Help preparing a rough sawn Ash board

[Rafael Herrera]

Hello,

I'm a beginner woodworker and I've started a personal project to building a live edge coffee table. As a trial run and to learn technique, I got a rough sawn Ash slab, approx 3" x 24" x 60".

I want to use hand tools for the slab preparation. I got a few vintage no. 4 and no. 5 hand planes for this project.

I converted a no. 4 plane into a scrub plane and started to clean up the slab.

As you can see in the picture, there is a large knot in the middle of the slab. As I try to clean it up I get deep tears.

My questions are:

Which plane is better for scrubbing, the no. 4 or no. 5?

How to avoid tearing or minimize it?

Thank you,
Rafael

[Ron Selzer]

Don't know the answer.
Just want to say GOOD LUCK
Looking good so far, enjoy yourself as you go and keep posting pictures

[Rod Sheridan]

Try a low angle plane or a card scraper...............Regards, Rod.

[Doug Dawson]

Hello,

I'm a beginner woodworker and I've started a personal project to building a live edge coffee table. As a trial run and to learn technique, I got a rough sawn Ash slab, approx 3" x 24" x 60".

I want to use hand tools for the slab preparation. I got a few vintage no. 4 and no. 5 hand planes for this project.

I converted a no. 4 plane into a scrub plane and started to clean up the slab.

As you can see in the picture, there is a large knot in the middle of the slab. As I try to clean it up I get deep tears.

My questions are:

Which plane is better for scrubbing, the no. 4 or no. 5?

How to avoid tearing or minimize it?


I use an "actual" scrub plane, but your modified #4 should be sufficient. Scrub planes are purposely rather light, because the weight of the plane is the last thing you need in this somewhat aerobic work.

Re the tearout around the knot, a smaller plane like a #3 would be helpful, tuned super sharp, and proceeding with care. You might also consider filler, once you've otherwise got the surface how you like it. (But that's another subject.)

[Jim Koepke]

Rafael, your #5 looks to the length of a #7 if your panel is close to 24" wide.

Working around a knot is one of the trickiest parts of a board to tame. Sometimes with a small plane like a #3 or #4 it can be worked from the knot outward. Often it needs to be followed with scraping or sanding.

Knots tend to be very hard parts of "end grain like" wood that chips easily.

Good luck,

jtk

[Tom Trees]

Once you get your board somewhat flat you can use set the cap iron close to eliminate any tearout, One of the irons will have more camber, and the other will need a barely noticeable camber.
A four and a five has the same width irons so you can swap them over if you deem one plane more suitable than the other.
You might just choose to use the 5 for the extra length for both jobs.
I like the no.5 1/2 for nearly everything, but have a four for short stuff, and the fact its a bit handier to set the narrower iron even closer to the edge.
Make sure the frog in the plane is back all the way.
Look up David Weaver, (David W) on youtube, for knowledgeable and correct information on setting your cap iron.
The cap iron need to be this close, about a 64'th" away from the edge to start with, and if it needs to be closer then I use the no.4 with half that much camber again.
You probably won't need to go closer than below for the job though.

https://i.ibb.co/6ndn9CW/Getting-close-to-a-fully-infulenced-cap-iron-setting.jpg

Tom

[Rafael Herrera]

Jim, yes, that's a no. 7 in the picture. I did most of the work w the 4 and 5.

[Rafael Herrera]

Tom,
I found the videos by David W some time ago and found them very informative, he also turned me on to Arkansas stones. He seems to have stopped posting though. Since I worked on the plank I've acquired no. 3 and 5 1/2 planes. I'll give them a try working the knot from the inside out and a small blade exposure.

Rafael

[Tom Trees]

Tom,
I found the videos by David W some time ago and found them very informative, he also turned me on to Arkansas stones. He seems to have stopped posting though. Since I worked on the plank I've acquired no. 3 and 5 1/2 planes. I'll give them a try working the knot from the inside out and a small blade exposure.

Rafael
Rafael
You won't need to bother doing that with the knots, just plane as you would normally.
You need a somewhat flat enough surface to have an even thickness shaving to progressively take it down with the rest of the material.
If the knot is now higher or lower than the surrounding wood, then that means the shaving will be thicker and the plane will not work as it should.
If the knot is hollow then you will need a deeper cut to get it to cut which will stall the plane.
If the knot is a lump then that means its a heavier cut on the plane which won't be nice either.
But a plane that is taking full width unbroken shavings can plane that no bother with disregard for grain direction and give a flawless surface.
Tom

[steven c newman]

Been doing a lot of work with Ash...all rough sawn.

IF needed, I have a #5 with a 8" radius camber iron...

I also have a #5-1/2", and a #5-1/4, and a "normal" jack #5 ( with a very slight camber)...
419850
This is the 5-1/2. While I am going with the grain, plane travels along skewed like this.....as I am more interested in how flat the board is, than what the shavings look like. Panel was a glue up..3/4 x 10" x 21" for a door panel.

So, even with the longer planes, I go at a diagonal to the grain, might even use a low angle for scrub work...
419851
But, never with the grain, as this plane is a tear out machine.
419852
Which I don't need when doing a panel like this....

[Doug Dawson]

Rafael
You won't need to bother doing that with the knots, just plane as you would normally.
You need a somewhat flat enough surface to have an even thickness shaving to progressively take it down with the rest of the material.
If the knot is now higher or lower than the surrounding wood, then that means the shaving will be thicker and the plane will not work as it should.
If the knot is hollow then you will need a deeper cut to get it to cut which will stall the plane.
If the knot is a lump then that means its a heavier cut on the plane which won't be nice either.
But a plane that is taking full width unbroken shavings can plane that no bother with disregard for grain direction and give a flawless surface.


There's often a grain reversal in the immediate vicinity of a knot, so I don't know how you would plane directly over it "through and through" without significant tearout (why does this idiot spell checker keep trying to change it to tarot, maybe it knows something I don't.)

One thing that sometimes works is to use a hand-held power planer with a very fine set to mill down around and over the knot. It will leave small witness marks, but they're going to be far enough away from the knot that you can handle them with a #3 or a scraper. Particularly useful technique if the knot is at a significant elevation w.r.t. the final surface height of the board.

[Tom Trees]

There's often a grain reversal in the immediate vicinity of a knot, so I don't know how you would plane directly over it "through and through" without significant tearout
There is no tearout if you set the cap iron close, you will never need consider the grain direction again when planing anything but scrub work.
No need for scraping ever.
If you have deep tearout from planing with the cap iron not close enough, this means a whole lot of needless work to scrape down to,

[Edward Dyas]

About all you can do with a plane is set to cut very light and run the plane in a diagonal direction so it's more slicing the knot than a direct cut. If it were me I would sneak in a belt sander when nobody was looking.

[Doug Dawson]

There is no tearout if you set the cap iron close, you will never need consider the grain direction again when planing anything but scrub work.
No need for scraping ever.
If you have deep tearout from planing with the cap iron not close enough, this means a whole lot of needless work to scrape down to,

So you're saying that you can plane against the grain, often aggressively opposing grain, and experience no tearout, just by setting the cap iron close. Kind of like walking on water? I'll have to try that.

[Tom Trees]

So you're saying that you can plane against the grain, often aggressively opposing grain, and experience no tearout, just by setting the cap iron close. Kind of like walking on water? I'll have to try that.
Absolutely Doug
It is indeed a silver bullet.
I have to use the close set cap iron for iroko as at least a third of the stuff I come across has alternating grain/grain reversal and bandings.
Before I started using the close set cap iron, I bought a no.3 and set the frog with the tightest mouth I could set get with the hope I could plane alternating
bandings with the grain, and bought a Stanley no.80 scraper plane for the transitioning areas.
It was a horrible using a scraper that went blunt after a few passes to get down to the tearout.
It was in the height of the summer and I ended up getting a reaction to the dust of the iroko
and had to stop for a bit.
Now I can plane away and not have ill effects as there's less dust being made making continuous unbroken shavings over knots and such,
and I'm not slogging it out and sweating the dust into me anymore.
Warren Mickley was one of the driving forces that ultimately led me reading David Weaver's knowledge on the subject.
So I have both those guys to thank. :)
Tom

[Andrew Hughes]

I’ve found some woods just cannot be hand planed after kiln dried.
Kiln dried with knots doesn’t sound like fun.

Good Luck

[Stephen Rosenthal]

Just finished paring off a number of Cocobolo dowels from the sides of a project with my rarely used LN chisel plane. Was very fast and left a perfect surface. I’ve often thought about selling it but can now envision a number of uses for it. I know you probably don’t have one, but considering that it utilizes a slicing action and Cocobolo end grain is likely as hard as a knot in ash, any reason why it wouldn’t be the perfect tool for the job?

[Rafael Herrera]

I spent some time on the plank last night. I adjusted the chip breaker closer to the edge, installed the cambered cutter in the no. 5 plane, and planed diagonally. I think it was better than my previous times. I need to sharpen the blades for my next session, my no 3 was not cutting. I also have a 5 1/4 and a 5 1/2 that I have not tuned yet. I'll try those in the next few days.

[Mike Brady]

In my experience building projects from white ash, including a large work bench, I found it very difficult to plane without tearout. It sounds like you are getting some good advice on technique. When I flatten my workbench top, I first work with a 5-1/2 that has a toothed iron in it. I finish up with a scraper or scraper plane. This is not the same as furniture work where even a small amount of tearout is problematic. I'll have to try the super-close -set chip breaker. Just be aware that ash is very porous, and a grain filler may have to be applied before the topcoat if you want a glassy smooth result.

[Stew Denton]

Tom,

Do you have a link to the discussion on David Weavers technique?

Thanks and regards,

Stew

[Tom Trees]

Tom,

Do you have a link to the discussion on David Weavers technique?

Thanks and regards,

Stew
The're is an article named Setting the Cap Iron on Wood Central,
and here one of a few videos he has made on the subject

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9pAVgfSPMN0&t=30sI


That's the best I can do for ya.
Maybe some tips might help like checking your ends often, which might catch you out as there's more effort to keep on top of being square
since your not hollowing the work out as much,
and in the haste of getting rid of tearout from the scrub/jack may distract oneself.
You still can hog off a whole lot with it set close.
If you get tearout still, maybe switch to a narrower iron like a no.4 or no.5.
This will mean that the setting you have on the plane your using, is what one might call a reduced tearout or a less influenced cap iron setting for that particular piece of timber.
This range of influences will depend on what works for other folk on their timber.

I have a feeling the condition on the sole of the plane has a more important role to play rather than with a larger cambered iron, for two reasons I can think of...

The first obvious one is still being able to take a narrow shaving with a reduced tearout setting that's a bit closer than a 32" from the iron.
Nice for the times one piece is a bit more cantankerous than the rest on my no.51/2, but not bad enough for the no.4 to come out.

The second being, I've started working on shorter stock after working on long lengths for some time, this has only become obvious to me.
Since I use reclaimed door components and such, the irons need honing often from planing varnish and crud off.
I noticed that my unfettled no.5 1/2 was tending to take a heavier bite at the beginning of the cut and it was causing an inconsistency, not all that noticeable when working door stiles
but I'll bet I would notice it more now, but it took these short lengths of cranky grain stock with an iron which was dull (would still do a few swipes easily on the next piece of iroko though)
Another noticeable thing is the plane refusing to cut in the middle of a reasonably flat edge, I think I will give this plane a kiss and experiment in the future.


Tom

[lowell holmes]

I would start with a belt sander and finish with a plane.

https://www.homedepot.com/s/planer?NCNI-5

[Rafael Herrera]

So far using my heavy camber blade on an enlarged mouth Wards Master no. 5 plane has been the most effective. Using the blade with a MF no 9 was not effective.

I have cleaned out most of the rough areas on the top of the plank. I cleaned some tears and created new ones, it's not bad at the moment. I need to figure out what to do with the bottom, maybe use a hand held belt sander.

I also used a 5 1/2 with a lightly cambered blade to continue smoothing the surface and it has worked relatively well.

I tried to use a no. 3 plane to try to clean up the areas around the knots and it wasn't effective at all, it kept stopping on its track. There's something goofy with this plane, I need to keep tuning it.

I also tried to set the chip breaker close to the edge with a no.4 and no.5 planes with no significant improvement. I think I'll continue to use the 5 1/2 to level the surface a little more and try again with the smoother with the close to edge chip breaker.
Lowell, I rather not use power tools. I was reminded of why last Sunday while making some boxes for a beekeeper friend. Donning the respirator, ear muffs and goggles before using the table saw is a pain; on top of that the goggles didn't seal well and I was getting dust in my eyes.

[Anuj Prateek]

As you can see in the picture, there is a large knot in the middle of the slab. As I try to clean it up I get deep tears.


Noob advise, to be taken with grain of salt.

Recently, when I was flattening a board, some knots were causing tear outs, uneven cuts and no cuts.

I took a 1/4" chisel and relived the knot and a little surrounding area. During planning I had to do it few times whenever plane would start hitting the knot. But it solved the problem.

[lowell holmes]

A thickness planer makes shavings, not dust. :)

[Bill McDermott]

Knots are hard. ;)
They are essentially a dense section of end grain in the middle of your face grain board. When I have problems with end grain (and knots), I use some denatured alcohol to soften it up. It always helps. It might make some of the other suggestions even easier. The other thing is to slice at the knot. Don't plane (or chisel) it head on. Use the blade as if you were whittling that specific location working from the edge to the center of the knot. Anyway, knots are hard. Nothing changes that.

I've noticed that Ash often tears out where the cathedral peaks feather out to nothing. It got me to the point that I broke down and used the sander on a top that need to be perfect. Then again, your slab has enough checks and anomalies that I wonder if a more rustic finish will work on your project? A little tear out is not always a deal breaker.

Good news is that you have a live edge slab with lots of character. Straight grain pine would have been boring.

[Rafael Herrera]

Bill, thank you for the suggestion, I had never heard of using alcohol to soften the knots, I'll give it a try. I wonder if mineral spirits could also work, it won't evaporate as fast and will not leave a noticeable residue.

I made some progress in the last few days, I've been paring down the board as there was some dry rot from laying down outside several years without cover. Here is the board before I cut the ends and some of the sides, I sprayed some water to highlight the grain. The light colored wood on the right edge is dry rotted wood. The worst is in the upper right corner.

Rafael

P.S. I also found this page informative regarding solvents: https://www.popularwoodworking.com/article/a_primer_on_solvents (https://www.popularwoodworking.com/article/a_primer_on_solvents/)

[Jim Koepke]

Rafael, that is a pretty piece of wood for a coffee table.

You may want to install a couple of butterfly dutchmen into the crack to keep it from splitting any more.

jtk

[Rafael Herrera]

Here is what the board looks like at the moment, I wetted it with mineral spirits to accentuate the grain. There are a few stains that I will try to remove with oxalic acid. I've never done a live edge coffee table, but since this is my first try, I'm experimenting.

The other side is still a little bit rough and has a large knot hole. I'll just clean it up a little bit further.

I will be inserting the butterflies next and start searching for legs. Any suggestions regarding attaching legs to a slab? It is not perfectly flat. Three legs or four legs?

Rafael

[Jim Koepke]

Any suggestions regarding attaching legs to a slab? It is not perfectly flat. Three legs or four legs?

As to attaching the legs, either a frame or battens would work. Another would be to build a trestle type support. This is similar in some ways to using battens with a different leg design.

With a frame to support the slab, L-shaped buttons in slots along the aprons would hold the slab while allowing for wood movement. With battens holding the legs it would be necessary to have slots so as the slab wood moved the screws wouldn't cause binding against the battens.

jtk