Woody shrinkage

[Robert Norman]

I recently acquired a wooden jack from an antiquing friend who knew I love old tools. The price was right -- an invite next time I make jambalaya! Yeah, it's that good. This is the first time though I've come across a plane that has shrunk so much the wedge and iron assembly (its a double) were jammed in. It took A LOT of wigglin' to get it loose.

By nature of wood is this more likely with the larger widths? I usually rehab moulding planes for fun (it's my version of the sickness). I'd like to produce some wooden planes and certainly don't want this to happen in my future endeavors.

[Jim Koepke]

This is something currently outside of my knowledge. There have been some discussions of wooden planes going through changes with the seasons.

Hopefully someone with more knowledge will be able to explain the ins and outs of shrinking woodies.

One question comes to mind of the practice of soaking wooden planes with boiled linseed oil. Another is the habit of some folks giving them a coat of lacquer.

jtk

[Robert Norman]

This one is coated (poorly) with lacquer. I'll put up pics of the before and after rehab a la a Stewie thread but it won't be anywhere near that pretty lol! Will most likely slowly float some space on the sides of the bed and get it back in action. The iron and chip breaker are unmarked and the maker stamp is too faint to date this plane with any reasonable accuracy. The wedge is complete and unbroken at the tips so that's a plus.

I'm sure most people would call it firewood, I'm just too darn stubborn to not give it a shot. More to come soon when it's warm enough to do the work!

[John Vernier]

I have come across serious cases of this problem two or three times, and less extreme cases are pretty common - you see a lot of old wooden coffin smoothers on which the sides of the body are broken out on either side of the blade, an obvious weak point. I think this is often caused by wood shrinkage, although aggressive blade adjustments could also be a factor.

I think over-heating and over-drying of the wood in modern climate controlled environments is a common cause of this. I briefly had a shop in an industrial building (in Ohio) with central steam heat, and the winter climate was drier than the summers when I lived in L.A.! I had a lot of wooden-bodied planes "sieze up" on me, which had previously worked freely. I had a lot of other problems relating to the extreme dryness, so it was a relief to get out of that environment. My planes mostly recovered, but their time in the desert was relatively brief.

[Robert Norman]

Thanks John. I'll leave it disassembled and sand off the lacquer so it can enjoy this gulf coast humidity.