Finally made a Rabbet Plane

[Tony Shea]

Sorry about re-posting this but thought after all the time and effort I put into this thing it deserved its own thread. It is some lovely QS Beech that I spent forever trying to find, probably paid too much for the pieces I got but I finally found it. Crazy how scarce beech has become for some unknown reason. Hopefully the hand tool woodworking revolution helps relieve the shortage of good quality beech.

Anyways, this is what I have been working on for the past couple of weekends when I get some shop time. This was completely a hand tool build per Larry's DVD, Matt, and Caleb's advice. Everything seemed to work out wonderfully, especially happy with the hardness of the blade after my cheesy attempt at heat treating. I have made a bunch of test rabbets and the blade is still sharp enough to leave a great surface. This is much better than my first attempt at heat treating.

The conical escapement was another difficult part for me, mostly struggled with laying it out rather than executing it. I suppose it came out ok, not sure what the dimensions of this escapement are supposed to be but looks ok to my eye given my first try.
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[Steve Voigt]

Tony,
That's a lovely-looking plane. All the details--the chamfers, the gouge cuts, the conical escapement--look great. Congrats.

[Clark Christenson]

...Crazy how scarce beech has become for some unknown reason. Hopefully the hand tool woodworking revolution helps relieve the shortage of good quality beech...

It's not without reason that beech lumber is hard to find. Look up beech bark disease. No amount of desire from handtool makers will revive the tree, look to Europe for quality beech lumber.

Also, nice plane.

Clark

[Steve Voigt]

???
Beech bark disease is real but has little to do with the lack of availability of plane-sized billets. Beech is still enormously plentiful in the Eastern U.S. But it's undesirable as a furniture wood, so sawyers don't cut it--they'd rather cut stuff that sells for higher prices. The other factor is that it's tricky to dry, and very tricky to dry in the sizes needed for planes.
I think actually things are looking up for beech supplies.

[Michael Fross]

Fantastic looking plane. I'm really impressed.

Making a hollow and round plane is up next on my "stuff to make" list and I also will be following Larry's DVD. One question, however. What floats did you end up using? LN has quite a few options and I was wondering what you found necessary.

Again, just a great job and I hope mine turn out as nice as yours.

Regards,

Michael

[Robert Engel]

Looks great. Any thoughts about a fence or depth gauge?

[Jim Koepke]

Looks great.

Did you take any pictures during the build?

It would be great to see how you did some of the edge work and made the escapement.

jtk

[Don Emmerling]

The work is excellent. I am sure the old timers of that era would give you two thumbs up. If you do one again take some pictures as you go along. With your talent it would be very instructive.

[Chris Griggs]

Nice work Tony. Lovely plane!

[Trevor Walsh]

Nice one Tony.

[george wilson]

A GREAT plane,Tony!!!! I love the artistic escapement,and the nice bold 18th. C. bevels,with correct terminations. Correct 18th. C. wedge. Extremely neat looking work.

Not that everything has to be 18th. C. to please me. I think toolmaking reached its peak in the 19th. C..(I was paid to work 18th. C..) But,what you have done is correct all over,all details,as far as the woodworking is concerned. Great job!

[Tony Shea]

Thanks a lot George. That means a lot coming from you. I agree completely with you, toolmaking started to lose all the small artistic details that made the work really stand out. I think a good looking tool in some sort of subconsious way actually works better. Obviously the tool needs to work good anyway but something about really refining the details and taking pride in the aesthetics of the tool really plays in how well the tool works in your shop.

Thanks everyone, I will try to upload some of the pictures I took while I was making the plane. I don't have a lot of build pics but do have some to show if any are interested.

[Jim Koepke]

[major snip]

Thanks everyone, I will try to upload some of the pictures I took while I was making the plane. I don't have a lot of build pics but do have some to show if any are interested.

I am interested.

Mostly I am curious as to how you cut the chamfers, especially the curved chamfers at the front and back.

jtk

[Mike Allen1010]

Absolutely beautiful Tony! I love not only the aesthetic details, but also your terrific execution – looks like a great user!

I find myself using my rabbit plane more and more and would love to try in build one with a quality, modern steel iron. I'm curious if this was your first attempt at heat treating and overall how difficult/how much time did it take for you to get a quality result? I'm not really interested in diving into heat treating blades; the impression I get from the experience folks here is that it is kind of a subjective process and I don't see colors well. That's just my uninformed impression, I appreciate your perspective.

BTW, where did you pick up the iron?


Thanks, Mike

[Chuck Hart]

Thanks a lot George. That means a lot coming from you. I agree completely with you, toolmaking started to lose all the small artistic details that made the work really stand out. I think a good looking tool in some sort of subconsious way actually works better. Obviously the tool needs to work good anyway but something about really refining the details and taking pride in the aesthetics of the tool really plays in how well the tool works in your shop.

Thanks everyone, I will try to upload some of the pictures I took while I was making the plane. I don't have a lot of build pics but do have some to show if any are interested.


Same principle that a car runs better when its washed