LV Japanese planes

[Larry Rose]

Has anyone had thier grubby little hands on one of LVs new japanese hollow and round planes? They look interesting in the new catalog but I've been burned before.

[David Gendron]

If you are talking about these, I have a few of them and they are ok. They are a little small for big jobs, but I find them fine for occasional moldings, of smaller scale like boxes etc...
Traditional Asian Hollow & Round Planes

http://www.leevalley.com/images/item/woodworking/planes/07p1601s4.jpg

[Chuck Tringo]

http://www.sawmillcreek.org/showthread.php?t=119580&highlight=hollow+round

Might want to check this thread.

[Graham Hughes (CA)]

The caveats are pretty up-front—they're shorter and smaller than the usual Western hollows & rounds and they're bedded at a 45° angle instead of a more typical 55° for the Western ones. With those caveats out of the way if you work with the grain and can deal with the size disparity they're very useful. I have both these and a lot of Western hollows & rounds (mostly rounds, which is why I bought the Mujingfang ones) and I have a slight preference for the traditional ones, but there's nothing especially wrong with these.

I should note that I haven't tried to do anything really aggressive with the hollows and the thin rounds, and because they're top escapement and so the body is a little wider than you might expect they may not perform perfectly for that.