Plane: how do I adjust and use

[Steve McCaffery]

I need some information on this plane. A coworker of mine gave it to me. It's from her deceased father's collection. It's a Knight Tool Works brand. The blade is wedge shaped. Unlike the other wooden plane she gave me, there is no wedge to hold the blade in place, nor is one missing as there's no room for it in the groove.

The blade has Japanese writing on it. I suspect this is a Japanese pull plane. Am I right?

How do I adjust the blade? Currently, the cutting edge doesn't even reach the sole. The only way I can see is to shave wood from the groove it sits in. This seems a really crude way to adjust it, though. Am I right?

I really want to use this plane as the blade looks magical to me. The other wooden plane is a pleasure to use.

I emailed the maker some time ago, but received no response.

Thanks for any help.

[Robert Rozaieski]

http://www.knight-toolworks.com/articles.htm

[Terry Beadle]

There is no wood needing to be removed. Steve ships his planes ready to go and with the blade ready for final honing. You need to read some online articles on Japanease planes. Stanley Harleson has a great video on Japanease planes called Kana, which is the Japanease word for them.

You need to get a small 4 ~ 6 oz steel hammer and give the top of the blade some lite taps until a very small amount of the cutting edge of the blade protrudes below the sole. The wood piece in front of the blade is a mouth adjustor and is used to set a very fine mouth as this is a smoother used to take the last 2 dor 3 thousandths of an inch off a project componet or surface. It may look to you that the blade will not move but it will. Japanease wedge shaped blades are hand fitted to each individual plane. Yours would not have been shipped unless this key hand fitting had been performed. Steve has used different types of blades in his planes depending upon the customer's wishes and price/performance issues. The blade you have is the near top of the line and you'll be quite pleased with it after you get thru the initial familiarity. In general, tapping on the blade will extend the blade towards the sole and tapping on the little bevel on the heel of the plane will receed the cutting edge. A couple good taps on the heel will loosen the blade to the point where you can remove it from it's custom fit wedge shaped hole so you can hone it or what ever.

I highly recommend you don't do any wood adjustments to the plane until you've found and read the info on the net. Steve also ships with his planes instructions on their use. His web site discusses some of this but there are lots of sites that go into detail on their adjustment, tuning and use. Steve's site discusses planes with wedges in general where as your plane requires no wedge so it's slightly different.

Once you get the hang of it, you'll really come to appreciate what a tremendous value Steve's planes are.

Keep us informed of your progress. If you get befuddled, just PM me and I'll be glad help all I can.

Enjoy. Remember is the process not the product....well mostly..hoot!

[Sean Hughto]

Have you tried lossening those brass screws? Those slots look like they allow that resddish piece to slide up and down. Back off this part, then advance the blade to where you like and retighten.

[lowell holmes]

If the plane is like his other designs the screws are there to allow adjusting the mouth of the plane, not the iron. I don't thnk I would be eager to adjust the wood under the screws.

[Steve McCaffery]

I appreciate the help. I'll dig out a small hammer and start tapping away.