Good day all:
I got a Veritas bullnose plane in with a bunch of tools I bought bulk in a tool box. I already have one, so I am getting it spruced up to sell. I decided to hollow grind the edge on the Tormek for whoever buys it since it had some nicks to touch up anyway. The blade for this plane has a widened part at the business end, and then has a narrow shaft (not sure what to call it) at the other end, since it is made to fit edge to edge in the plane. The Tormek has a registration jig for sharpening plane blades, and the only way I could make this fit the jig was to register along the long, skinny part.
Well, I started grinding and it was taking a lot off one side versus the other. I stopped and checked everything. The Tormek wheel did need to be dressed, so I dressed it with the diamond truing tool. That helped a little, but not much. I rechecked everything, and all the Tormek stuff appeared to be square. Why was this thing grinding at an angle? I then checked the skinny edge of the blade to the wide edge, and it was off by just a wee bit- not much, but enough that if you register it in the jig on the skinny edge, then the business end is not going to be aligned square to the wheel.
Since this was a used one that I have no clue how it was used, I decided to check my own, and same thing- it was slightly different on the skinny edge versus the wide edge.
THIS SHOULD NOT BE A PROBLEM FOR USE- it is perfectly square edge to edge on the business end, and the skinny end doesn't have to be perfectly square, and the plane has adjustment grub screws to adjust to match the edge of the skinny end. The problem is if you use that skinny end to register to a jig, then you need to first make sure it is square to the wide end.
I took a picture to try to illustrate- I aligned a straight edge to the wide end edge, and then measured the gap top and bottom between the straight edge and the skinny edge. You can see there is a slight difference in gap between top and bottom.
This is a great plane, and is well made. The issue has nothing to do with function of the tool, and I am only posting in case someone else bumps into this and can't figure out why they keep getting a skewed edge when registering this blade in a jig. I am not claiming there is any poor quality here- you just have to make sure you register to the right edge and don't assume the skinny edge is square to the business end.
Bullnose.jpg