Face-Jointing with Hand Planes

[John Buzzurro]

I usually joint boards on my 6" power jointer, but there are times when a board is wider than 6", and I really hate to rip it to width. I'm considering upgrading to an 8" jointer, but in the meantime I figured it would be a good opportunity to develop some hand tool skills.

So, not having done extensive hand planing, I'm looking for any tips, tutorials, videos, books, etc. that might help. Keep in mind that the idea is to just get 1 side of the board flat enough to run through my power planer.

I don't have a jointer plane, but I currently have a #5&1/4 bench plane (12" long). I'm not sure how large a board it would be practical to use this to joint with, but I'd appreciate any opinions on the matter. I also have 12, 24 and 48" straight edges.

[Wendell Wilkerson]

Two videos that I know of that cover surfacing rough lumber with hand planes are :

Rob Cosman - Rough to Ready
Chris Schwarz - Course, Medium, Fine

I have both videos. I personally like Chris's video better but they are both good. Here's the bad news, you don't have enough planes. Both Rob and Chris use three planes: a course plane like a scrub plane or jack plane with a heavily cambered iron, a jointer plane at least 22" long, and finally a smoothing plane. The main difference between the two approaches is the choice of a course plane. Rob uses a LN scrub plane while Chris recommends using a 14" to 18" long plane with a heavily cambered iron and a wide open mouth.

Chris also had an article back in the Feb 2006 issue of Popular Woodworking which covered his "Course, Medium, Fine" philosophy.

Wendell

[Ben Rafael]

A 12" plane should be fine for face jointing. If you have a huge surface it just might get tiring though. There are a ton of books that describe the procedure for it. David Charlesworth has a video that is IMO not very good, I think it does not give enough detail on how to do it. Google face jointing with hand planes and you should have more than enough hits to help you.
I'd recommend starting with something small, say 1' by 2', to get the hang of it. After you do one it will be easy, though possibly a bit time consuming. BTW, You will want to make/buy yourself a pair of winding sticks.

[Ben Rafael]

Whether or not you need a scrub plane depends on how rough your lumber is.
I do not have a scrub, I use a #7 set to take a heavy cut and it works, it just takes longer than it would with a scrub and is a bit hard on the blade. You can buy decent scrubs for under $100 new, it is not a precision tool.

[Ken Bryant]

I actually like the Charlesworth video (as well as the Cosman and the Schwarz). What the Charlesworth video does is give a systematic -- very systematic -- way to handle the tendency of jointing attempts (particularly with shorter planes) to end up with a hump in the middle in the long dimension, and to be out of square in the left-right dimension.

[Brad Olson]

What I do a lot of the time is just scrub the face roughly flat and then use my planer to clean it up and make the opposite side parallel.

Believe it or not you can do this with any plane, you just need a long straight edge or reference surface such as a tablesaw.

Use the plane to make the board flat, but not cleanly planed (i.e. ugly looking).

Once flat and not rocking on your reference surface and no major gaps longer/wider than 2-3", run it through the planer.

Works every time and just requires a bit more skill than the tool doing more of the work.

[James Carmichael]

I'm assuming you have a planer to go with that jointer, so my non-neander answer would be to build a jointing sled for it.

[Martin Cash]

Hi everyone,
I'm new to this board and find the subject matter fascinating.
Derek Cohen has a short tutorial on squaring a board, complete with pictures, at the end of his review of the Lee Valley Scrub plane.
See:
http://www.wkfinetools.com/contrib/dCohen/LVScrubPlane/index.asp
After reading this I was inspired to modify an old stanley with a radiused blade and have a go myself.
I couldn't believe how much fun scrub planing was, and it was quick.
Hope this is able to assist in your board flattening endeavours.
Regards
MC:):):)

[Dave Bow]

John,
I ran into the same problem recently when working on some RS cherry. It was 8'+ wide and my jointer is only 6". What I have been doing is setting the board up on my bench with any cup facing up, and clamping it. Then using my longest plane, I would skew it so that resting on both edges of the board. Planing this way allowed me to take enough off of both edges to a width of about 1/2 to 1". Then I would flip it over and send it through my planer to flatten the opposite side. Finally, I would go back to the original side in the planer to finish flattenning that side. The entire first side does not need to be flattened before going through the planer, just enough to stabilize the face. It has worked very well, and I have some of the straightest and flattest lumber I have ever worked with.

Dave

[Robert Rozaieski]

You don't need a perfectly flat face to start. Pick the concave side of the board and plane across the grain with a hand plane, taking light cuts, so you get two flats on the outter edges of the board face, about 1-2" wide each. The center of the board's face will be unplaned. Then, pass the board through the planer using this side as your reference. Take light cuts with the planer so you don't bend the board in the center when the rollers contact it (you could also throw a couple shavings under the center for extra support but I never found this necessary.) When the first side has been flattened by the planer, turn the board over and do the other side. I have flattened many wide boards this way, before I sold my planer.

[Dave Bow]

Yeah, what Robert said. I'm just not that good at explaining things in simple terms.

Dave

[Robert Rozaieski]

You said it fine. I just missed your post before posting my reply. Maybe I should pay more attention?;)