portable plane holders

[Scott Winners]

I hesitate to call them tills. each of a cash till, a saw till and a plane till have a bunch of whatevers in them. These are onsies I have been making over the years.

Here is an example, this one for my block plane I made when I was building a boat in my garage. The boat was on a strong back on sawhorses and tool storage was "over there."

In the one picture, with the plane sitting on its side on the bench with a naked edge, I am not making any kind of argument about what other people should do. It is not going to hurt the plane to sit there like that, I agree. I am pretty confident about not banging the edge of the iron with other tools, though it is a risk. For me personally, I spend a lot of time worrying about banging my skin into that exposed sharp and it cuts into me enjoying my wood working time. So I built a wee box like in the second picture.

With the block plane on the bench top, or down inside the boat I was building, or in the spare bedroom with the window trim I am building, when the block plane is in this little box I can relax, get on with the job and enjoy myself.

This one, and the similar one for my shoulder plane were all butt joints and epoxy. At the time I was trying to clamp all kinds of weird stuff and I was unfamiliar with epoxy so these were sort of a practice at bat. I don't remember exactly how I clamped them, but I know how I would clamp them today. "Glen L tiny titan no metal fasteners" does hit on google but photobucket is getting tired of hosting my images from back then.

The one pictured is poplar and has been holding my block plane since 2016 with no visible corrosion on the plane base.

[Scott Winners]

I did upgrade from there when I got into joinery about a year ago. This one for my number four Bailey had two troughs or ditches in it so I can not worry about which way the plane is pointing in the box, just drop it in. Poplar base and sides, titebond 2 assembly, no finish. Finger joints, and a s6s floor, no joinery between the walls and floor. This one gets carried around the house quite a bit doing homeowner stuff, but I don't worry about it when it is "home" inside its onsie till. BRB, have to load the woodstove.

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The base looks fine to me. I have no idea what the acidity of poplar is compared to other wood that might be considered for tills, but this one has been through one Alaska summer and one Alaska winter in my minimally climate controlled garage. I am seeing 56 dF and 1% RH now in the garage (we are looking for -38dF tonight) and I have seen +85dF with 80-90%RH routinely around summer solstice. Not hijacking the "wood choice for tills" thread.

[Scott Winners]

The last one I built still in stock was for my 4 1/2 Bailey. I had a handyman #5 that has since moved on with its onsie box, so when I brought my 4 1/2 home I could take my time with it because the Handyman #5 (and the #4 bailey) was still here. FWIW a custom box for a #5 Handyman won't hold a #5 Bailey. This one is in red oak, dovetailed walls, TB II, and I put a dado at both ends and a groove on both edges (made a raised panel?) so the walls rest on the floors of the base and touch the edges of the rim. No visible corrosion after one year, KD red oak to start, no finish inside or out.

What I have found so far in my relatively extreme climate is construction grade 2x stock is going to move in the first two weeks when I bring it home and sticker it stacked, KD woods not available at the Borg will move of they are going to in 6-10 weeks. I have been seasoning more than 10 weeks, all KD, white oak, red oak, poplar, walnut, cherry, ash, teak, hickory, Doug Fir, NA beech, unknown birch and black spruce. I had one piece of KD North American beech move on week 10. It crooked, no bow, no cup, just crook. On the one hand my experience is KD will move in the first three months if it going to move, but I have a air dried eight foot 4x8 of white spruce in my garage right now so twisted (didn't make the cut for WWPA grade 2) that it would need to be jointed down to a zero by six to get a square board out of it.

Mostly my 4 1/2 stays at the bench. When I am making a window frame or a door frame or fitting baseboard I can generally get stock close enough to finish that I need my block plane and maybe my #4 in whatever room I am working on. The 4 1/2 and up pretty much stay at my bench. But it is nice to have a box or a onsie till for it. The big planes pretty much stay on my bench with their heels on the lower stretcher and their toes on the under bench shelf with a 1/8" drop between the two to keep their bevels off the shelf. This is partly because my bench is only 48 inches long. OTOH if you want to practice doing stuff instead of just reading about it, these can be super handy if you are working on your house and are worried about protecting your edges or needing stitches.

I have found this a handy outlet to learn joinery, and it lets me relax about slashing a finger open when I have a plane or two out on the benchtop with other tools. YMMV as always.

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[William Fretwell]

Scott, there is no hinged lid on your little box, what if it falls out? I make Amsteel plane mats in tool grey for bench use. Job site planes have their blade withdrawn, wrapped in a cloth and tossed in a tool bag, nothing fancy.

[Scott Winners]

Scott, there is no hinged lid on your little box.

I haven't needed lids. Depending on how a person was using their planes I guess they could.

If I am finalizing window trim in say the upstairs back bedroom I will have a couple sawhorses with the workpiece on it, may or may not be wearing my tool belt, but with a plane or two in little boxes like these under the sawhorses with the plane in it when not in use and maybe also a back saw and whatever have you. Utility knife. Pencil. Straight edge.

When the project is done the plane gets carried back to the shop and lives in its wee box on the shelf under my bench, instead of being in its wee box under the saw horse in whatever room I was working on.

When going to a work site by automobile I have used a thick rubber band to hold the plane in the box for the trip.

[Tom Bender]

When working outside my shop I like to grab a shallow cardboard box and place tools, parts and sometimes trash in it.