Block plane stress test

[Michael O'Sullivan]

I am trying to figure out ways to test (a) which of my blades are sharpened the best, (b) which of my planes perform better than the others (assuming the blades are the same), and (c) which other variables do I want to account for.

What sorts of woods "separate the men from the boys"? I was fooling around this evening with end-grain cherry, but the results (while pretty good:)) were not useful in terms of drawing distinctions.

Let me know your thoughts.

[Eiji Fuller]

Maple. Regular and figured. If you can get nice thin shavings with out alot of effort in maple then I would say youve got a sharp iron and a turned up plane.

End grain Jatoba is pretty hard to plane too.

[David Gendron]

+1 on maple, but has to be hard maple(sugar maple). I found Yellow Birch realy hard, not in terms of tear out but in terms of wood to plane resistence.

[Jeff Willard]

Do you have any one species that you commonly favor? If so, I'd use that as my benchmark, and work from there. The reason? That which gives you good results in maple, might give you less than stellar results in pine. One species may require different blade geometry compared to another species for the best result.

One common test for relative sharpness is how well an edge handles end grain pine. Not exactly the toughest customer. But pine, generally being soft, tends to crush under an edge. The keener the edge, the better it handles it.

[John Coloccia]

Hard maple. If you can plane birds eye, you can plane anything.

[Dan O'Sullivan]

Not sure on this question/title? Are you talking about your block plane blades or all of your planes and all of your blades?

Blade geometry for a low angle block plane with a BU blade is important. You would not use the same blade angle for pine that you would use for birdseye maple.

Send a little more detail on your question.

Two Irishman trying to make sense of a woodworking question.. that's a challenge in itself.

Dan O'Sullivan

[Jim Koepke]

Two Irishman trying to make sense of a woodworking question.. that's a challenge in itself.

Dan O'Sullivan

Come join me for a few pints of Guinness and then it will all make sense.

jim

[John Coloccia]

Not sure on this question/title? Are you talking about your block plane blades or all of your planes and all of your blades?

Blade geometry for a low angle block plane with a BU blade is important. You would not use the same blade angle for pine that you would use for birdseye maple.

Send a little more detail on your question.

Two Irishman trying to make sense of a woodworking question.. that's a challenge in itself.

Dan O'Sullivan

+1 I was thinking just in terms of sharpness, BE maple is always the worst for me.

[Brian Kent]

I would agree on curly or birdseye maple. Other exotics do in my dull planes, like purple heart and padauk, because of changing grain directions. But for domestic - curly maple.

[James Taglienti]

How about end grain hickory? Thats always brutal. Also some reversing grain exotics (pencil stripe?)

[David Keller NC]

Go get a piece of cocobolo or honduran rosewood. I will garantee that it will make Bird's Eye maple or highly curled sugar maple look like soft basswood in comparison.

[Dan O'Sullivan]

JT
I would agree that would be a fair test of blade vs wood. My lingering question is: What do you do with dry hickory? The stuff is so hard I just look at the stack of the stuff I have(5 years) and question my judgement for even keeping it around. It is soo hard, I dull drill bits after drilling 6 holes.
I got the stuff when it was just milled. I didn't work all of it(windsor bends) and left it for a month or two. It was all quartersawn so I could easily split it with my froe. Yea thats what I thought.
The stuff I steam bent was impossible to get a spoon bit or a bradpoint to work after a month of drying.
So.. for the difference in the appearance of some other open grain woods and the option of using hickory: put the hickory in the wood stove and seek alternatives for building furniture. It just ain't worth the hassle.

Oh-- keep some around for testing block planes if you have that much time on your hands.
dan