What woods are good to practice on

[dan sherman]

I want to refine my hand plane and chisel skills this winter, in preparation for a spring/summer that is going to packed full of projects.

from what I have read white ash is cheap, and easy to work with hand tools. what other woods should I be looking at?

[Kevin Groenke]

We usually suggest/provide medium density, relatively diffuse-porous(lacking distinct porous growth rings) stock for noobs working on hand tool skills: Yellow Poplar, Mahogany, Soft Maple, Alder, Aspen are some examples. Yellow poplar is cheaper than dirt and great for confidence building. Obviously you'll need to learn to read/deal with grain at some point, but the satisfaction of having successfully hand-cut a dovetail in forgiving stock will help you to tackle bigger challenges.

Ring porous hardwoods like Ash, Oak, Hickory, etc have more pronounced grain which can be more problematic to work with. A bit harder too which requires a keener edge.

Cherry, Hard Maple, Walnut, Birch have less ring porosity but are a bit harder and can have squirrely grain (like everything of course).

Somewhat counter-intuitively, really soft woods can be harder to work than harder woods, it takes an extremely sharp chisel to cut a mortise in Western Red Cedar for example. Alder is about as soft as you can go before fiber crushing instead of shearing get to be an issue.

g-luck

-kg

[Robert Rozaieski]

Poplar is about the best practice (and non-practice) wood I know of for hand tools. It works fantastically with hand tools. Oaks, ashes, maples, and other really hard woods are a challenge, to say the least, for working with hand tools.

There's a reason that mahogany, walnut, cherry, poplar and pine were the most popular woods to make furniture from in the 18th century. It wasn't just because they looked nice. While this certainly played a role, these woods are a dream to work with hand tools compared to those mentioned above. Tiger maple (a kind of soft maple) was used occasionally as well, but not nearly as much as these other woods. They just work really well with hand tools. I use poplar and pine for a lot of shop projects, which are basically practice pieces.

[Harlan Barnhart]

I want to refine my hand plane and chisel skills this winter, in preparation for a spring/summer that is going to packed full of projects.

from what I have read white ash is cheap, and easy to work with hand tools. what other woods should I be looking at?
Poplar and Eastern white pine.

[Michael Faurot]

Poplar, Alder, Eastern White Pine and Philippine Mahogany. Those are all easy to work with hand tools and fairly inexpensive.

[dan sherman]

I must be doing something wrong then, as I have been practicing on Honduran mahogany scraps and no matter what I do, I always ens up with little ridges parallel to the direction of planing. Some times I can feel them, other times I can only see them when I look across the board in glancing light. I know it's not the corners digging in, as I have watched the iron very closely. I'm also pretty sure it's not the iron, as I refined my honing skills to the point that I always get a hair shaving sharp edge.

anyone got any ideas what I'm doing wrong?


There's a reason that mahogany, walnut, cherry, poplar and pine were the most popular woods to make furniture from in the 18th century. It wasn't just because they looked nice.

[Deni Irawan]

i would take mahogany,

Cheers,

Deni I.

[John Keeton]

I agree with all that has been said, particularly by Robert and Kevin. Developing technique will be easier in the woods mentioned.

However, ultimately it really comes down to which woods do you want to use with the projects you have in mind. You could practice to a point of confidence with poplar, and choose oak for your first project and be horribly shocked at the difference in workability. Perhaps some early practice runs on poplar, and then move rather quickly to the species you intend to use.

On the ridges, it sounds like you have a dead flat edge on the plane, and that may be fine for you. I like a slight camber on my smoothing planes. Otherwise, it could be that your blade is not protruding evenly from the mouth of the plane - even ever so slightly. That could be from lack of squareness of the cutting edge, or plane adjustment/feddling.

Just some thoughts from one reasonably new to hand planes.

[John Keeton]

i would take mahogany,

Cheers,

Deni I.Deni, you can probably buy mahogany for what we pay for poplar!!:D:mad:

Any way you could ship me a load of mahogany and that rosewood you use for about $1/ft delivered?? Or, I could trade you a load of red oak?;)

[Robert Rozaieski]

I must be doing something wrong then, as I have been practicing on Honduran mahogany scraps and no matter what I do, I always ens up with little ridges parallel to the direction of planing. Some times I can feel them, other times I can only see them when I look across the board in glancing light. I know it's not the corners digging in, as I have watched the iron very closely. I'm also pretty sure it's not the iron, as I refined my honing skills to the point that I always get a hair shaving sharp edge.

anyone got any ideas what I'm doing wrong?

Dan,

Can you describe the ridges a little more? Are you talking about distinct sharp lines being left by the plane or just a gentle scalloping? I ask because you mention that sometimes you can only see them in raking light. If it's just a gentle scalloped surface, then you aren't doing anything wrong. That's what a plane should do. A hand planed surface isn't 100% dead flat. That's part of its character. If it's distinct, sharp, scratch like ridges, then it is indeed the iron or the plane, even if you can't see the iron doing it.

Are you honing your iron with a camber or curve to the iron or is it honed dead straight? A slight bit of camber to the iron will help, but if we're talking about a smoothing plane, we're also talking a very slight amount of camber. So slight you woldn't even notice is has any camber at all until you put a straight edge up to the cutting edge. This is accomplished by grinding the edge dead straight and honing as usual, but at the very end of the honing process, make about a dozen extra honing strokes on each corner on your fine stone with pressure only on the outside corners of the iron. This will relieve the corners so that they are not digging into the surface of the wood.

If you are 100% sure it is not the iron, check the plane itself. Are the ridges consistently coming from one side of the plane? Look at the mouth on that side and check the sole and mouth of the plane for a burr or chip that could be galling the surface of the wood and leaving the ridges you are getting.

[Graham Hughes (CA)]

Ash is a little tough but it's tolerant of abuse. For starting out poplar is great (especially tulip poplar if that happens in your neck of the woods); I recommend cherry and walnut also. I did a lot of my early stuff in oak and maple and while you can learn to work around oak's little peculiarities maple is just a hard slog all the way through. White pine has been suggested but I find it really irritating to work with because of its fragility; if you slip it'll tend to split and you need razor sharp tools to avoid crushing the grain in it.

[Jim Nardi]

I don't think there is one perfect wood to practice on. Someone told me to save the nasty swirly grained pieces to practice on. If you can smooth the nasty woods everything else will be a breeze.

[Sean Hughto]

Any wood is fine to practice on, but the best is the same wood you are planning to use for the "real" projects. Every wood has its own personality. Learning how to get along with a particular species is just as important practice as learning to saw a dovetail to a line.

If you are just looking at tool skill building, I think shop projects are hard to beat. Make yourself a cabinet of some sort for the shop. As mentioned above, poplar and clear pine are good bets. I personally think maple is fine too, though it will be slower to cut with saw and chisel.

Some examples of things I made for the shop when practicing:

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2317/2281043624_ff65229e3b.jpg

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3108/3256578957_10049bc58c.jpg

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3353/3267728943_d4aef48570.jpg

[John Keeton]

Sean, I have previously admired your plane cabinet, that is one cute little box!!

[Sean Hughto]

Thanks, John. I don't mean to repeat pics, I just figure the OP might not have been around or read that particular thread when I posted it somewhere else.

The little box holds all the fences, blades, and such for my 66 beader. Dovetails in that scale are a hoot. You can saw each side in like two strokes and chop them out in with hand pressure. I found that a file or jack knife can clean them up really fast too.

[george wilson]

It depends upon what type work you intend to do. White pine might be falling apart a bit near the corners if you practice dovetails.

Cost may be an issue. Cherry is good for dovetailing,walnut too-though it turns my fingers purple! I'm trying to think of local woods. I used to be convinced that cherry was the prettiest wood. Can't remember why,now!! Maybe in the 60's I could afford it?

[dan sherman]

Sorry I didn't get back to everyone earlier, we got a new edition to the family yesterday that required about 8 hours of driving. Marley is Rebecca and I's second goldendoodle.


Can you describe the ridges a little more? Are you talking about distinct sharp lines being left by the plane or just a gentle scalloping?

The lines are distinct, but nothing 2 or 3 swipes with 220 grit wouldn't erase. I guess at some point i should go to a show or something so I can watch some people who know what they are doing. The internet hasn't been much help in this requard. LOL

[James Carmichael]

I'd say almost any straight-grained, domestic hardwood that is either diffuse-porous, or a tight grained ring-porous species. Some of the ones I've worked with, in order of cost:
Poplar
Ash
*Hickory
Birch
Maple

*Real hickory, not pecan. I don't know why, but the true hickory I've worked is straighter-grained and easier to work with than pecan, possibly because the latter is grown for fruit-production, which is an opposing goal to lumber production. And I'm in Texas, where the pecan is the state tree, and the lumber sometimes costs less than poplar or ash.