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View Full Version : Playing with my Ron Brese small smoother



Jameel Abraham
06-24-2008, 8:49 PM
After I finished my Ron Brese small smoother kit, I didn't have much chance to really play around with it. A few days ago I took an afternoon to do a little testing of the plane. I'm not building any furniture at the moment, so I grabbed some curly cherry left over from a desk I built last year. I thought this would be a good test since this is pretty typical of the woods I like to use.

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After a few passes to get things really flat, I was pulling full-length, full-width shavings that were as thin as a delaminated kleenex.

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This is fun....

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Jameel Abraham
06-24-2008, 8:56 PM
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The real purpose of the tool is to make these fantastic shavings. The shimmering, translucent, chatoyant surface left on the wood is just a nice side-effect. :D

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The 55 degree bed angle makes this little puppy really shine (pun intended) on rosewoods. Heck, even the shavings of this cocobolo are polished!

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Can you say tearout? Because I haven't for a while...:rolleyes:

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A ribbon of cherry wood molecules. ;)

Doug Shepard
06-24-2008, 9:13 PM
Have you tried it backwards yet? I haven't had much time with it since taking mine on a test drive with some curly mango, but I initially read the grain direction wrong. It was planing so well against the grain with no tearout that it took me a while to realize I was going the wrong direction. Things just got even better when I started planing with the grain. I hope Ron decides to have you Beta test one of his full size smoother kits when they're ready. I'm giving some thought to trying one of those. If you do the same oustanding blog job as the small smoother build, I'd have a great set of instructions to work with.

Zahid Naqvi
06-24-2008, 9:29 PM
that's just fantastic.

John Shuk
06-25-2008, 7:52 PM
I guess you like the plane a bit.

Jameel Abraham
06-26-2008, 7:16 AM
Have you tried it backwards yet? I haven't had much time with it since taking mine on a test drive with some curly mango, but I initially read the grain direction wrong. It was planing so well against the grain with no tearout that it took me a while to realize I was going the wrong direction. Things just got even better when I started planing with the grain. I hope Ron decides to have you Beta test one of his full size smoother kits when they're ready. I'm giving some thought to trying one of those. If you do the same oustanding blog job as the small smoother build, I'd have a great set of instructions to work with.

You said it Doug. You can throw a lot of different woods at this little pit bull. I'd love to test the large smoother kit. Just can't justify the expense right now. Eventually I hope.


I guess you like the plane a bit.

Just a little...;)

Danny Thompson
06-26-2008, 8:05 AM
That is SICK!

And beneaith it a sweetworkbench! What is that--a tail vise? planing stop? or is that a wooden dog? . . . Do you have workbench pics too?