wood bodied plane anatomy,tuning

[Noah Wagener]

Looking from above at a wood bodied plane the slope from the front comes towards the bed at about 90 degrees but towards the mouth it changes so that it is parallel to the bed angle.I reasoned this must be so that as you plane the sole the mouth stays same width. But the slope seems to be steeper in the front so that the back of the mouth would recede faster than the front making the mouth wider as the sole is tuned.Is there some reason for the different angles? I'd say the bed crosses the sole at 45 and the front of the mouth at 60.
And how are those angles cut? I was thinking of just adding an inch or so to the sole of a jointer to tighten mouth but have no idea how to chisel out the opening or do the same making a plane. The book i'm browsing has plans for a plane but requires a mortising machine.
I was also wondering if i do fir the sole on a smoothing plane if i should maybe make the back thicker to raise the angle (it is at 45 now) as ive read that smoothers come at higher pitches.Do you all have multiple planes for different types of wood?

thanks

[Jeff Heath]

Noah

A mortiser is a nice power tool to have to make planes with, but it's not required. 300 years ago, men were making planes all over the world without the use of power tools. You can do your layout with a pencil on your plane blank, and then drill out as much waste as you can without drilling into the remaining plane body. Obviously, you want to fall short of the bed of the plane. Then, you can drill through the mouth on the sole-side of the plane to create the mouth opening. Now you can finish with chisel and mallet, followed by a plane float or wood rasp/file to get the bed and cheeks flat and true.

As far as adding an inch or so to the sole of your plane, I wouldn't recommend that. you can tighten up the throat of the plane by insetting a 1/4" thick piece of hardwood and reshaping the throat/mouth opening to suit your needs.

[Kees Heiden]

The area you describe, the face facing the rion, low down at the mouth, is called the wear. It is usually at an angle of something like 70 to 80 degrees. Indeed to prevent th mouth from opening too much when tuning the sole. But in the old planes a tapered blade was used and as you had to grind the blade over the years the mouth would grow pretty fast. So the angled wear is just part of a solution.

Anyway, making a patch is a much better cure for an overwide mouth (like Jeff wrote above). Adding a planesole wasn't done nearly as often. Make the patch a bit too tight and file open the mouth until you are happy with the result.

I wouldn't alter the bedding angle of a wooden plane. Make a new body if you really want to experiment with high angle planes or just learn how to use the chipbreaker.

[Noah Wagener]

thanks for the info guys.

i am real green to woodworking so i need somewhat detailed instruction for simple things that you wouldnt think to explain. Like drilling the mortise for the chipwell. Would clamp some kind of guide block for drilling and mortising with a chisel? I've made some of those rustic chinese foot stools that have compound splay and had a hell of a time mortising at those angles.The metal on my chisels (they are not mortising, cheapbox store ones) is short and then the handle interferes with the guide block real quick so it has to be small and then removed pretty early.How is this done? I saw a picture of a guy using a brace freehand for drilling mortises on the bottom of a chair. Can people really do that? I don't even feel comfortable holding a chisel plumb for standard mortises.

And you both recommended "insetting" a patch. Would this be stuck to the "wear"? Or would it be like an inlay in front of the mouth? If so how do you cut out existing sole to insert patch? With chisel?

Incidentally, i happened upon a book Woodworker's Guide to Handplanes by Scott Wynn. He writes that planes where the wear changes direction so that it is sloping somewhat parallel to the bed are single iron planes. where the front of the chipwell does not change directions is for blades with cap iron. the front slope would either somewhat match the slope of the back of the blade in relation to the sole in the case of the single iron or the bevel on the front of the cap iron. i say "somewhat" because in both diagrams angles somewhat separate or widen.

do you agree with this? Jeff, do you make single iron and double iron planes and have different shaped chipwells? Also, in the above mentioned book he has plans for making planes where he does not use the slots along the side of the well (he calls them abutments) for wedges but rather a dowel across the well. i think maybe this is the Japanese way? Anyways, he says this actually constricts the throat more but is easier to make. I mention this because i get chips jammed in those "abutments" between the wedge and the cap iron. Maybe the sole has been planed so much that now the sole has moved closer to the wedge? The feet of the wedge stick out past the where the cap iron angles down to meet blade. The feet are actually beveled themselves away from the iron. Are either of these conditions proper?

Jeff, does your toolworks have a website?

Kess, learning to use the chipbreaker negates the need for different angle planes? from browsing the above book i was under the impression i needed at least 2 of each jack and jointer planes and multiple smoothers. I have to confess the only plane i use is my dad's Home Depot Stanley i found in his basement. Or i guess it would have been Builder's Square or Knox. I can't seem to get the others to work. Maybe its because i have a Hock blade in the block. tuning sure is more complicated then i thought. i gave up trying to flatten the stanley no 7 after a summer of trying and thought i'd give the wood ones i had lying around a go.

thanks again, Noah

[Kees Heiden]

Hi Noah,

The patch to close up a gaping wide mouth is been inserted in the sole. When I repair such a plane I usually use an electric router to make the cavity, but first drilling some holes and then using chisels to make the mortise would work too of course.Then you glue in the patch and use a file to create the mouth you want. On wooden planes I never try for a super tight mouth. Overall I think super tight mouths are overrated, but that is just my opinion.

In planes with a chipbreaker i would say the wear stand up a bit steeper and on single iron planes the wear should be more parallel to the iron. On most late 19th, early 20th century planes you won't see much difference though. The very tips of the wedge are indeed prime areas for congestion in your plane. You should probably trim them back a bit when they protrude beyond the chipbreaker. The prongs of the wedge should also fit close to the sidewalls of the abutments. Often on old planes, the prongs have bowed inwards a little, thus creating shaving traps at the tips. You could glue some beech strips to the outside of the wedge prongs and make everything nicely tight fitting again. It is also a good idea to camber the blade edge, or to round over the corners of the edge, so the blade isn't cutting at the corners. This does two things, you won't get tramlines in the surface of the wood you are planing and it helps avoiding shavingtraps at the tips of the wedge.

The chipbreaker is a chapter in itself and has created long and hot discussions on the internet fora. But because you are at the beginning of your handplane career I wouldn't worry too much about all that. Just keep in the back of your mind, when you get tearout in the surface you are planing, one of the cures is setting the chipbreaker very close to the edge of your blade. Another cure is an high angle plane, but because you won't find these much on the vintage tool market, it remains a bit of a theroretical posiibility. I would just clean up and tune your existing planes for the moment. The chip breaker is also one of the first candidates to look at when you get shavings trapped in the mouth of the plane. The chipbreaker should fit tight against the face of the blade, no gaps allowed here. And the very tip of the chipbreaker should be smooth.

And don't forget, the most important hand tool rule is, use one of these: SHARP EDGES!

[Derek Cohen]

Hi Noah

Wooden planes wear, and corrections open the mouth. Fortunately, this is unlikely to occur frequently enough to affect a new plane, however well-used vintage planes more often than not need a patch to close up the mouth again. This is relatively simple to do. Some modern wooden plane makers, such as Terry Gordon (HNT Gordon) add a brass wear strip to their planes to reduce wear. I tend to do so as well (although sometimes this was not planned :) ).

The mouth is also "opened" when a tapered blade is ground back as it gets thinner. This amount is negligible for several years when used appropriately, and only really affects a smoother, since a jack or a jointer are coarser planes. A parallel iron does not have this disadvantage. Overall, however, the advantages of a tapered iron in a wooden plane outweigh the disadvantages (advantages include easier extraction and more secure placement).

The other factor is that the higher the bed angle, the less important is the size of the mouth. Once you get to about 55 degrees, the mouth size is relatively unimportant. At 60 degrees it no longer relevant.

Regarding blade holding... In order of best to worst, the wedge used with a slot, then a wedge held with a Krenov cross-pin, and lastly a round dowel.

The wedge-in-a-slot can provide a very solid reinforcement across the full length of the iron. Indeed, a poorly-fitted wedge may support the iron only at the top and create the illusion that the iron is supported, but the plane will chatter as the bevel area is left to vibrate. Attending to the fitting will transform the plane.

The Krenov cross-pin is free to pivot and this allows it to adjust to the best angle for its wedge. The difference between this arrangement and a dowel is night-and-day. The support from a Krenov cross-pin is usually between 1/4" - 3/8". The support from a dowel is about 1/32". No contest which I would use.

I have a pictorial on my website for building a low angle traditional woodie (with a wedge-in-a-slot), a strike block plane: http://www.inthewoodshop.com/ShopMadeTools/BuildingaStrikeBlockPlane.html

I shall be writing up another for a coffin smoother. However, the construction is the same, so there may be something there to help.

Regards from Perth

Derek

[Jeff Heath]

Noah,

I make both double iron and single iron planes.....depends on what the customer wants. Mostly, I make double iron planes.

My website will be up soon, but I have not made it a priority as I have been plenty busy the past year without it. It is presently under construction, and the guy who is building it for me (a friend who is also in that business) is waiting on me for professional photography. I need to quit selling the planes I build before the photographer can get to my shop. :)