scrub plane question...

[David Rose]

I need to remove about 1/4" and flatten a cherry panel right away. The width of the board keeps me from using existing 'lectric tools to flatten and thin it without ripping it. Gulp! What better time to learn more planing skills? :) It is about 3 square feet and both sides will need flattening. I did a practice run on the end of the piece and it planes fairly easily with little to no tearout. At present I have three planes that are not block planes. My main one is a Stanley Bailey #5 that I fettled and put a Hock iron on. The corners of the iron are lightly relieved but otherwise it's flat. I set it coarse and worked on the board long enough to realize this will be a slow proposition.

I have another #5 that may be a Stanley. It is an old Sears plane. I also have a #4 Keen Cutter. Neither of these planes have frog that supports the blade closer to the mouth than about 3/4". This would preclude any mouth adjustment, if I let the rear edge (of the mouth) support the blade. And is mouth opening important for a scrub? Is radiusing the iron all that would need to be done for this purpose? That is of course besides normal fettling. I don't really have time to get a better iron so it would be the factory one. My suspicion is that a scrub needs support and heavy iron more even that another bench plane. Or should I just put in the extra time with the plane that works? What is the consensus?

I know... I need more planes. But short of that, what ye think?

I'm posting this before I've done my homework. :o I'll break out the G. Hack book tonight and see if he covers this.

Thanks

David, the wanna be (sometimes :confused: ) neander

[Richard Gillespie]

Dave, many different planes can be used as a scrub. A #3, 4, and 5 all can be used. You need a blade ground to a about a 6" radius arc and the mouth set wide open.

I use a Defiance #1244 which is about a #3 size but has a fixed wide open mouth. I ground the blade in an arc and it works great.

Technique is a learning curve. I clamp the board down and use the plane at about a 45 degree angle. You want your board to be wider than your final width because scrubing tends to tear out the edges. Be sure to work up grain.

Good Luck

[Aaron Kline]

I have an old transitional jack that I just turned into a scrub by radiusing the blade. It works fine and it doesn't take as long to plane my boards now as with a straight edge iron. It may seem like a burden but hand planing IS fun! I will be back to hand planing as soon as I make a new plane handle thanks to some guy who did a bad glue job on the old one.

[Kurt Loup]

I use an inexpensive 5 1/4 I purchased off ebay as a scrub. I drilled a hole in the blade above the slot and mounted a scrap piece of wood with a small nail in it on my grinder's tool rest. I slipped the blade hole over the nail. This allowed the blade to pivot as I ground a radius on the blade. This worked great.

Kurt

[David Rose]

Richard, thanks for the tip on the far edge tearout. I can see that happening easily. I will definitely practice/test on some scrap first.

Aaron, I do enjoy hand planing too. I flattened on side of a 2 square foot board that was fairly twisted a couple of nights ago. Even with a tuned #5 set for a heavy cut, it was easier than I thought it would be. It just would have been quicker and easier (I think) with a more aggressive cutter like a scrub to start.

Kurt, that is about what I was thinking of doing. Going from grinder to SS paper with the iron hand held is somewhat intimidating to me. I use a guide on flat irons. But I really have nothing to lose and much to learn. :) I may try to setup a "rocking" guide for that too.

For a moderately aggressive cutter on one of these wider planes, would you use a little larger radius or just a shallower cut? I realize the advantage of the narrower blade which would equate with the smaller radius.

David


I use an inexpensive 5 1/4 I purchased off ebay as a scrub. I drilled a hole in the blade above the slot and mounted a scrap piece of wood with a small nail in it on my grinder's tool rest. I slipped the blade hole over the nail. This allowed the blade to pivot as I ground a radius on the blade. This worked great.

Kurt

[Roger Bell]

I dont recommend trying to convert a typical thin-iron Stanley metallic bench plane to a scrub plane. While such a conversion can be made to kinda-sorta work, it lacks a couple of essential design features of the scrub plane per se.

Study the features of the Stanley #40 and the currently available Ece scrub planes. First, a scrub plane has a very narrow width, long radius iron fit into a huge mouth. True scrubs are never designed with wide irons. For good reason. Scrubbing is exceptionally hard work. I have done a fair amount of it and continue to do it regularly. The idea is to take quick, deep, diagonal wasting cuts and to remove a lot of material very quickly and to be able to to keep at it until the job is done. The wider the iron, the harder the push. Second, scrub irons are exceptionally thick. This is to hold down on the chatter. A thin blade with a chipbreaker really wont perform as well....no matter how much you file open the mouth or camber the edge of the iron. Finally, true scrubs have short length soles. That allows them to fit where they need to fit. You dont want the "jointing" or "flattening" liability of the longer soles (such as the #5). The longer the sole, the less effective it will be. The thin irons, the inadequate chipbreakers, etc of the typical Stanley are simply not as well suited to the task.....even with modification. I am not saying that such a modification cant work....just that it wont work as well as a tool incorporating ALL the specific design features that are needed.

If you insist on modifying a metallic plane, I would recommend that you consider the #3 with its relatively short sole length and somewhat narrow iron. Better yet, get yourself a cheap wooden plane with a honkin thick (but narrow) iron. You can very easily modify both the iron and the wood to create something that will work far better.

[David Rose]

Roger, I suspect that you are right. When I started wood working I did almost everything with a router (electric). I found that I could do almost anything that could be done to wood with it. In the process, I discovered that planing and jointing and other jobs for which it is not really designed are much more easily and quickly and economically done with the proper tool.

Planes have been around for at least 2000 years with only minor modifications. I suspect the proper plane for the job is... exactly that, the proper plane.

My current dillima (sp?) is that I have a piece of cherry to make two panels about 15 x 13 inches each. It is 5/4 s2s and I need the panels to be about 5/8" thick and flat. Oh, and the piece is a little twisted. I really don't prefer to rip the piece to fit my power tools. It is too nice for that. I need to flatten it and thin it to 5/8". I have a decent number 5 plane with a Hock blade that I found will do the job... eventually. I will probably run into this situation again, but it is the first time that I remember in 5 years of working wood, so I am not planning for it yet. I doubt that I will become a true neander any time soon. I enjoy it, but my health doesn't like the physical labor. :( Should I go to the effort (not too much, from what I read) of radiusing an iron on the otherwise useless #4, or just put some time into thicknessing with the flat bladed 5? I can't really see myself needing to remove the 1/8" thickness at a time that a true scrub will do on my projects. I would just like a little more bite than a few thou.

Did this help explain my situation?

David


I dont recommend trying to convert a typical thin-iron Stanley metallic bench plane to a scrub plane. While such a conversion can be made to kinda-sorta work, it lacks a couple of essential design features of the scrub plane per se.

Study the features of the Stanley #40 and the currently available Ece scrub planes. First, a scrub plane has a very narrow width, long radius iron fit into a huge mouth. True scrubs are never designed with wide irons. For good reason. Scrubbing is exceptionally hard work. I have done a fair amount of it and continue to do it regularly. The idea is to take quick, deep, diagonal wasting cuts and to remove a lot of material very quickly and to be able to to keep at it until the job is done. The wider the iron, the harder the push. Second, scrub irons are exceptionally thick. This is to hold down on the chatter. A thin blade with a chipbreaker really wont perform as well....no matter how much you file open the mouth or camber the edge of the iron. Finally, true scrubs have short length soles. That allows them to fit where they need to fit. You dont want the "jointing" or "flattening" liability of the longer soles (such as the #5). The longer the sole, the less effective it will be. The thin irons, the inadequate chipbreakers, etc of the typical Stanley are simply not as well suited to the task.....even with modification. I am not saying that such a modification cant work....just that it wont work as well as a tool incorporating ALL the specific design features that are needed.

If you insist on modifying a metallic plane, I would recommend that you consider the #3 with its relatively short sole length and somewhat narrow iron. Better yet, get yourself a cheap wooden plane with a honkin thick (but narrow) iron. You can very easily modify both the iron and the wood to create something that will work far better.

[Roger Bell]

David
Since you have a beater #4 available, you might go ahead and modify it and give that a try, since you have nothing much to lose.

Since you mentioned the electric router, you might also consider constructing one of those router planing jigs that you've probably seen in the magazines if you really just want to get your panel flattened. Should work well on a severely twisted piece. You will likely need to use wedges and tape to keep the piece flat to the bench while routing the first side flat enough. And you shouldnt get a lot of tearout with this approach, I wouldnt think.

[David Rose]

Roger, I've already "got" a router planing jig! I forgot. :rolleyes: But that thing eats bit edges like crazy. At least it did on a maple piece, maybe it wouldn't on cherry as much. And I never could get a surface that didn't require a fair amount more material removal. My setup was probably not rigid enough. I can save that as a later resort. With this much wood to remove, I can play some and still recover.

The end of the same board that I've played with planed very nicely. Of course, there is more figure in what I plan to use, so who knows until I give it a shot. And this is a personal project with no *real* deadline, except for self (wife?) imposed. ;) And I want to improve my hand working skills a bit. Besides, although I understand the plane's mechanics, there is something almost mystical about watching those curls emerge. :) "Hon, look at this. This is wood! You can see through it!" LOL

David


David
Since you have a beater #4 available, you might go ahead and modify it and give that a try, since you have nothing much to lose.

Since you mentioned the electric router, you might also consider constructing one of those router planing jigs that you've probably seen in the magazines if you really just want to get your panel flattened. Should work well on a severely twisted piece. You will likely need to use wedges and tape to keep the piece flat to the bench while routing the first side flat enough. And you shouldnt get a lot of tearout with this approach, I wouldnt think.

[Robert Tarr]

Here is a tip I picked up from an old Tage Frid article. If you have a need to do some "scrub like" work, take a #3,4, or 5 and use the lateral adjuster. Throw it entirely to one side and have one corner deeply protruding from the mouth. The only trick now is shaving/chip clearance. If you move the frog back you are golden. I have used this for a couple projects, before I purchased a scub plane (now I own two), as I really enjoy the work by hand, but if you don't have one handy, no reason you can't use the planes you have, without modifying them.

Hope this helps.

Robert

[David Rose]

Everyone (not here of course :D ) says I have a big mouth, so I'll check the plane to see if it does. I've seen the tip but forgot about it. I may give it a try. I was thinking tearout would be worse, but it might not. You have to cut everything down below the bottom of the cut anyway, so...

David


Here is a tip I picked up from an old Tage Frid article. If you have a need to do some "scrub like" work, take a #3,4, or 5 and use the lateral adjuster. Throw it entirely to one side and have one corner deeply protruding from the mouth. The only trick now is shaving/chip clearance. If you move the frog back you are golden. I have used this for a couple projects, before I purchased a scub plane (now I own two), as I really enjoy the work by hand, but if you don't have one handy, no reason you can't use the planes you have, without modifying them.

Hope this helps.

Robert

[Steve Kubien]

Hi Dave,

I am mostly a lurker around these parts but I am going to offer my 2 cents on this topic. Make your own scrub plane. You can get an ECE scrub iron from Lee Valley or from Lie-Nielsen. This weekend I have spent 2-1/2 hours and I now have a fully functional scrub plane. This is the first plane I've made completely from scratch (built a Shepherd shoulder plane from a kit last October) and it was really easy.

I had a block of 3" wide, 4" high cherry (18 or inches long). I bandsawed off the sides and relaminated everything once I had the bed cut. Smoothe the parts with your handplanes so it will all glue together nicely. Make the bed as close to 90 degrees to the sides as you can but it is not critical with a scrub. Shape the wedge, apply some BLO and wax and you are all set. The first coat of oil is curing on mine right now.

For the price of the iron (the cherry came from a pallet at work) I've now got a new tool. Try it. It's one of the easiest projects you are likely to come across.

Take care,
Steve Kubien
Ajax, Ontario

[Gary Bingham]

I'd recommend making a scrub plane also. I wanted a scrub plane, but didn't want to pay a lot of money, so I decided to try to make one myself. Even though I've never made a wooden hand plane before. Here's a couple of pics of it in an unfinished state:

http://home.earthlink.net/~gbingha/images/scrub_plane_1.jpg
http://home.earthlink.net/~gbingha/images/scrub_plane_2.jpg

It turned out to be a bit of a frankenplane. I intended to make it out of all purpleheart, but ran out, so I substituted maple. Then I cut part of the middle out so I could add some lead shot to increase the weight. Then I decided to add the thumb hold part to it. Also, I don't like the overall look of it, but it's comfortable to hold, and I guess that's the more important for a user plane.

Anyways, it works very well, and it only cost me about $5 in materials and a few hours in time. I've cut a lot of jatoba using it, and the blade still has a good edge and cuts just fine. Which is surprising considering that it's the first time I've tried making my own blade.

[Tim Sproul]

This enquiring mind wants to know what you finally did...... :D

[David Rose]

Hi Tim,

Here is exactly what I did (am doing). The piece is still dogged to the table while I work on other parts. :rolleyes: I take a few swipes here and there with my regular #5 working to get the first side flat. I'll have to do something different fairly soon, as the "other parts" are catching up with these panels. I keep thinking "only a few more strokes"... To be such a light weight piece of wood, this cherry is rough on my Hock blade. I resharpened again last night.

David


This enquiring mind wants to know what you finally did...... :D

[Tim Sproul]

Hi Tim,
The piece is still dogged to the table while I work on other parts.
In general, that is a bad idea. If you have a sudden swing in humidity, the panel is likely to warp on you as only one face is exposed ... that face will become wetter or drier than the face on the benchtop surface.


To be such a light weight piece of wood, this cherry is rough on my Hock blade. I resharpened again last night.
I've never worked cherry myself but it is well liked not only for it's grain and color, but also because it is easy on cutting edges. One thing I've noticed in my limited experience...as my sharpening skills have improved, my blades go longer between honings. Could well just be perception on my part. The more finely honed the cutting edge, the longer lasting the cutting edge....that comes from experts suchs a Leonard Lee and others.

[David Rose]

Yeah, I know this is not a good idea. I generally don't even like to plane one side only. It's called procrastination. :eek: I've got a fair amount of wood to remove so I may have to do it more than once. :o

You may be right about the edge quality. I think it is improving. However the previous sharpening would take off arm hair without touching my arm with the iron. This is the best I've done so far. I'm using SS then green honing compound. I'm not spending much time on the compound, but the other steps are raising a burr prior to grit change, so I suspect that is the limit for each paper. Still the previous sharpening lasted probably 15 minutes of planing time. That inclued straight edge and winding stick checking time but not much of that. Should I be getting more time or just save this tool for it's intended job? And yes, it does cut fairly easily in comparison to hard maple. :D

David


In general, that is a bad idea. If you have a sudden swing in humidity, the panel is likely to warp on you as only one face is exposed ... that face will become wetter or drier than the face on the benchtop surface.


I've never worked cherry myself but it is well liked not only for it's grain and color, but also because it is easy on cutting edges. One thing I've noticed in my limited experience...as my sharpening skills have improved, my blades go longer between honings. Could well just be perception on my part. The more finely honed the cutting edge, the longer lasting the cutting edge....that comes from experts suchs a Leonard Lee and others.