thread "which SMC flame war should I restart" and throw in a sharpening question...

I currently have a #6 and a 5 & 1/2 in my hand plane arsenal. These tackle most tasks with ease, however, I still have issues planing figured wood and wood with grain direction changes. I've set the 5 &1/2 up to take very fine shavings, adjusted the frog to close the throat down, and set the chip-breaker as close to the edge of the blade as possible, however i still get tear-out in the walnut and African mahogany i'm planing.

I now have the budget to buy one plane, from the wood river line, and i cant decide which to get. I want this plane to be my smoothing plane and to be able to smooth walnut and mahogany without tear-out.

Should i Get the 4 & 1/2 or the 62 with a 40 degree bevel blade?

I would get a 4 in your situation, possibly with a high-angle frog (which you can get with L-N or Veritas bench planes).

Your existing planes both have 2-3/8" irons, so your logical next step is to get something shorter, narrower, and more maneuverable. The #4 is the quintessential Stanley smoother. Normally I'd also suggest a 3, but you obviously prefer to "go big" so I'll leave it at the 4.

A 62 with a 40 deg blade is a 52 deg total angle. In my experience that won't do any better in terms of tearout on difficult woods than a close-set cap iron on a 45 deg BD plane. You'd probably want a 50 deg blade (62 deg total angle) if you go the BU route.

With all of that said, how close are you getting the cap iron to the cutting edge? I used to think that 1/64" or so was "close", but I've since come to realize that that's actually too much to control tearout in difficult woods. You need to be at around half of that and sometimes less. A 45 deg bench plane with a truly sharp iron and tight chipbreaker set should be able to handle walnut and African mahogany. I have a 55 deg frog for my #4, but I don't use it much ever since I got serious about learning to use the chipbreaker.

[Todd Stock]

Messing with fettling planes is lost time on customer projects, so new and largely tweaked planes make economic sense for me. For bevel down stuff, Lie-Nielsen #4 with a 50 degree frog. The chipbreaker needs about two minutes of attention with a file to match the geometry on old Stanleys and all of my early Lie-Nielsens. I'm apparently old enough to have learned to use a plane before the use of a chipbreaker was lost to the mists of time, so even on guitar exotics which are highly figured (and anything but rosewoods and ebonies tends to be), the #4 gets things done.

If your time is not billable (i.e., it's all for fun), and money is better spent on tuition, the light bill, or that cute blonde in accounting you finally got a date with, a nice prewar Stanley #4 would be a good place to start...watch the videos on tweaking things and take a stab at it. Plan on pestering someone that has some skills if it seems the plane is not working well...15 minutes with a subject matter expert (and this stuff is far from rocket science - lots of folks can cue you in) will address any fuzzy areas in setup, etc. I preferred the high knob because of big hands, but it's hard to get a bad #4 if it has a lateral adjuster and rosewood handles. Google 'Stanley Type Study' and look at the archives here for info and personal preferences...lots and lots of personal preferences.

Not a fan of Veritas bench planes, but their low angle jack is easier to use for a tyro than the LN, and if there is money in the budget for just one plane and you have to have a bevel up tool, the Veritas Low Angle jack pretty decent (I have had the LN 62 since it first came out, but most of my students moving on do the Veritas if budget driven and bevel up).

My personal favs are the 4-1/2, 5-1/2, and 7 - all with 50 deg frogs, but they take some commitment to getting comfortable with for a long session and I hesitate to recommend the extra weight and wider blade unless a) you are in decent shape (as in upper body strength and stamina), and b) like big planes. The flip side of that 'bigger is beefier' is the #3 and 5-1/4 combo, which work well for most of my students in the 132 lb and under class.

[Warren Mickley]

I currently have a #6 and a 5 & 1/2 in my hand plane arsenal. These tackle most tasks with ease, however, I still have issues planing figured wood and wood with grain direction changes. I've set the 5 &1/2 up to take very fine shavings, adjusted the frog to close the throat down, and set the chip-breaker as close to the edge of the blade as possible, however i still get tear-out in the walnut and African mahogany i'm planing.

I think you should learn to adjust the planes you have before buying a new plane. If you are having trouble planing these woods, something is wrong with the way your plane is set up. Buying a shorter plane will not solve these problems.

[Jared Hendrix]

The 5-1/2 is BD. Unless you're talking about back-beveling (which is somewhat incompatible with a close-set cap iron) there is no option to change the angle with an iron. But as I noted in a previous reply, 45 deg should be adequate with a properly set cap iron.

A question for the OP: What make is your 5-1/2? I'm asking because I'm wondering if there's an option to use a high-angle frog with that plane.

My 5-1/2 is a Stanley, one of the newer ones made in England with plastic handles. The chip-breaker is as close as it can get to the edge of the blade. the blade is slightly cambered, just enough so it doesn't leave plane tracks, so the chip-breaker is set so the corners are immeasurably close to the corners of the blade, there is only slightly more blade exposed in the middle. I get beautiful fluffy shavings from curly maple, i just cant get tearout free results in the walnut where the grain changes direction.

I'd spend the extra $40 on the Lee Valley/Veritas over the Wood River.

It's actually more like an extra $100 . Woodcraft has a 10% coupon they email you when you sign up, and the extra blade is $20. LN is 245 plus 40 for a blade and shipping . Veritas is about the same, but they are out of stock till september

If you can fettle a plane, go for the woodriver #4, and save even more money for chisels!
You asked for woodriver, so I suggest a #4 (which I have, and with very little fettling it is an excellent plane), but if you are willing to try a different maker, the Veritas Bevel Up Smoother or a Custom 4 at a higher angle (50 or 55) would be my first choices. Since you are having issues with tearout, maybe a Custom 4 would be your best bet so you can use a chipbreaker. The quality is the same as a Lie Nielsen (but costs a bit less) and better than a Woodriver.

I hadn't considered the veritas bevel up smoother, but it is also up there in price. By the time i buy an extra blade im close to $300. Id consider a plane with a different angle frog, however, that also ups the price out of my budget.

A 62 with a 40 deg blade is a 52 deg total angle. In my experience that won't do any better in terms of tearount on difficult woods than a close-set cap iron on a 45 deg BD plane. You'd probably want a 50 deg blade (62 deg total angle) if you go the BU route.

With all of that said, how close are you getting the cap iron to the cutting edge? I used to think that 1/64" or so was "close", but I've since come to realize that that's actually too much to control tearout in difficult woods. You need to be at around half of that and sometimes less. A 45 deg bench plane with a truly sharp iron and tight chipbreaker set should be able to handle walnut and African mahogany. I have a 55 deg frog for my #4, but I don't use it much ever since I got serious about learning to use the chipbreaker.

with a 62 i can get the 40 degree blade and put a 5 degree secondary bevel on it, for a total of 57 degrees. from what i've learned, that should tackle difficult grain more easily.
It may very well be that its my blade and chipbreaker that limit me, but im limited with how much i can alter them between uses. I use the 5-1/2 for basically everything. It's my fore plane, my smoothing plane, my everything in between plane right now. I want something that i can leave set up for smoothing all the time. a Dedicated smoothing plane or a 62 where i can easily switch blades and close down the throat, fit that bill.