# Plane set-up for flattening oak.



## RossJarvis (5 Dec 2013)

I tend to use my Record 5 1/2 for most jobs and generally it seems pretty well set up for pine at least. wafer thin shavings, easy to use, flattens well and I can get good straight stock. However I find it takes a lot more effort on oak and I'm sure the shavings could be finer, they seem too thick to me. I'm fairly sure the sole is flat, so am wondering what might make it a bit easier to work on oak. Preferably an easy rather than lengthy job. It's an 80s Record with original iron. Might up rating the iron be a good first step? I've had a bit of a search around on t'internet but can't see anything apart from "tuning" "flattening sole" etc recommendations. If I need to, yep I'll do that, but simple up-grades sought first. I had wondered about laminated irons. In the past I had a Ray Iles iron (D2 I think) for my 605, but really didn't get on with the sharpening faff it seemed to require and there was an issue with extending the yoke.

Any recommendations, ideas or links?

cheers

Ross


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## paulm (5 Dec 2013)

There are others much more experienced with hand tools than me Ross, but first things that come to mind are sharpness and depth of cut.

A blade that is sharp enough to require little effort on pine might not be sharp enough for a harder timber ?

If the depth of cut is already adjusted to be quite fine (assuming you are not trying to remove much stock ?), then maybe a slight camber on the blade to reduce the width of cut would help reduce effort required ?

I'm sure others will be along with much better ideas though !

Cheers, Paul


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## RossJarvis (5 Dec 2013)

paulm":1jbp44jt said:


> There are others much more experienced with hand tools than me Ross, but first things that come to mind are sharpness and depth of cut.
> 
> A blade that is sharp enough to require little effort on pine might not be sharp enough for a harder timber ?
> 
> ...



Might be an issue, but generally speaking the iron is pretty well sharp and has a slight camber. Easily cuts through paper held between two fingers. I use 1000 and 5000 grit Shapton stones and a Veritas Mk II (for my sins) I tend to set up depth of cut by skating across the wood, adjusting the iron a tad each time till it just starts cutting. This gives me this;





...with pine I'm getting this;





Maybe a 5 1/2 is a bit too wide and a 5 1/4 would be better?


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## Cheshirechappie (5 Dec 2013)

If you're getting wafer-thin shavings, then the plane's sole is adequately flat, so I wouldn't bother with all the faff of 'tuning' it. 

Let's assume you have the iron set to take a 2 thou shaving (i.e. very fine); if the plane sole is hollow in length by 2 thou, it'll cease cutting as the whole sole is over the wood. If it still cuts, the sole must be either flat or slightly convex. If the results you're getting are acceptable for flatness and finish, it doesn't really matter whether the sole is dead flat or slightly convex - it still performs adequately.

Oak is a much coarser wood than pine, so fine shavings tend to break up. On really fine settings, you may get little more than coarse dust. Don't worry too much about that - judge things by the quality of surface on the wokpiece. If it's straight, flat and smooth, you're set up OK.

For flattening hardwoods, it pays to do the bulk of the work working across the grain. The wood cuts much easier that way. It's even faster if you set the plane up like a true jack - an iron with a strong camber (say 1/16"), cap-iron set well back, and frog set back to give an open mouth. Set the iron to give the deepest cut you can reasonably achieve without exhausting yourself too quickly (going cross-grain, that'll be deeper than you think!) and attack the high spots on the rough board. Keep checking progress - you can take off too much very easily if you don't keep track of progress. Once you've got the board level and taken off the rough-sawn surface, revert to try plane (or try-plane set-up with the jack - fine set with a near-straight iron, close cap-iron setting and tighter mouth) and take out the jack-plane ripples by working the try plane along the grain. Since the jack did the bulk of the wood-shifting, the trying-up doesn't take long.


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## RossJarvis (5 Dec 2013)

Cheshirechappie":28w4bgvt said:


> For flattening hardwoods, it pays to do the bulk of the work working across the grain. The wood cuts much easier that way. It's even faster if you set the plane up like a true jack - an iron with a strong camber (say 1/16"), cap-iron set well back, and frog set back to give an open mouth. Set the iron to give the deepest cut you can reasonably achieve without exhausting yourself too quickly (going cross-grain, that'll be deeper than you think!) and attack the high spots on the rough board. Keep checking progress - you can take off too much very easily if you don't keep track of progress. Once you've got the board level and taken off the rough-sawn surface, revert to try plane (or try-plane set-up with the jack - fine set with a near-straight iron, close cap-iron setting and tighter mouth) and take out the jack-plane ripples by working the try plane along the grain. Since the jack did the bulk of the wood-shifting, the trying-up doesn't take long.



Hmm, yes, maybe I'm using the wrong technique, cutting along the grain and getting knackered. And maybe I'm expecting too much from the one plane/iron. I've got a wooden Jack with a good camber to the blade. Maybe I should be using this to flatten the oak and finishing with the 5 1/2 or possibly the 4 (I don't want to buy any more planes, I'm trying to cut down on them :? ). I'd been pretty pleased with the flatness/straightness and finish I was getting, just knackered.


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## Jacob (5 Dec 2013)

The single most effective thing for improving plane performance and ease of use is a squiggle of candle wax on the sole


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## Cheshirechappie (5 Dec 2013)

The wooden jack sounds ideal - means you can leave the 5 1/2 set up for try-plane work. Jack planes (old name 'fore plane' because they come before the rest) don't need the fine set-ups of try and smoothing planes; wide mouth, well-cambered iron, rank set.

It makes for quicker work if you can have three bench planes set up - jack, try and smoothing. Changing between planes is then just a matter of putting one down and picking up the next - no replacing of irons and resetting of frogs.

When you've been used to planing pine, the hardness of seasoned oak comes as a bit of a shock! The more you can take off cross-grain, the better. One thing to watch is that you do get break-out on the off-side of the board you're preparing. You can either run a generous bevel along the back edge before you start, or leave the board a good 1/4" wide while you surface the two faces and face edge, then clean up the raggy bits when you finish the back edge to final width.

With some boards, it's a toss-up whether or not to plane off excess width, or saw off most of it and just clean up. All down to individual circumstances, really.


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## matthewwh (5 Dec 2013)

Cheshirechappie":1mg19tl3 said:


> For flattening hardwoods, it pays to do the bulk of the work working across the grain. The wood cuts much easier that way. It's even faster if you set the plane up like a true jack - an iron with a strong camber (say 1/16"), cap-iron set well back, and frog set back to give an open mouth. Set the iron to give the deepest cut you can reasonably achieve without exhausting yourself too quickly (going cross-grain, that'll be deeper than you think!) and attack the high spots on the rough board. Keep checking progress - you can take off too much very easily if you don't keep track of progress. Once you've got the board level and taken off the rough-sawn surface, revert to try plane (or try-plane set-up with the jack - fine set with a near-straight iron, close cap-iron setting and tighter mouth) and take out the jack-plane ripples by working the try plane along the grain. Since the jack did the bulk of the wood-shifting, the trying-up doesn't take long.



One of the best summaries I have read for a long time.


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## Cheshirechappie (5 Dec 2013)

Thank you, Matthew. Coming from yourself, that's praise indeed!


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## RossJarvis (5 Dec 2013)

Cheshirechappie":1p7euzks said:


> When you've been used to planing pine, the hardness of seasoned oak comes as a bit of a shock!



Crumbs, yes indeedy :shock: 

The bit which is still befuddling me is that I can't get a finer shaving or dust than I'm getting. Even coming in from the edge, the cut is either "off or on", if that makes any sense. I've also got the cap/back iron set very close to the cutting edge, so maybe adjusting that will give a noticeable improvement. There's an awful lot to this planing business that I don't know. I'd love to spend some time with a master and learn from that, I think I need to set more time aside to just practice with all the adjustment I've got to really find out how to use the plane on different woods.

Thanks for the great help guys


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## Lawrence Hill (5 Dec 2013)

Have you considered a slightly steeper honing bevel say 35 deg instead of the usual 30? Also a spot of ruler trick on the back may help shift the attack angle slightly to give a scraping angle cut (remember the No5 will have a 45 deg bed angle good for softwoods but less ideal for tougher hardwoods (hence Norris pitched at 47.5 degrees and the LN frogs at other pitches).

(Now you have the perfect excuse to buy an infill...)

Is the timber very old? Oak sometimes casehardens for want of a better phrase, as it ages.

Hope this helps.

Regards
Lawrence


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## Kalimna (5 Dec 2013)

I would echo Jacobs suggestion - a squiggle of wax really does ease things up nicely.

Adam


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## Paul Chapman (6 Dec 2013)

RossJarvis":20cta5tm said:


> I've also got the cap/back iron set very close to the cutting edge, so maybe adjusting that will give a noticeable improvement.



I would try setting the cap iron back a bit. Some people recommend a close set cap iron but, in my experience, this doesn't always work well unless you fiddle about honing the cap iron to an optimum shape. It can also lead to shavings getting jammed if you have a close-set mouth.

Ideally, I would echo Cheshirechappie's recommendation of having three planes - a jack, jointer and smoother - set up ideally for their respective functions. The more you get into planning, particularly with hard woods, the more you will find that one plane can't do everything and the way the plane is set up is just as important as the sharpness of the blade.

Cheers :wink: 

Paul


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## RossJarvis (6 Dec 2013)

Thanks very much for all your replies. Generally I think I've got a very good 5 1/2 and I'm probably asking a bit too much of it. However I'm also very pleased that I can plane pine and oak and get a good finish on both as well as flat and square. A 5 1/2 may be a Jack of all trades but it's b****y good at a lot of them if not perfect at all of them. I'm getting both a good finish and a good rate of flatness and straightness. I'm probably also trying to wimp out a bit and avoid hard effort. I got very knackered producing two bin bags of shavings, profiling a 4' door cill and 4' weather bar, when a bit more skilful sawing or cutting may have saved a lot of effort.

I've used both camellia oil and wax which reduce the effort, but do worry a bit about how this might effect later finishes, maybe a rub over with white spirit will solve this.

At the end of the day though, I am coming to the conclusion that a 5 1/2 with one blade will do more jobs than anything else, as long as you accept it is a jack of all and a master of none and are proud of it.


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## RossJarvis (6 Dec 2013)

double post


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## RossJarvis (6 Dec 2013)

Thanks very much for all your replies. Generally I think I've got a very good 5 1/2 and I'm probably asking a bit too much of it. However I'm also very pleased that I can plane pine and oak and get a good finish on both as well as flat and square. A 5 1/2 may be a Jack of all trades but it's b****y good at a lot of them if not perfect at all of them. I'm getting both a good finish and a good rate of flatness and straightness. I'm probably also trying to wimp out a bit and avoid hard effort. I got very knackered producing two bin bags of shavings, profiling a 4' door cill and 4' weather bar, when a bit more skilful sawing or cutting may have saved a lot of effort.

I've used both camellia oil and wax which reduce the effort, but do worry a bit about how this might effect later finishes, maybe a rub over with white spirit will solve this.

At the end of the day though, I am coming to the conclusion that a 5 1/2 with one blade will do more jobs than anything else, as long as you accept it is a jack of all and a master of none and are proud of it.


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## RossJarvis (6 Dec 2013)

Lawrence Hill":34syo585 said:


> H
> 
> Is the timber very old? Oak sometimes casehardens for want of a better phrase, as it ages.
> 
> ...



luckily I've been working on new seasoned oak, the last time I worked on old oak (100years+) I think I'd have been better off with a Death Star Disintegrator.


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## bugbear (6 Dec 2013)

Whilst people's comments on general plane tuning are helpful. no-one has addressed the reported issue.

The plane is taking a (much) thicker shaving on oak than pine, at the same depth setting.

My own guesses are either concave sole (with the harder oak sucking the plane down in the concavity once the blade engages),
or a poorly bedded iron (ditto, but on the iron).

BugBear


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## Richard T (6 Dec 2013)

Hmmm yes ... What BB says. How do your other planes compare in use with Pine and with Oak?

(Notice that I am assuming that you have other planes...)


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## RossJarvis (6 Dec 2013)

Thanks BB and Rich T. I think I need to do a bit of investigating here. For some reason it just didn't occur to me to compare with other planes #-o and for the life of me I can't remember how the block plane compared and I'm sure I used that along the grain. It seemed fine on the end-grain and produced a fair amount of dust there.

I'm starting to wonder if the sole isn't as flat as wot I thought!


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## Cheshirechappie (6 Dec 2013)

Fair point, BB.

As Ross says he has to push harder when planing the oak than the pine (which sounds logical, oak being the harder timber), the effort he's exerting is being felt by the cutting edge of the iron, which reacts to the extra load by bending slightly downward, thus increasing the depth of cut. The solution would be to stiffen things up by either using a two-piece cap-iron instead of the standard bent metal one, using a thicker iron, or both. It might also be worth setting the cap-iron back a little more than you would use for a smoother.

Interestingly, Ross doesn't mention chatter, which is something I've experienced with thin irons on hard woods. It usually happens at the beginning of a cut, and the surface shows a series of parallel 'cut-lines' about 1/8" apart as the iron digs in, snaps off a shaving and springs out, then digs in again. Skewing the plane often reduces or eliminates the problem, which is fine if smoothing, but no help if trying an edge. Interestingly, I've never had chatter from my woody planes - maybe because they have much thicker irons. Since fitting a thicker Clifton iron and two-piece cap-iron in my tryplane (Record 07) some years ago, I've had no problems with chatter; whether this is because the iron is thicker and therefore stiffer, I don't know, but the problem has gone away.


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## Jacob (7 Dec 2013)

RossJarvis":1kmfi8l2 said:


> ....
> I've used both camellia oil and wax which reduce the effort, but do worry a bit about how this might effect later finishes,...


It is largely removed with the shavings. Never seems to be a problem with finishes. Candle wax is such a valuable aid that I really wouldn't worry about finishes until it shows up as a problem.

Tuning - the main thing with hard woods is to set the frog back so that the back of the edge gets as much support as possible. 
2nd is to sharpen it - *you must raise a distinct burr across the whole width.* 
Sounds obvious I know, but it's easy to give up just a little too soon and leave a bluntish bit in the middle of the blade, as it often takes longer than you expect. Most of the blade will be still be sharp even when blunt, as most wear is in the middle. The burr is the only way of knowing that you have removed the blunt bevel, short of examining with a microscope.

The best value upgrade is a two piece cap iron. I wouldn't bother with new blades etc.


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## RossJarvis (7 Dec 2013)

Cheshirechappie":26cjrlgu said:


> Fair point, BB.
> 
> Interestingly, Ross doesn't mention chatter, which is something I've experienced with thin irons on hard woods. It usually happens at the beginning of a cut, and the surface shows a series of parallel 'cut-lines' about 1/8" apart as the iron digs in, snaps off a shaving and springs out, then digs in again. Skewing the plane often reduces or eliminates the problem, which is fine if smoothing, but no help if trying an edge. Interestingly, I've never had chatter from my woody planes - maybe because they have much thicker irons. Since fitting a thicker Clifton iron and two-piece cap-iron in my tryplane (Record 07) some years ago, I've had no problems with chatter; whether this is because the iron is thicker and therefore stiffer, I don't know, but the problem has gone away.



Ah, yes, there is a bit of something like that at the beginning of the cut, though the gaps are longer. The tendency was that the iron seemed to jump from the edge of the stock, dig in about 1/2 inch in, jump a bit and start cutting. I'm reasonably meticulous about sharpening the iron, checking for burr on entirety of edge and that final honing extends across the full width (though I can't promise I'm not cacking something up there). Along with the general lack of experience there's also the circumstances I'm working in. No proper workbench, so planing on stock secured with nail heads to anything large and flat enough.

Once again, thanks for the tips everyone  , It's given a few good pointers to look at. I think I need to check for sole flatness, then try adjustments of back-iron and frog. If that doesn't work I'll stick to green oak in future :? .


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## Jacob (7 Dec 2013)

Chatter means you are doing it wrong, it's not the plane. 
Might be your "bench" isn't stiff enough - might need bracing against the wall you are planing towards. A planing beam japanese style is good idea - basically a joist, braced against something.
Could be too coarse a cut - try putting the nose on to the workpiece and advance it slowly until you feel the blade engage, and stop. Then hold it down tight and start forwards again. If too deep a cut you may find this difficult. You are aiming at a steady slow controlled push rather than a swipe or stab.
Could be blade not tight enough or too far forwards.
Could be all sorts of things!


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## Paul Chapman (7 Dec 2013)

Jacob":1tr9e65v said:


> Chatter means you are doing it wrong, it's not the plane.



Chatter (in the normally accepted sense of the term) is a quite specific problem and stems from a lack of rigidity in the blade, usually caused by a thin blade/bending of the blade by the bent metal type of cap iron/poor seating on the frog, or a combination of these issues. Can usually be cured by fitting a two-piece Clifton cap iron and/or a thicker blade.

Cheers :wink: 

Paul


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## Jacob (7 Dec 2013)

Paul Chapman":3v9toz7b said:


> Jacob":3v9toz7b said:
> 
> 
> > Chatter means you are doing it wrong, it's not the plane.
> ...


More often due to loose or springy work holding in my experience. Sometimes just putting something lower in a vice will stop chatter.


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## bugbear (7 Dec 2013)

Paul Chapman":39ctamnc said:


> Jacob":39ctamnc said:
> 
> 
> > Chatter means you are doing it wrong, it's not the plane.
> ...



Jeff Gorman coined "skitter" for the other (similar) problem.

BugBear


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## Saint Simon (8 Dec 2013)

I have found that, as Jacob says, if the wood isn't supported adequately, because its bowed or twisted and is springing under the pressure of planing, can cause real problems however good your plane is. Getting one side roughly flat and then working more precisely on the other helps sort out a lot of flattening problems. 
Just my pennys worth,
Simon


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## Cheshirechappie (8 Dec 2013)

The plane is performing well on mild woods, giving translucent (ie very thin) shavings. Consequently, provided the workpieces are coming out flat and not convex, the sole is flat enough. (If the sole was slightly concave, the mouth area would be clear of the wood when both ends of the plane were in contact with the wood, and a fine-set iron wouldn't cut, so no fine shavings unless the job is planed hump-backed.)

So, if it's flat enough for mild woods, it's flat enough for harder ones.

From my experience, Bailey planes with thin irons are fine on softwoods, and work well enough on milder hardwoods such as mahogany and ash. They're OK on the likes of sycamore, too. However, when you get to really hard woods - oak, beech and the exotics - they do start to struggle a bit. For wood preparation, when fair dimensional accuracy is more important than ultra-smooth finishes, they can get by, but for high dimensional accuracy and super finish, they sometimes can't quite perform well enough. That's when the extra stiffness of blade and blade support is needed.

There are several ways to improve matters. Making sure the job is well supported is certainly one. For the affluent and well-equipped, switching to a stiffer plane such as an infill is another. Setting the frog back so that the iron bed-surface is continuous from the mouth opening may help, but has the disadvantage of opening the mouth and therefore exacerbating any tear-out problems there may be. A general tune-up of frog seating and blade seating surface can help too, but the most sure-fire way is to stiffen things up with a two-piece cap-iron and stiffer (thicker) blade, which allows the user to maintain a narrow mouth and thus limit tear-out.

As Ross points out, the other pragmatic way to avoid the problem is to use the plane within it's limits by avoiding very hard woods!


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## Corneel (8 Dec 2013)

You can use the chipbreaker too to help in the chattering department AND in tearout reduction. When you set the chipbreaker very close to the edge, you won't need a tight mouth in 99% of the cases to avoid tearout. The blade is stiffened quite a bit too with this setup, and it allows you to pull the frog back so it sits flush with the sole. But a thicker blade certainly helps to make things stiffer. But it has the disadvantage of longer sharpening time. I haven't tried a thicker chipbreaker yet, sounds like a perfect solution.


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## Jacob (8 Dec 2013)

Cheshirechappie":jesdax8l said:


> The plane is performing well on mild woods, giving translucent (ie very thin) shavings. ...


"Performing well" means producing thick shavings (not thin translucent ones) i.e. getting the waste off fast. The critical thing is the quality of surface on the workpiece. The shavings go in the bin and are not interesting at all.


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## RossJarvis (8 Dec 2013)

Another member has offered to spend some time helping me look through the issue. Hopefully we'll be able to find out whether it's a tool or user issue, or combination of both.


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## G S Haydon (8 Dec 2013)

That's great to hear Ross, good luck!


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## Cheshirechappie (9 Dec 2013)

Jacob":7qa1yc7p said:


> Cheshirechappie":7qa1yc7p said:
> 
> 
> > The plane is performing well on mild woods, giving translucent (ie very thin) shavings. ...
> ...



The point I was trying to make here is that if Ross's plane is capable of giving very thin shavings, the sole of his plane is adequately flat. The reason I was addressing that point is that Ross suggested that perhaps sole flatness was something he needed to check.

Well done to the mystery forum member. Ross, I hope a bit of a practical session helps to answer your questions!


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## Vann (9 Dec 2013)

Jacob":2utwxj3d said:


> The shavings go in the bin...


*In the bin * :!: Certainly not sir.

Ours get used in the kids guinea pig cage, or put in the compost heap (or both - eventually), and we have very discerning guinea pigs.... (none of your coarse shavings thanks, only the finest)

Hat, coat...

Cheers, Vann.


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## Vann (9 Dec 2013)

Cheshirechappie":1wrpotz5 said:


> ...The solution would be to stiffen things up by either using a two-piece cap-iron instead of the standard bent metal one, using a thicker iron, or both.
> 
> Since fitting a thicker Clifton iron and two-piece cap-iron in my tryplane (Record 07) some years ago, I've had no problems with chatter; whether this is because the iron is thicker and therefore stiffer, I don't know, but the problem has gone away.


Just for discussion purposes - is it worth using a thicker cap-iron AND a thicker cutting iron? 

I would have thought that a thicker cap-iron would be the first step (as it is both cheaper, and easier to fit). If that didn't work, or if the iron needs replacing for other reasons (e.g. pitting) then consider a thicker cutting iron.

But if a plane requires both to dampen chatter then it must be in a bad way, and needs fettling surely !?!

Cheers, Vann.


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## bugbear (9 Dec 2013)

Vann":2ouq3nok said:


> Cheshirechappie":2ouq3nok said:
> 
> 
> > ...The solution would be to stiffen things up by either using a two-piece cap-iron instead of the standard bent metal one, using a thicker iron, or both.
> ...



With planing, it's a question of getting the tool to _at least_ the performance level required by the task at hand.

There are several things known to improve plane performance, and they all cost money. By popular agreement, something like a Holtey panel plane embodies them all. But many tasks simply do not need that level of performance (and, indeed, do not measurably benefit from it), and can be done just as well with a less-tuned (and likely cheaper) plane.

BugBear


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## Cheshirechappie (9 Dec 2013)

Vann":2mi4hqit said:


> Cheshirechappie":2mi4hqit said:
> 
> 
> > ...The solution would be to stiffen things up by either using a two-piece cap-iron instead of the standard bent metal one, using a thicker iron, or both.
> ...



Actually, that's a good point. Lots of people (including me) trot out various opinions, but I don't know if anybody has ever done any comparative trials to see what improvements really make most difference, and under what set of circumstances.

Bugbear's point is also very valid. If you never work with hard exotics, there would be little point in tuning your planes to cope with them, especially if your planes work satisfactorily on the timbers you do use.

Would make an interesting thread of it's own....


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## James-1986 (9 Dec 2013)

Oak will never plane up like pine, two totally different materials when you think about it. Oak has a coarse grain so beyond a certain point you just get dust, no amount of 'tuning' is going to change that!


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## RossJarvis (19 Dec 2013)

Having spent a good few hours with another forum member, it seems that the plane is pretty well sorted and I was just asking a bit too much of it (cheers Paul  ). I.e. hoping to get a good scrub/fore/try/smoother/jointer out of one plane with one iron. I'm trying to have as few tools as possible and learn to use them as best I can, I'll just need to use more than one plane. 

We decided it's probably a good idea to have the 5 1/2 set up with a toothed or "cambered" iron for stock removal and rely on the 4 for smoothing, or maybe have a few irons to swap out on the 5 1/2. We also discussed getting a 7 or 8, but I really must resist the urge to buy any more tools before I can use the ones I've got :? . (I'm sure no-one else here gets the urge to buy more tools :lol: )

I think Cheshirechappie had pointed out the issues best. It goes to show that you can't beat having someone with more experience on-hand to work these things through with.

So thanks for all the help and advice, a really good and knowledgable bunch of chappies/ettes you all are.

All I need to do now is go out and practice as much as I can.

We also had a quick look at what the difference was between my Bahco and new Japanese chisels. About 42 quid each seems to be the answer


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## bugbear (20 Dec 2013)

RossJarvis":ptmnamaw said:


> Having spent a good few hours with another forum member, it seems that the plane is pretty well sorted and I was just asking a bit too much of it (cheers Paul  ).



What (on earth) made it take thicker shavings in Oak than pine?

BugBear


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## Paul Chapman (20 Dec 2013)

bugbear":3gxzpcsv said:


> RossJarvis":3gxzpcsv said:
> 
> 
> > Having spent a good few hours with another forum member, it seems that the plane is pretty well sorted and I was just asking a bit too much of it (cheers Paul  ).
> ...



The issues came down to setting up the plane for the work in hand and we covered everything from heavy stock removal through flattening and on to smoothing and scraping. A very enjoyable few hours.

Cheers :ho2 

Paul


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## RossJarvis (20 Dec 2013)

As Paul said, a bit of improved technique and clamping up in a decent work-bench seemed to resolve things. We didn't replicate the same situation, possibly due to the clamping. I was getting much finer shavings/fibres/dust. My usual equipment, a bit of 2x6 and wedging the oak down with nail-heads may not help the plane reach its best performance. Nor the height of the garden staging that I've been using as a bench!


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## Corneel (20 Dec 2013)

Real benches are nice, aren't they? 8)


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## RossJarvis (20 Dec 2013)

I wasn't sure if Paul wanted me to mention that he was the person who helped me out, but as he's now posted, all I can say is he's a true gent and thanks very much for your generous help, time and pork pies. 

As I've mentioned earlier, this site is great for people offering help and advice to each other and Paul's shown a great spirit and willing in helping out. I've read lots of books, spent too much on tools (or so SWMBO says) but you can't beat having someone taking the time to show you how a job's to be done.

Until recently I was a college instructor (in swarf, rather than sawdust) and am painfully aware that showing others how to use their hands and tools is a dying art, so hopefully us lot as a community can keep some of that going. So any chance we get to help someone else's enthusiasm please use it.

PS. The apprentice is gutted Paul didn't give me a pork pie to "take away".


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## Paul Chapman (20 Dec 2013)

RossJarvis":3a3cnqi6 said:


> The apprentice is gutted Paul didn't give me a pork pie to "take away".


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## paulm (21 Dec 2013)

We had already guessed it was Mr C by the mention of toothed plane blades, Paul's very fond of them ! 8) 

Nice work guys, hope you didn't eat all the pork pies  

Cheers, Paul


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