Plane Protection

[David Wadstrup]

Hi,

I have a question regarding protecting planes from moisture and corrosion. I have Waxilit(a Lee Valley paste product) and camellia oil. Would using both be redundant or overkill? I normally like to give all of my tools a clean wipe with a rag damp with camellia oil after each use. I have just treated everything with Waxilit for the first time, and am wondering if I would be in essence removing it were I to continue with my usual clean up with the oil. Applying the Waxilit is a lot messier and time consuming than the occasional oil wipe, so if it adds no benefit I'd love to skip the wax step. And if you do feel like the Waxilit offers extra protection, how often do you think I should reapply? What do you think? I do live in NYC, by the way, and it gets very humid here in the summer.

Thanks for your help,


David

[Pam Niedermayer]

I've found the best, most reliable, and easy method is to store metal things inside wooden cabinets, in my case more like kitchen cabinets. Apparently the wood, even plywood, absorbs enough of the humidity to protect the contents.

Pam

[Johnny Kleso]

What you dont wannt is rapid changes in tempature or humidty..
Store them in a box or cabinet, I just WD-40 and buy it by the Gallon from Lowes for $9.99

I have some planes that have rusted in long term storage and I think I will shellac the cheeks and soles..

[Frank Drew]

David,

I'm with Pam and Johnny; the easiest protection for your tools is storing them inside some kind of enclosure. Even my tools out in the open, though, stayed rust free when I was in the shop regularly, and I never wiped them with anything.

I think you're right that using two products would definitely be overkill.

[John Tallyn]

I don't use wax, or wax type products on any tool that will touch a glue joint, that may be overkill, but just my personal opinion. I agree with Pam and Frank that storing them inside a wooden enclosure is the best thing can do, along with using them on a weekly basis, if for no other reason then to practice.
John

[Jim Belair]

Hope this isn't a hijack, but for those who do wipe down their tools, do you disassemble them before doing so? I mean remove lever cap and blade on a plane so you can wipe the bedding surface, mouth area, etc? I guess to do a thorough job one would also need to separate cap iron from blade. I have had some spot corrosion on planes stored in a metal machinist chest before I built my wooden cabinet. I've started to give them a wipe every month or so in the hot humid season when I'm not in the shop much. Seems to me there are vulnerable surfaces I'm not wiping without disassembling, but it's a lot more work to do so.

Jim B

[David Weaver]

I don't take mine apart unless I'm sharpening. It's a pain to get the planes out from time to time to check for rust. You could spray the frog with light oil when you're sharpening, etc, but it might be easier to put wax on it once in a blue moon, or a *very thin* coat of shellac, like a wipe on of a 1 pound cut.

I wax mine (when I can remember), but I'm not above putting shellac on planes. I put it on the inside of the casting of all of the users, and on smoothers that will never be used on their sides, I sometimes wipe on a coating of shellac.

When I used to keep planes that I didn't use a lot, I did that and paste wax on the soles (obviously can't shellac the sole), which works much better than a light oil. The places that I got rust that mattered most often were the bottom of the plane when you fingerprint it, between the lever cap and the cap iron, and between the cap iron and the iron (putting pitting at the cutting edge). I sold most of the planes I didn't use a lot a while ago, though -that was the best solution for rust. As frank mentioned, if you use them often, you won't have the issues.

[george wilson]

I have a customer who does exactly the type of inlay you are doing,except smaller. Brass inlaid lines in wood and the like. I made him a router plane (commonly just called a router). Once in a while he contacts me wanting extra blades made in different widths. It is a small router which uses 1/8" square tool steel cutters. Their cutting ends are bent forward and filed down to different widths,and hardened and drawn.

The small Stanley router would be a good choice as Pam suggested,for your project.

[Robert Joseph]

I've found the best, most reliable, and easy method is to store metal things inside wooden cabinets, in my case more like kitchen cabinets. Apparently the wood, even plywood, absorbs enough of the humidity to protect the contents.

Pam

This is true. Used a metal automotive tool cabinet before building a wood tool cabinet and there was a noticeable difference in the return of rust/tarnish.



What you dont wannt is rapid changes in tempature or humidty..
Store them in a box or cabinet, I just WD-40 and buy it by the Gallon from Lowes for $9.99

I have some planes that have rusted in long term storage and I think I will shellac the cheeks and soles..

Also true. I roll my hand tool cabinet into the bathroom of my shop in winter because it is heated year round. The rest of the shop is heated by the woodstove.

I use that T-9 stuff on my cast tables periodically (more often in winter) and hand tools if they aren't getting regular use. Works fairly well and haven't noticed it contaminating any wood as long as it's dry.

[Christian Castillo]

another +1 for Boeshield T-9.

[Tom Vanzant]

A friend here in the Houston area takes his rust prevention to a slightly higher level. His garage/shop is not air conditioned and his perspiration is very acidic, so after a session with his planes, all Stanley Type 11 smooth soles, he breaks down the planes, sharpens the irons, removes the frog and wipes down ALL metal surfaces with a rag soaked in 3-in-1 oil to remove any wood dust and chips as well as any traces of his prespiration, then re-assembles the planes and returns them to a wooden cabinet. He sets the irons the next time he uses the planes.
In seriousy humid areas, electric dehumidifiers used in metal gun cabinets work nicely to prevent rust on your tools.

[Pam Niedermayer]

... wipes down ALL metal surfaces with a rag soaked in 3-in-1 oil to remove any wood dust and chips..

This is key, have been caught myself a couple of times on this one, nasty outcomes.

Pam

[Bill Houghton]

One of the magazines did a test, and camellia oil was NOT very effective in rust prevention. Strangely, they didn't test paste wax; that's why I use.

Bill, California North Coast, Mediterranean climate, high moisture in the winter but not the killer humidity of the Midwest/East Coast.

[Frank Drew]

Living in a temperate zone with cold winters and hot, humid summers, my opinion is that heating and air conditioning in a woodworking shop is as important as dust collection -- life's too short to work without them. :D

[Jim Matthews]

The blue corrosion inhibiting bags from LV work well in my damp coastal Mass basement.

[Curt Putnam]

http://www.corrosionx.com/hd.html

My Ridgid cast iron stuff sat for 4 years in an unheated garage, unused, with stuff stacked on them with zero rust at the end.

no affiliation, yada ....

[Kevin Fitzsimons]

Lie-Nielsen recommends camellia or jojoba oil, so I'm surprised by the magazine test that said camellia oil was not good. I use jojoba and the plane socks which are treated with silicon. L-N and LV sell them.

[Dan Sheehan]

Has anyone tried silicon spray?

And what about applicators for WD40 or 3-1 oil? I hate the idea of oily rags and the spray seems too heavy, meaning I'll oil a rag by wiping the tool down before use. There must be something ingenious out there.

[Casey Gooding]

I have lived both in Coastal South Carolina and Florida. I simply use a stiff paint brush to clean off all the and dust I can and then wipe my tools down with a rag that has whatever rust preventative is closest. I've used Camelia oil, WD-40, Boeshield, 3-in-1...whatever is handy, they all work fine. I have never had any rust problems despite these high humidity areas. Also, I've never kept my tools in an enclosed box or cabinet.

[David Keller NC]

Has anyone tried silicon spray?

And what about applicators for WD40 or 3-1 oil? I hate the idea of oily rags and the spray seems too heavy, meaning I'll oil a rag by wiping the tool down before use. There must be something ingenious out there.

Yeah - it's called electricity that runs an airconditioner or dehumidifier. :D

Seriously - some of the greatest furniture ever made was created in shops before the advent of electricity, but many of these same pieces have a lot of shrinkage/expansion damage from changes in humidity. It isn't true that all of this damage was caused by taking these pieces into modern air-conditoned and centrally heated homes - the humidity swings in an unconditioned space are extreme.

The same is true for your metal tools - you can certainly protect them for years by smearing heavy grease on them, like the cosmoline that was used in WWII to ship jeeps, tanks and guns across the Pacific, but lightly oiling them isn't going to cut it. At the very least, one needs to keep them in a tool cabinet or box in an unconditioned shop, but even that is going to result in a heck of a lot of work to keep them corrosion-free. The amount of power used to put a small "golden rod" type dehumidfication unit in a tool box is trivial.