I'm confused...

[Jim Koepke]

You can easily sell the LN for close to your orig purchase price..Then, stick with your proven STANLEY..

The other option for the LN might be to purchase a Hock O1 blade for it.

jtk

[Jim Matthews]

This is a trap.

Pursuit of perfect surfaces can derail projects. Most of my projects get a wash coat of shellac before final finishing. This requires sanding to 220 grit.

A test sample using both planes will illustrate if this is a real problem to redress, or not.

Obsessions about flatness, air tight joinery and interior spaces will stop projects in their tracks.

https://i.imgur.com/YoQ9933.jpg

[Derek Cohen]

Eli, there can be just three possible causes. In order of least to most likely ...

3. Micro-chipping of the A2 blade. A2 has a reputation for being vulnerable owing to large carbide grain which can become dislodged. Possible, but I have used A2 for decades and it is quite capable of producing a glassy finish.

2. The sole or mouth of the plane may have a ragged edge somewhere. Could be the back or front of the mouth. Could be the toe or heel edge of the pane has a nick. This is easy to do if you bump the plane hard enough. Feel the edge surround. Run a little 600 grit sandpaper over the circumference.

3. My money is on a wire from sharpening. A2 is more tenacious of legging the wire go. It is important to abrade it progressively rather than all in one go. Generally this occurs as one moves through the grits. The danger is jumping grits and then the fine grit has a lot more work to do. A torn wire will leave marks. Winston raised the Unicorn profile, and he is correct - that would clean up the bevel wonderfully. But you do not need to go that far; you can just strop the blade.

Incidentally, if you want to swap out the blade, as I have done, get a PM-V11 from Lee Valley. They make a #3 replacement for Stanley planes. It is a tad thinner, but that is not an issue.
Regards from Perth

Derek

[Warren Mickley]

If you want a fine surface, I recommend dumping the A2 iron and the diamond stone. I have never seen a decent surface from either.

[Tom M King]

I agree with Warren. I've tried a couple of A2 irons, and I just don't like the feel of them slicing wood, without even any consideration of the surface. The only one I kept was a hinge mortising plane. It doesn't get used much, but is good enough for that job, of fine tuning the fit of old doors.

[Derek Cohen]

A2 is not my favourite steel, however it is not the bogeyman it is made out to be. It's been around a long, long time, and been used very successfully in LN and Veritas planes. Look at the videos made by Rob Cosman - he is taking very fine shavings, and these hold together very well. It is evident that he does a great job in sharpening, since there is no evidence of fractures ... just long, streaming shavings.

Regards from Perth

Derek

[Eli Akin]

Thank you all for your input! Honestly, the Stanley 4/Hock combo is working great with my existing way of sharpening for getting a glass surface. I will keep working on my sharpening skills with the A2 iron as time goes by but I will probably just grab the Stanley and quit worrying about it. If it works it works. I dont want the LN plane to put me down the rabbit hole

[Michael Fross]

Hello Eli,

I would take some fine sandpaper to the edges of the LN plan bottom just to make sure there is nothing sharp there. Probably run the bottom over the same sandpaper lightly to knock of anything that might be there.

For what it's worth, I use both Hock O1 blades in Stanley planes and the LN A2 irons. I find no difference in the finish on the wood. For both types of irons, I sharpen the "Rob Cosman" method of grinding a 25 degree bevel. The using a 1000 water stone for a micro-bevel. Then a 16,000 water stone for a tiny tertiary bevel. Knock the burr off with the Charlesworth ruler trick and I couldn't be happier with result.

Please note, I'm not saying this is better or worse than any other method. There are a lot of ways to sharpen an iron and this is just the method I use and have success with A2 and O1 blades.

Best of luck!

Michael

[Jim Matthews]

Do you have a final stropping (polishing) step?

Something like Autosol or Flitz metal polish on a slab of MDF might be worthwhile.

https://youtu.be/64sJAso7fu4

[Mike Brady]

I don't see this mentioned in woodworking forums, but the knife forums will caution you against using a power buffer (cotton wheel) on edge tools as a final step in sharpening. This is an operation that should only be done while wearing safety gear, head-to-toe. An injury from dropping a sharp tool from waist high can be serious. Imaging a blade propelled by a buffing wheel is troubling. Hopefully this has come up in the many sharpening posts that seem to be out there, especially in hand-tool forums.

[Jim Koepke]

I don't see this mentioned in woodworking forums, but the knife forums will caution you against using a power buffer (cotton wheel) on edge tools as a final step in sharpening. This is an operation that should only be done while wearing safety gear, head-to-toe. An injury from dropping a sharp tool from waist high can be serious. Imaging a blade propelled by a buffing wheel is troubling. Hopefully this has come up in the many sharpening posts that seem to be out there, especially in hand-tool forums.

Hi Mike, The method of using a buffer on edge tools has been mentioned in some woodworking forums. It has been introduced recently as the unicorn edge.

As one who avoids grinding an edge as much as possible this seems like a sharpening trick accompanied with an increased need to regrind an edge.

The dangers of working with and sharpening edges is one of my reasons for honing blades by hand as much as is reasonable.

The perils inherent in touching blade to a wheel or belt running at high speed need to be impressed on all who sharpen knives or tools.

jtk

[Winston Chang]

It's important to put the blade on the part of the wheel that's spinning away from you. That's the bottom side of the buffing wheel. I've never remotely felt that the buffer was going to pull the blade out of my hands, and if it did, it would pull it away from me and throw it onto the table that the buffing wheel is sitting on.

There's no need to wear head-to-toe safety gear if you do it this way.

[Mike Brady]

There's no need to wear head-to-toe safety gear if you do it this way.

Really? If you were right, SawStop would be out of business.

[Winston Chang]

Really? If you were right, SawStop would be out of business.

I have no idea what kind of connection you're trying to draw between a SawStop and a buffing wheel. And no one wears head-to-toe safety gear with a table saw either -- if you have trouble with a table saw, that stuff isn't going to help you.

As it happens, I recently took a photo of how to hold a chisel to the buffing wheel. The bottom side of the wheel is moving away from me in this picture.

buffing-wheel-1.jpg

[ken hatch]

Really? If you were right, SawStop would be out of business.

Mike,

Look before you leap

ken