lie nielsens (ready to go out of the box?)

[mike johnston]

I just ordered two Lie Nielsen planes. Knowing very little about hand tools I was hoping these would be usable right out of the box. I figured I would have to flaten and sharpen the iron, but was hoping not to have to mess with the sole of the plane. I've never done that before, and the the thought of rubbing on that beautiful bronze body scares the heck out of me. Also I sharpen with a worksharp 3000, and I know that would not be the method of a true Neander, but it is what my limited skills allow.


PS over the years I have added a few decent hand tools to my shop and never seemed to use them. But this last project, I did pull out a 2 year old Veritas block plane that had never been used. I thought it was the greatest thing in the world. I used it every chance I could and thought it was the sharpest tool in the world. Then I found out you have to sharpen them first. Same thing for my two cherries chisels, been using them right out of the box because they were by far the sharpest thing that was ever in my shop. Then yesterday I sharpened one and wow. Is there anyone in the Omaha area that would have time to show me a few things about hand tools. I would gladly pay for your time.


Thank You
Mike

[David Weaver]

You've got it right, you hone the iron and go with it. If LN's are still the same, you'll have to do a little work on the back of the iron, but not too much.

There should be no point that you'd do anything other than degrade the rest of the plane by working on it (e.g, lapping the sides or sole, that part is all ready to go and the most you'd need to do with any of it is paraffin wax or something to lubricate the bottom and make it work easier).

[Danny Burns]

I know that Lee Valley and Lie-Nielsen planes are ready to go out of the box, but can anyone tell me if the WoodRiver planes are the same, or do you need to flatten the bottoms?
Is this where the price difference is between the top planes, and the next tire below?

[Chris Griggs]

I know that Lee Valley and Lie-Nielsen planes are ready to go out of the box, but can anyone tell me if the WoodRiver planes are the same, or do you need to flatten the bottoms?
Is this where the price difference is between the top planes, and the next tire below?

The difference between the WRs and the LN/LVs is most apparent in the adjustments, which have less slop and are little smoother in the LV/LNs than the WRs. The WRs should and generally do come flat and other than a honing should work out of the box. If you get a WR that doesn't meet that criteria you should send it back. The LNs and LVs are nicer to use, your probably less likely to need to send them back, and are well worth stepping up to (you also get to support 2 of the best companies out there, period). That said, when it comes down to brass tacks use, I cannot fault the flatness or performance of the WRs.

I recommend doing search for "woodriver plane". This question comes up every few months and there are a wealth of opinions about the WRs from past threads.

To the OP....I agree with what Dave said.

[Jim Koepke]

Is Omaha in the extreme south east of Nebraska?

That is where Junior (Harry Strasil) lives.

At the top of the Neanderthal Haven is the Neanderthal Haven Announcements. Inside is a thread for a mentoring program. Locate the post by Junior and click on his name. That will bring up some options of which one will be to send him a private message.

If you were in my area, the only payment requested would be to bring me an interesting ale or two.

jtk

[Andrew Pitonyak]

I just ordered two Lie Nielsen planes. Knowing very little about hand tools I was hoping these would be usable right out of the box.

That is why my first hand plane was a LN... I knew that I lacked the ability to (or time) to do an initial tune up. And I used it out of the box. I did not even sharpen it first. Now, I had a primary one time use problem and I had never done any wood working and was not doing it, but, I was able to trim a door with no problems.

[Mike Cogswell]

You've got it right, you hone the iron and go with it. If LN's are still the same, you'll have to do a little work on the back of the iron, but not too much.

There should be no point that you'd do anything other than degrade the rest of the plane by working on it (e.g, lapping the sides or sole, that part is all ready to go and the most you'd need to do with any of it is paraffin wax or something to lubricate the bottom and make it work easier).

Agree completely. No new quality plane should need to have its sole flattened out of the box. If it does, send it back.

[Danny Thompson]

I was hoping these would be usable right out of the box.

Mr. Weaver is right, after trying to improve the edge in a variety of ways and "degrading" the blade in the process, the right approach to one of these planes has proven to be:

Add a microbevel and go to town!

[Mike Cogswell]

The difference between the WRs and the LN/LVs is most apparent in the adjustments, which have less slop and are little smoother in the LV/LNs than the WRs. The WRs should and generally do come flat and other than a honing should work out of the box. If you get a WR that doesn't meet that criteria you should send it back. The LNs and LVs are nicer to use, your probably less likely to need to send them back, and are well worth stepping up to (you also get to support 2 of the best companies out there, period). That said, when it comes down to brass tacks use, I cannot fault the flatness or performance of the WRs.

I recommend doing search for "woodriver plane". This question comes up every few months and there are a wealth of opinions about the WRs from past threads.

To the OP....I agree with what Dave said.

Chris nailed it. I have 12 bench planes, 9 are Lie-Nielsen and 3 are Woodriver V3. The LN planes look and feel better, with a higher level of finish all around. Operationally, the most noticeable difference is the amount of backlash in the blade advancing mechanism. The WR backlash is easily 3 or 4x the LN. Blade advancement and the occasional frog adjustment are smoother on the LN as well. Both take decent shavings right out of the box and plane flawlessly after the blade has been honed (the WRs did take more work the first time on the back of the blade.) Plus, with a LN you have the peace of mind of an unconditional lifetime warranty. I think FWW had it right when they gave LN a Best Overall and WR a Best Value in their plane comparison a couple a years ago. The WR is a really good plane that I have no hesitation recommending. The LN is the best in class, but you pay a premium.

I also have a number of other LN and Veritas (Lee Valley) planes thanks to their huge variety of specialty and block planes. I didn't mention LV above because I don't happen to have any Veritas bench planes, but their planes are, INHO, the equal of LN in both quality and support. Great products from two great companies.

[Jim Koepke]

One very big advantage to the LN & LV planes is how they hold their value. If one wants to sell off their planes in the future, they will likely recover most of their cost with an LN or an LV product.

My accumulation of Stanley planes were mostly bought for low prices. That is my only guarantee of possibly recovering my investment if it ever comes time to sell.

jtk

[Jim Koepke]

Mr. Weaver is right, after trying to improve the edge in a variety of ways and "degrading" the blade in the process, the right approach to one of these planes has proven to be:

Add a microbevel and go to town!


My take on what Mr. Weaver said was not about degrading the blade, but the rest of the plane.

As far as the micro-bevel is concerned, it is my belief that a person should first learn how to get a blade sharp before trying any of the modifications like micro-bevels, back bevels, ruler tricks or cambering.

It is a much easier path of progression to get a solid grounding in what a sharp blade actually is before adding all of the tricks and then not knowing why the plane isn't working up to one's expectations.

jtk

[Mike Cogswell]

One very big advantage to the LN & LV planes is how they hold their value. If one wants to sell off their planes in the future, they will likely recover most of their cost with an LN or an LV product.

My accumulation of Stanley planes were mostly bought for low prices. That is my only guarantee of possibly recovering my investment if it ever comes time to sell.

jtk

Jim makes an excellent point. I've been keeping track of the sell price of completed eBay sales of LN planes for more than a year. The median sales price as a percentage of the original MSRP ranges from 70.0% to 93.9% for the models that have had at least five sales. The overall average of all the median prices is 87.3%. I do not include the various limited editions, these are all the regular production ones. I also to not include the shipping costs.

There aren't many things in the world that you can expect to resell used for that kind of a percentage of the original price.

[Ryan Baker]

My take on what Mr. Weaver said was not about degrading the blade, but the rest of the plane.

As far as the micro-bevel is concerned, it is my belief that a person should first learn how to get a blade sharp before trying any of the modifications like micro-bevels, back bevels, ruler tricks or cambering.

It is a much easier path of progression to get a solid grounding in what a sharp blade actually is before adding all of the tricks and then not knowing why the plane isn't working up to one's expectations.

jtk

Words of wisdom! I agree 1000% Jim.

[Danny Thompson]

My take on what Mr. Weaver said was not about degrading the blade, but the rest of the plane.

As far as the micro-bevel is concerned, it is my belief that a person should first learn how to get a blade sharp before trying any of the modifications like micro-bevels, back bevels, ruler tricks or cambering.

It is a much easier path of progression to get a solid grounding in what a sharp blade actually is before adding all of the tricks and then not knowing why the plane isn't working up to one's expectations.

jtk

I see your point about ruler tricks and back bevels, but not so much about micro-bevels. You don't see a secondary/micro-bevel as part of a normal sharpening regiment for an LN plane blade, which comes with a reasonable primary bevel right out of the box? Maybe this applies to be BU planes, alone?

[Mark Roderick]

My take on what Mr. Weaver said was not about degrading the blade, but the rest of the plane.

As far as the micro-bevel is concerned, it is my belief that a person should first learn how to get a blade sharp before trying any of the modifications like micro-bevels, back bevels, ruler tricks or cambering.

It is a much easier path of progression to get a solid grounding in what a sharp blade actually is before adding all of the tricks and then not knowing why the plane isn't working up to one's expectations.

jtk

I agree with all that except the part about the micro-bevel. All beginners are going to be sharpening with a honing guide. Rather than hone the entire bevel to a shiny polish, it makes complete sense to retract the blade a bit and hone a micro-bevel. It's far easier and far faster, so the beginning will see the fruits of his labor much more quickly with much less chance for error.

[David Weaver]

I think most people will get a smoother and consistently better edge if they use a micro bevel and a very thin ruler to apply the ruler trick.

I'd like to say my freehand edges are as good on the smoother, but they're not. I don't use the ruler trick because I'm too lazy to locate the ruler, but I still apply a fine microbevel on my smoother iron to speed sharpening and protect the edge against tearout. There's no other plane I necessarily would use the method on in the long term, but I've gotten a lot of improperly sharpened tools from people, and well, straight razors are set up to do exactly what you do with a microbevel - provide only the tiniest bit of metal to be worked to improve your chances of getting a fine finish all the way to the edge...quickly.

The trick is to not make sharpening take 5 minutes, require four hands, etc. and think about how you want your setup to be. I can't imagine it takes me more than two minutes to sharpen a smoother iron with a three bevel system, and if I hollow grind the iron, it might take slightly less time to run through a couple of stones, but the edge is *never* not finished properly the first time with the three bevel method charlesworth describes.

None of it is especially critical if you're not trying to go straight from a planed surface to your first coat of shellac, but if you are, you don't want tool marks or nicks or any of that stuff.

[Mike Cogswell]

Jim makes an excellent point. I've been keeping track of the sell price of completed eBay sales of LN planes for more than a year. The median sales price as a percentage of the original MSRP ranges from 70.0% to 93.9% for the models that have had at least five sales. The overall average of all the median prices is 87.3%. I do not include the various limited editions, these are all the regular production ones. I also to not include the shipping costs.

There aren't many things in the world that you can expect to resell used for that kind of a percentage of the original price.

I just noticed a significant error. It should have read: ". . . percentage of the original MSRP ranges from 79.0% to 93.9% . . . "

Those Lie-Nielsen planes really do hold their value.

[Jim Koepke]

All beginners are going to be sharpening with a honing guide.

That is not something you should bet on. In my experience it is not always true.

If one is using a honing guide, there can be complications from not knowing what they are doing or how to correct if something goes amiss. There was a lengthy discussion about how some honing guides are uneven when set for a micro bevel.

My suggestion is that one should be able to repeatedly sharpen a blade well, before one tries any variations to the edge. For many years I have worked without micro bevels and as long as the blades are sharp they fulfill my needs and expectations.

For a beginner a micro bevel may be easy to achieve the first time but may introduce a problem on the second sharpening.

Other than that, we can just agree to not agree.

jtk

[george wilson]

When I was starting out,I don't think honing guides had been invented. Of course,rubbing flint on granite was the order of the day.

[Chris Fournier]

I'm certain that I'll be hung out to dry for my response but I can assure you as a LN fan with a couple dozen of their products, purchased in the '90s (most pre-production) and into the present century and as a metalworker I will say this.

Anyone who tells you that you've spent a lot for these tools and you can use them with confidence out of the box is niave. No decent craftsman would take a manufacturer's tolerance claims at face value and dig into a project.

Are the soles dead flat? Nope. Are they good enough for woodworking? Most likely! Can you further flatten the soles in your well equipped shop? You bet. Tension the blade (cutting edge retracted above the sole), cross hatch the sole with a sharpie marker and lap the sole on a granite inspection surface with a piece of wet dry 320 grit pape taped to it for 10 seconds, look at the sole. There's your "flattnes roadmap". Your standards for flat will determine your efforts from this point on. Is dead 100% flat the objective? That's up to you, but co-planer at the fron, mouth and back of the sole should be a minimum spec.

Should you flatten the plane blade back? Sure you should, you'll actually flatten it if you're careful. Will it improve your work? I don't know but your work ethic is the backbone of good craftsmanship.

Would you really hone a flat ground blade? Sure you would if you have time on your hands. Hollow grind that blade and then hone it - efficient. If you want to hone it straight out of the box go ahead but once you're honing more than 50% of the bevel hit the grinder!

If you want to be confident in wood I'd suggest that you read up on metal working.

I've responded to your thread because I've percieved that you are really thinking about your craft. The answers are simple and have existed since mankind has been making objects. How far you take things is your personal journey.

BTW if you haven't figured this out, the LN product is top notch! You'll love your planes and anything less will be unacceptable to you once you use these planes in your shop.

[Tony Shea]

I'm certain that I'll be hung out to dry for my response but I can assure you as a LN fan with a couple dozen of their products, purchased in the '90s (most pre-production) and into the present century and as a metalworker I will say this.

Anyone who tells you that you've spent a lot for these tools and you can use them with confidence out of the box is niave. No decent craftsman would take a manufacturer's tolerance claims at face value and dig into a project.

Are the soles dead flat? Nope. Are they good enough for woodworking? Most likely! Can you further flatten the soles in your well equipped shop? You bet. Tension the blade (cutting edge retracted above the sole), cross hatch the sole with a sharpie marker and lap the sole on a granite inspection surface with a piece of wet dry 320 grit pape taped to it for 10 seconds, look at the sole. There's your "flattnes roadmap". Your standards for flat will determine your efforts from this point on. Is dead 100% flat the objective? That's up to you, but co-planer at the fron, mouth and back of the sole should be a minimum spec.

Should you flatten the plane blade back? Sure you should, you'll actually flatten it if you're careful. Will it improve your work? I don't know but your work ethic is the backbone of good craftsmanship.

Would you really hone a flat ground blade? Sure you would if you have time on your hands. Hollow grind that blade and then hone it - efficient. If you want to hone it straight out of the box go ahead but once you're honing more than 50% of the bevel hit the grinder!

If you want to be confident in wood I'd suggest that you read up on metal working.

I've responded to your thread because I've percieved that you are really thinking about your craft. The answers are simple and have existed since mankind has been making objects. How far you take things is your personal journey.

BTW if you haven't figured this out, the LN product is top notch! You'll love your planes and anything less will be unacceptable to you once you use these planes in your shop.

I do agree that any plane you receive out of the box is probably not going to show dead flat using the surface plate with paper attached to it method. I also agree that this process of improving the flatness is certainly a good idea if you have necessary skills to fix, not hurt, the sole. But for someone starting out I can really see them causing more harm than good during this flattening process. You have a good chance of making a banana out of your plane's sole. If you do end up getting the sole dead flat in this process then the other problem you probably neglected is keeping the sides square to the sole during the lapping. More pressure on one side is very easy to do for someone who has little to no experience in this process. I personally just don't think this method should even be an option for someone starting out and having zero experience even getting a sharp iron. You can almost guarantee they don't own a granite surface plate to the spec required.

Another point I disagree with in this thread is about the ruler trick. I personally am not a fan of it. When I started out sharpening I would then try the ruler trick on LN and LV iron needlessly. This caused me more trouble in the long run trying to remember what irons have the back bevel and what irons i need a ruler around for. I went through and ground past where any of the blades had back bevels and just went through the process of flattening the back of the irons. But this is certainly a valid method and works very well for people, just am not a fan personally. It can be helpful on antique planes where the iron is beyond getting it flat. But I would certainly try flattening it before comitting the ruler trick.

[Shawn Pixley]

Would you really hone a flat ground blade? Sure you would if you have time on your hands. Hollow grind that blade and then hone it - efficient. If you want to hone it straight out of the box go ahead but once you're honing more than 50% of the bevel hit the grinder.

For what it is worth, I always hone flat ground blades. I can get them very sharp. The first honing is the longest, but afterwards, everything goes quickly. I recently got a new LN 4-1/2. It took me all of 20 minutes to flatten the back, flat hone the bevel and camber the blade. There are many good ways to get blades sharp. I didn't need to do anything to the plane beyond slightly tightening the mouth.

I am not saying flat ground is better then hollow ground, nor would I accept the opposite contention. I use flat honing because I can get the repeatability I desire. I also use a mix of japanese and wetern chisels. I didn't want to use multiple techniques. My advise to anyone would be, "find a technique that gets blades sharp. Perfect it and use it."

[david charlesworth]

Is it not strange that Deneb, the superb Lie-Nielsen demonstrator, uses microbevels, a honing guide and the ruler trick?

I believe that both he and I recommend these techniques because they are a simple and effective route, for getting a supreme edge. ( Assuming one has suitable stones). In my case, just two, King 800 and King 8,000 or 10,000 grit.

best wishes,
David Charlesworth

[David Weaver]

When I was starting out,I don't think honing guides had been invented. Of course,rubbing flint on granite was the order of the day.

What george, no obsidian?

[David Weaver]

I do agree that any plane you receive out of the box is probably not going to show dead flat using the surface plate with paper attached to it method. I also agree that this process of improving the flatness is certainly a good idea if you have necessary skills to fix, not hurt, the sole. But for someone starting out I can really see them causing more harm than good during this flattening process. You have a good chance of making a banana out of your plane's sole. If you do end up getting the sole dead flat in this process then the other problem you probably neglected is keeping the sides square to the sole during the lapping. More pressure on one side is very easy to do for someone who has little to no experience in this process. I personally just don't think this method should even be an option for someone starting out and having zero experience even getting a sharp iron. You can almost guarantee they don't own a granite surface plate to the spec required.

Another point I disagree with in this thread is about the ruler trick. I personally am not a fan of it. When I started out sharpening I would then try the ruler trick on LN and LV iron needlessly. This caused me more trouble in the long run trying to remember what irons have the back bevel and what irons i need a ruler around for. I went through and ground past where any of the blades had back bevels and just went through the process of flattening the back of the irons. But this is certainly a valid method and works very well for people, just am not a fan personally. It can be helpful on antique planes where the iron is beyond getting it flat. But I would certainly try flattening it before comitting the ruler trick.

If the ruler trick is applied correctly, there is a very distinct well-polished bevel, if the iron is heavily worn, it just sits between a glinting wear bevel and wherever the ruler trick hadn't been applied. That kind of sharpness is really only useful on a smoother, it's transient and not necessary on anything that takes a deeper cut and heavier abuse. But it's useful on a smoother, as is a fairly steep final bevel (like 32-35 degrees) to avoid chipping.

The reason I brought it up is because people very rarely spend enough time on the flat side of an iron, especially one that's very hard, to remove the wear from the face of the flat face of the iron. To get rid of that wear, you have to have finger pressure on that part of the iron and spend a fairly significant amount of time there with the polish stone, like 15 seconds or so (as opposed to just the few wipes it would take to remove a burr).

I've never received an iron from anyone that was well polished on the flat face, smoothers or anything else.

The ruler trick is actually not quite so useful on older planes and pitted irons because it's too shallow, those defects still have to come out. On that type of shallow RT, it doesn't really matter too much if you forget and polish the flat face a few times, and the shallowness doesn't threaten using a closely set cap iron.

I don't necessarily use the RT on smoothers, but i consciously spend quite a bit of time on the flat face to make sure that I remove the wear bevel.

I haven't got too many thoughts about deneb because he's advised people that the double iron is fiddly and that steeper frogs should be used (i think that is exactly the wrong way around), but the very first iron I sharpened I did right after watching David's video with the three bevel method and it was easily hair shaving sharp. That is a very fortunate first step. For years I thought maybe there was a secret I didn't know because it was "common knowledge" that you couldn't get good sharpness at first, but that first edge was literally as good as any edge that I've used since, save any canned nuttiness using razor abrasives just for giggles.

I thought the same thing about razor honing until I bought a new razor that had been "professionally honed" by an "expert" only to find it was several levels below where my daily shavers are kept.

[Chris Vandiver]

When I was starting out,I don't think honing guides had been invented. Of course,rubbing flint on granite was the order of the day.


Well, when you hail from the Bronze Age...............

[Shawn Pixley]

What george, no obsidian?

Maybe I should try a knapped flint plane blade?


Knapped flint gets very, very sharp. When I used the mircotome, the glass blades were impossibly sharp. They dulled quickly (dull being a relative term). Maybe we can get LN to make obsidian chisels?

[Jessica Pierce-LaRose]

… Maybe we can get LN to make obsidian chisels?

You know, I've always really wanted to justify my safety glasses … I'm sure chopping a few dovetails with those would be just what I need!


…I thought the same thing about razor honing until I bought a new razor that had been "professionally honed" by an "expert" only to find it was several levels below where my daily shavers are kept.

I know your avatar's not you, David, but it's hard to take anything you say about shaving seriously when I see that picture looking back at me!

(both these comments are meant in jest, of course…)

[David Weaver]

I know your avatar's not you, David, but it's hard to take anything you say about shaving seriously when I see that picture looking back at me!



I only wish I was as tough and as cool as Harley Race. Harley could say that was one day's growth, and nobody would say a thing to him about it!