Chips under the chip breaker

[Lee Schierer]

I have a Stanley Baily #3 plane that I was using today to true up the edge of some hickory boards today. The first cut or two went pretty well, but then I had a problem with the plane chattering and not wanting to cut. I noticed chips hanging up in the mouth of the plane. When I took it apart, I noticed that some of the chips were packed under the chip breaker but only on one side of the blade. When I removed the chip breaker from the blade there were chips under the right side of the chip breaker, but none under the left half.

What needs to be don to stop the chips from getting under the chip breaker?

[Jim Koepke]

Howdy Lee,

You need to do some work on your chip breaker so the leading edge sits tightly on the blade. Here is an old thread of mine with some information about tuning up a plane:

https://sawmillcreek.org/showthread.php?114373

The cap iron is addressed more in posts #27 &28.

Sometimes drastic measures are needed. Occasionally mine have been held in a vise with the top end in the jaw and then a couple of pieces of wood are used tp hold the end that mates to the blade. Sometimes this requires clamps to get a good grip. You do not want to distort it, you just want to correct some of the geometry.

Hope this helps,

jtk

[Lee Schierer]

So if I understand correctly, I should twist half of the chip breaker so that it touches on the gap side of the blade? I have a metal working vise, where I am still not clear is just where I want to clamp the chip breaker to do the bending. Do I clamp on the flat just behind the curved front area? Or do I try to clamp on the curved area?

Once I get it straightened out would I then hone the leading edge to get a perfect fit against the blade?

This is a pretty nice condition plane and I don't want to mess it up.

[Jim Koepke]

So if I understand correctly, I should twist half of the chip breaker so that it touches on the gap side of the blade? I have a metal working vise, where I am still not clear is just where I want to clamp the chip breaker to do the bending. Do I clamp on the flat just behind the curved front area? Or do I try to clamp on the curved area?

Once I get it straightened out would I then hone the leading edge to get a perfect fit against the blade?

This is a pretty nice condition plane and I don't want to mess it up.

My terminology for correcting a warped chip breaker is 'torsional adjustment.' They are made of soft steel and you do not want to torsionally adjust it much more than it needs to go or you will have to then adjust it back the other way.

There are a few things to be checked. If you have a good flat surface make sure the blade is not warped in any way. Check across the blade to make sure there aren't any low spots. It should be flat. Use the flat surface to evaluate the chip breaker. Try to determine how and where it is bent. Carefully do what can be done, with a soft touch, to unbend or undo any warpage.

Posting some images, if possible, might also help for others to evaluate the blade and the chip breaker union.

My chip breakers often get rubbed down with my furniture oil/wax soaked rag when its companion blade is sharpened.

jtk

[Lee Schierer]

My terminology for correcting a warped chip breaker is 'torsional adjustment.' They are made of soft steel and you do not want to torsionally adjust it much more than it needs to go or you will have to then adjust it back the other way.

There are a few things to be checked. If you have a good flat surface make sure the blade is not warped in any way. Check across the blade to make sure there aren't any low spots. It should be flat. Use the flat surface to evaluate the chip breaker. Try to determine how and where it is bent. Carefully do what can be done, with a soft touch, to unbend or undo any warpage.

Posting some images, if possible, might also help for others to evaluate the blade and the chip breaker union.

My chip breakers often get rubbed down with my furniture oil/wax soaked rag when its companion blade is sharpened.

jtk

My first twist attempt went too far. It took 7 more tries to get it perfect. I now have no light showing anywhere across the chip breaker. I took a few passes over the edge of a board with no problems. It appears that the hickory dulled the blade a little so I will need to touch that up a bit to get back to fluffy thin shavings.

One additional question is it normal for the lever cap leading edge to rest on top of the curved portion of the chip breaker?

[Jim Koepke]

My first twist attempt went too far. It took 7 more tries to get it perfect. I now have no light showing anywhere across the chip breaker. I took a few passes over the edge of a board with no problems. It appears that the hickory dulled the blade a little so I will need to touch that up a bit to get back to fluffy thin shavings.

One additional question is it normal for the lever cap leading edge to rest on top of the curved portion of the chip breaker?

It sounds if your efforts were successful, congratulations.

Yes, it is normal (in other words necessary) for the lever cap's leading edge to seat on top of the curved portion of the chip breaker.

In some cases the pressure from the lever cap will compress the chip breaker and close a small gap in its misfitting against the blade.

jtk

[Charles Guest]

So if I understand correctly, I should twist half of the chip breaker so that it touches on the gap side of the blade? I have a metal working vise, where I am still not clear is just where I want to clamp the chip breaker to do the bending. Do I clamp on the flat just behind the curved front area? Or do I try to clamp on the curved area?

Once I get it straightened out would I then hone the leading edge to get a perfect fit against the blade?

This is a pretty nice condition plane and I don't want to mess it up.

Set it on a flat surface to see if it's twisted and by how much. If it's all honked up, I'd buy a replacement rather than beating and twisting on it, but the steel is bendable/malleable so it can be fixed. It all depends on how you want to spend your time. The craft itself is hard enough to learn without all the ancillary time-wasters like defective equipment. There's certainly no shame in wanting to get on with working wood rather than fixing and/or restoring abused and neglected tools. A twisted cap iron would have been a reject at the factory. One either got through all those years ago, or some idiot in the chain of ownership messed it up.

[steven c newman]

Glad I don't pay you people by the hour to fix a plane up......"Hours of drudgery"? Not sure what people are doing that takes so dang long......it takes me one afternoon to rehab a plane....from a pile of rust to a WORKING plane...usually bring a plane home from a Rust Hunt about..noonish....by supper time, it is clean, sharpened, and tuned up, and doing work. Then again..I do not work for a "timeclock"....I just need to get it done, so the next item can be worked on.

Have seen irons put in ( and used) with the bevel up...under the chipbreaker. Have seen irons with a wavy edge, and reverse camber. Have seen chipbreakers bent by someone using a screwdriver to pry the thing off the iron (didn't work, did it?) Lever caps placed upside down....Missing depth adjuster wheels, or, if they are there, they are on backwards, and not attached to the yoke. Sewing spools for the front knobs, square headed bolts( hard on the hand,ain't it) to attach the rear handle. estimate is about 500+ planes that I have rehabbed over the years.....and resold most of them. I kept the ones I liked best....

Have developed a way to rehab a plane over the years....as I used to have several waiting in line....That is quick, no messing around, and gets very good results. Time-wasters? More likely the one doing the "rehab" is the culprit.

IF I had the spare $25....there is a Craftsman No.4 sized plane downtown.....that I could have making shavings..in about 4 hours...if that.

used to call such "Time-wasters" when I worked as a Carpenter...Milkman.....because they milked a 1 hour job out to an 8 hour job....and worked harder getting out of work, than just doing the job would have been...."3 days to install a bathroom vanity (no plumbing involved,either), with a helper?"

[Tony Zaffuto]

Glad I don't you people by the hour to fix a plane up......"Hours of drudgery"? Not sure what people are doing that takes so dang long......it takes me one afternoon to rehab a plane....from a pile of rust to a WORKING plane...usually bring a plane home from a Rust Hunt about..noonish....by supper time, it is clean, sharpened, and tuned up, and doing work. Then again..I do not work for a "timeclock"....I just need to get it done, so the next item can be worked on.

have seen irons put in ( and used) with the bevel up...under the chipbreaker. Have seen irons with a wavy edge, and reverse camber. Have seen chipbreakers bent by someone using a screwdriver to pry the thing off the iron (didn't work, did it?) Lever caps placed upside down....Missing depth adjuster wheels, or, if they are there, they are backwards, and not attached to the yoke. Sewing spools for the front knobs, square headed bolts( hard on the hand,ain't it) to attach the rear handle. estimate is about 500+ planes that I have rehabbed over the years.....and resold most of them. I kept the ones I liked best....

Have developed a way to rehab a plane over the years....as I used to have several waiting in line....That is quick, no messing around, and gets very good results. Time-wasters? More likely the one doing the "rehab" is the culprit.

IF I had the spare $25....there is a Craftsman No.4 sized plane downtown.....that I could have making shavings..in about 4 hours...if that.

used to call such "Time-wasters" when I worked as a Carpenter...Milkman.....because they milked a 1 hour job out to an 8 hour job....and worked harder getting out of work, than just doing the job would have been...."3 days to install a bathroom vanity (no plumbing involved,either), with a helper?"

Ya said a mouthful here Steve! The past few days I've been tinkering with different scrapers/thicknesses. Now, I've been using card scrapers for many years, and over the past few days, I recall seeing some fancy red colored jig for prepping a card scraper, along with the text of saying how you can shorten that time. Anyhow, I decided to time myself on prepping a card scraper: under five minutes, for two edges, including filing, stoning, turning first burr and then rolling the burr. Nice curlies and no jig used or needed. Granted, I've been doing this for a while, but sometimes we just need to learn to hold our tongue just right and not to overthink or complicate things.

[Charles Guest]

Ya said a mouthful here Steve! The past few days I've been tinkering with different scrapers/thicknesses. Now, I've been using card scrapers for many years, and over the past few days, I recall seeing some fancy red colored jig for prepping a card scraper, along with the text of saying how you can shorten that time. Anyhow, I decided to time myself on prepping a card scraper: under five minutes, for two edges, including filing, stoning, turning first burr and then rolling the burr. Nice curlies and no jig used or needed. Granted, I've been doing this for a while, but sometimes we just need to learn to hold our tongue just right and not to overthink or complicate things.

Every plane I own or have ever owned was used. Thankfully I've never had to spend more than five minutes on a cap iron and on probably half of them shouldn't have spent that much time, as they were basically fine. Doubt seriously if I'd bother with one that was a pretzel. I guess I'd better have my testosterone level checked.

[Jim Koepke]

Glad I don't you people by the hour to fix a plane up......"Hours of drudgery"? Not sure what people are doing that takes so dang long......it takes me one afternoon to rehab a plane....from a pile of rust to a WORKING plane...usually bring a plane home from a Rust Hunt about..noonish....by supper time, it is clean, sharpened, and tuned up, and doing work.

+1 on what Steven said.

My most recent plane rehab, a #60-1/2 likely from ~1923-1935, was likely less than two hours. Most of it was tinkering time while letting the oil soak in. Of course being a block plane it didn't have as many screws to clean or wooden handles to strip and sand. The sliding toe was stuck in place and there was a bit of rust to clean off of parts. The toe plate took less than two minutes getting stoned so it will slide smoother when adjusted. This is a step all of my fresh from the factory planes with an adjustable mouth have had done to them.

There is still some rust in places. Possibly to be cleaned at a later time.

Now the plane is making nice end grain shavings.

Maybe take the camera out to the shop later to take pictures of another plane that just had to come home with me.

jtk

[Jim Koepke]

The camera was taken out to the shop and some pictures were taken. Instead of a hi-jack of this thread, a new thread was started for a couple of rust hunt finds.

This post is to show one way of straightening a lever cap that is torsionally maladjusted:

Torsional Adjustment of Cap Iron-chip breaker.jpg

Since this was done in a woodworking vise a couple pieces of scrap were used to protect the vise jaws. Two more pieces of scrap were used to grip the end of the chip breaker to twist it by hand.

When doing this be careful to not over twist or you will have the same problem on the other side. Do a little, test, repeat as needed.

jtk

[Scott Winners]

What works for me, that I read about and didn't think up myself, is to grind a bit of a bevel on the face of the chip breaker where it meets the iron.

Usually I set the face I am trying to grind on a stone, with the far end of the chipbreaker, the end that is up in the air on the assembled plane, resting on the benchtop.

When finished the very tippy tip edge of the chip breaker should rest firmly on the iron with a bit of relief showing. I think in Leonard Lee's book he suggests about 15 degrees of bevel. I _think_ could be wrong Paul Sellers calls for "10 to 20" degrees there but I am likely to be wrong, been reading on saws a lot lately.

The other thing to look at real careful is pitting on the opposite side of the chip breaker, the ramp your shaving rides up on it's way out of the plane. I had one doing what you described and finally fixed that when I had the shaving ramp area buffed enough.

FWIW I typically take the iron side of the chipbreaker up to 1200 grit and get after the shaving ramp side with buffing compound on leather. I am sure some one will be along with better advice shortly, don't rush out to do it my way.

[Tom Trees]

As Jim said you may need to make sure the bend is square.
Lay it on a flat surface and see what it's like, and check your iron's flat while your at it. It may need a tap to flatten it.

From what I've seen from a lot of chipbreaker/cap iron publications elsewhere, it seems to me that whilst honing the underside, they're not dropping it down enough,
inviting dust to get trapped between the cutter when in use, especially when set very finely for smoothing reversing grain.

If you find yourself creating a belly on the cap iron/chipbreaker and can't get it to mate.
Hone it on the corner of the stone hollowing out the middle minutely, and finish off with a rub on the entire stone.

[Warren Mickley]

You can fix gross problems by bending or twisting (the cap iron is mild). The fine work is done with a stone, carefully abrading the parts of cap iron that are in contact with the blade so as to bring the rest of the front edge of the cap iron in contact all across.

We generally undercut the cap iron edge by a very shallow angle so that only the very front is in contact. This makes a tighter seal.