Help on cambering a iron

[Jason Buresh]

I was at the antique store yesterday and found 3 planes in a booth. I was super excited at first because I found a bedrock lever cap but upon further inspection it was a keen litter 4-1/2 and it had a huge piece of the cheek missing. There was an old union #4 and an old Sargent #4 there and the Sargent came home with me as everything was intact and free moving. The union had a busted tote and was siezed tight.

I would like to set this up as a scrub plane but I have no experience cambering irons or using a scrub plane in general. Is there a standard radius that works well for most woods? Is it best to use a grinder to set up the radius and grind the bevel? I have googled how to do it but was wondering what others have done.

Thanks for the help!

[Jim Koepke]

Howdy Jason,

The amount of camber depends on how much wood you need to remove and how fast you want to do it. The smaller the radius, the deeper the cut, but it also ends up being a bit narrower. For smoothing a very large radius is easy to do by hand. For shaping blades to use in scrub planes, a grinder is very helpful. The cambering to use for scrub work can be done by hand but takes longer.

Here are blades from my three planes set up for use as scrub planes:

421775

From left to right the blades are used in a #5 (same size as a #4), a #5-1/4 and a #40.

jtk

[steven c newman]

The Woodwright's Shop (pbs.org) Episode is called Hand plane essentials, with C. Schwarz.....gives his method on a cambered iron. How to mark it, how to grind it, how to use it.

I'd have to look up the exact episode number...or, you can.....