# "Flattening" Chip Breaker



## El Barto (30 Nov 2016)

Doing a bit of sharpening today and on a couple of second hand planes the chip breakers don't sit perfectly flush with the iron.

A few goes on the stone gets an improvement but still got gaps on both sides. Is it just a case of working the breaker on the stone until it's square and flat?


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## AndyT (30 Nov 2016)

Yes. 

If you still get no success, you could try flattening it with a file rather than a stone. 

Some people recommend assembling the cap iron onto the cutting iron, then running a burnisher or hard screwdriver along the leading edge of the cap iron to make sure that it seats entirely snug. As it's mild steel, it should deform quite easily.


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## D_W (30 Nov 2016)

El Barto":3i9irrof said:


> Doing a bit of sharpening today and on a couple of second hand planes the chip breakers don't sit perfectly flush with the iron.
> 
> A few goes on the stone gets an improvement but still got gaps on both sides. Is it just a case of working the breaker on the stone until it's square and flat?



Agree with the file comment above. Make sure the back of the cutting iron isn't crowned, too - check with a ruler. 

If it's a challenge to prepare a badly worn cap iron without rocking a little bit and creating that curved surface, finish straightening the cap iron edge with strokes in one direction only on the stone.


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## El Barto (30 Nov 2016)

Thanks guys. I'm thinking I'll square it with a file and then finish it on a stone.


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## bugbear (30 Nov 2016)

El Barto":edz4wb2m said:


> Doing a bit of sharpening today and on a couple of second hand planes the chip breakers don't sit perfectly flush with the iron.
> 
> A few goes on the stone gets an improvement but still got gaps on both sides. Is it just a case of working the breaker on the stone until it's square and flat?



Check the blade too - gaps at the edges can be formed by laterally-convex chip breaker, blade, or both.

If you're lucky (many variables are involved) the pressure of the lever cap may deform the parts into alignment, but it's best not to rely on this.

BugBear


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## El Barto (30 Nov 2016)

Yeah the gaps aren't huge so I did try it with the lever cap in place, didn't make a difference


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## Racers (30 Nov 2016)

Its something I struggle with, I find the best way is to lap the cap iron on a diamond plate resting on the blade, the thickness gives you a clearance angle and by using the blade as a base it comes out parallel to the cutting edge.

If you don't get a good fit shavings will clog the blade very fast.

Pete


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## Beau (30 Nov 2016)

The way I do it is file the cap iron slightly concave first and then finish on a diamond stone. This helps to stop you making it convex.


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## custard (30 Nov 2016)

I wonder if it's this issue more than any other that pushes so many woodworking newcomers towards expensive LN/Veritas planes or Bevel Up planes? If you have even the slightest gap between cap iron and blade then planing becomes a horrible chore as you end up with the cap iron way too far back and you still spend most of your time picking out trapped shavings. That's such a dispiriting scenario that it wouldn't be surprising if many aspirant woodworkers just pack it in as a bad job and spend the money on a premium tool that generally works okay straight from the box.

I've been around experienced furniture makers most of my life and the only solution I've ever heard is meticulous flattening to resolve the problem, but IMO that's not really appropriate for most newbies, flattening a crowned plane iron requires quite a delicate touch if you're not to rock the blade from side to side, which then means you could make the problem worse rather than better.

Paul Sellers has a brutal but effective solution for thinner Stanley or Record plane irons, place the iron bevel down on a piece of softwood and bash it once about an inch back from the cutting edge and dead centre with a nylon headed hammer.

I tried this a few times but couldn't get it to work. Turns out I was being too timid. I repeated the exercise with a piece of 6mm MDF on top of the iron and hit it moderately hard with the ball end of a ball pein hammer. This produced an iron with a _minute_ hollow on the cutting face, which made flattening very fast and the cap iron then closed up to give an air tight seal.

I've since repeated the exercise on about four or five thin Bailey style plane irons, returning to a nylon faced hammer but hitting it much harder, it's now worked every time. Make sure there's a piece of flat softwood under the iron, and make sure you're proficient enough with a hammer to get it dead centre.

With that problem sorted cheap Stanley and Record planes are superb tools, toss in DW's closely set cap iron trick and one or two budget priced Record or Stanley tools are all the bench planes that most woodworkers will ever need.

Incidentally, I've sometimes become unstuck with flattening a cap iron because the metal's so soft you can quickly raise a massive wire edge that's tricky to then get rid of, the soft metal means it doesn't just float away like with harder steel and just bends back and forth for ages. I've found that stropping can help, and not to use too aggressive a stone in the first place.


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## El Barto (30 Nov 2016)

That sounds like a neat trick, I'm going to give it a go - thanks!!! How thin are we talking here? I'm working on a number 4 and 5.

It would be a shame if an issue such as this was putting people off these kinds of planes - they're such wonderful tools and the closer I get it to perfect the more I appreciate it and enjoy it. I'm certainly still in the infancy of my woodworking experience but the idea of buying something new and easier to use because the alternative is proving too difficult is an unpleasant one.


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## custard (30 Nov 2016)

El Barto":3he92veb said:


> That sounds like a neat trick, I'm going to give it a go - thanks!!! How thin are we talking here?



All the Bailey style original irons are fairly similar thickness, around 2mm.


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## El Barto (30 Nov 2016)

Cool thanks. Could the same general concept be applied to the chip breaker? Assembling the chip breaker and iron and then bashing any areas of the breaker edge that are turned up and liable to clog up.


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## custard (30 Nov 2016)

El Barto":34yt9frs said:


> Cool thanks. Could the same general concept be applied to the chip breaker? Assembling the chip breaker and iron and then bashing any areas of the breaker edge that are turned up and liable to clog up.



I don't think so, because there's a curve in the body of the chip breaker that would complicate things enormously. But then again, I've never tried so maybe I'm wrong.


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## Phil Pascoe (30 Nov 2016)

I've found chip breakers that are nearly flat, and also that are twisted. As Custard said the steel is soft, so they are easy to re shape with a bit of round bar (large screwdriver?) and a nylon faced hammer, then the leading edge flattened with a little clearance towards the back so it seats 100%.


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## ED65 (30 Nov 2016)

*@Beau* My preferred method too if a cap iron is giving me trouble. I find this much more repeatable than doing my very best not to rock the iron slightly when there's a fair amount of metal to remove before there's no radius left on the leading edge.

*@custard* A close-set cap iron is hardly D_W's trick. Credit where credit is due, he's done more to bring it back to people's attention than anyone in recent years (although many still haven't received the memo), but using the cap iron properly dates to their earliest days in the 18th century.


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## ED65 (30 Nov 2016)

I presume I'm not the only one who has come across this, occasionally you get a cap iron that's high on one side only, sometimes high enough that if you tried to use abrasion only to get to level you end up with the leading edge no longer being square to the sides. (Found that out the hard way  )

So what I do now if I encounter this is to clamp the iron curve-up on the edge of a piece strong ply and either using a small C-clamp or pliers (padded) to try to massage out the twist in the iron, or percussive means to bend that one corner down using the end grain of a small piece of hardwood struck with my heaviest hammer.


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## skipdiver (30 Nov 2016)

I've also used the Paul Sellars method. I followed his video on bringing an old plane back to life, including all the flattening and easing the edges with sandpaper on a flat surface and they work much better now than they used to. After years of site work, my planes were not in a very good state. In fact it wasn't until i gave my Stanley 41/2 a good clean that i noticed a crack in the side of it in line with the mouth. Don't know how long it has been there but it seems to work just fine.


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## NazNomad (1 Dec 2016)

Having read this thread with interest, followed up by some internet research last night, I completely stripped down my entire plane collection today (both of them) and started from scratch... It's like night & day, they were set up by Stevie Wonder's dog, I think. I never used them much but when I did it was a horrid experience. Loving them now though.

Anyhoooo, they are both Stanley Bailey planes and both chipbreakers had an 'S' stamped on them.

Is this something as obvious as 'S' for Stanley of is there some other reason for the letter stamp?


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## woodbrains (1 Dec 2016)

Hello,

What is a chip breaker?

Mike.


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## NazNomad (1 Dec 2016)




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## NazNomad (1 Dec 2016)

I just remembered, I have a Stanley RB5 too, it's a truly hideous tool, both in looks and in use.


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## Paddy Roxburgh (1 Dec 2016)

woodbrains":39tcvdjw said:


> Hello,
> 
> What is a chip breaker?
> 
> Mike.



They mean cap iron


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## NazNomad (1 Dec 2016)

Mmmmnope, I meant chip breaker.

''Cap iron'' was used when Britain 'was' Great, but since the brexit vote we're going all 'murican now.


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## woodbrains (1 Dec 2016)

Paddy Roxburgh":2t72hihw said:


> woodbrains":2t72hihw said:
> 
> 
> > Hello,
> ...



Hello,

Indeed! I was being oblique. Perhaps we can write English instead, though. 

Incidentally, the cap iron effect is not something new to me. I found out when I was a lad that closely set was helpful for cranky grain. It was just a matter of experimentation, as the setting recommended in books at the time, said close for fine work, but didn't say how close. I just tried closer and closer, until I actually got an effect. I have done it ever since, though I still prefer a fine mouth on my smoother and cottony shaving fine setting on the depth adjuster. Finishing strokes are super fine anyway on my work.

Mike.


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## NazNomad (1 Dec 2016)

woodbrains":2yzfb0k8 said:


> Indeed! I was being oblique. Perhaps we can write English instead...



'Oblique' is French though? 8)


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## Paddy Roxburgh (1 Dec 2016)

NazNomad":237xkctv said:


> Mmmmnope, I meant chip breaker.
> 
> ''Cap iron'' was used when Britain 'was' Great, but since the brexit vote we're going all 'murican now.



What, all cuts to be made on unguarded table saw with $5000 dollars worth of Lie Nielsen planes hanging on the wall behind us?


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## CStanford (1 Dec 2016)

"...though I still prefer a fine mouth on my smoother and cottony shaving fine setting on the depth adjuster. Finishing strokes are super fine anyway on my work."

Yep. There's no need to hurry at this stage of the game, especially on projects that have been in process (not yours) for months on end, though we're likely about to be told how 'slow' and 'inefficient' this way of working is.


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## D_W (1 Dec 2016)

CStanford":3sm0kzu6 said:


> "...though I still prefer a fine mouth on my smoother and cottony shaving fine setting on the depth adjuster. Finishing strokes are super fine anyway on my work."
> 
> Yep. There's no need to hurry at this stage of the game, especially on projects that have been in process (not yours) for months on end, though we're likely about to be told how 'slow' and 'inefficient' this way of working is.



Put down the wine, Charlie. The cap iron doesn't do anything for a shaving a thousandth thick, and never has been claimed to.

Then again, neither does a fine mouth - but a fine mouth does prevent a mental error of letting a plane catch on the end of a workpiece at the beginning of a stroke.


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## El Barto (1 Dec 2016)

Out of interest, when buying Bailey planers on eBay etc is there any way of telling if the item truly is one of the older models? I got a No. 5 planer off there a while back and it has moulded plastic handles... they reek of poor quality.


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## CStanford (1 Dec 2016)

D_W":1sejtlsk said:


> CStanford":1sejtlsk said:
> 
> 
> > "...though I still prefer a fine mouth on my smoother and cottony shaving fine setting on the depth adjuster. Finishing strokes are super fine anyway on my work."
> ...



Put it down? Never! Wouldn't be efficient...

I'm trying to figure out a way to get the cap iron effect on a corkscrew.


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## CStanford (1 Dec 2016)

El Barto":y6wv9ttw said:


> Out of interest, when buying Bailey planers on eBay etc is there any way of telling if the item truly is one of the older models? I got a No. 5 planer off there a while back and it has moulded plastic handles... they reek of poor quality.



http://www.hyperkitten.com/tools/stanley_bench_plane/


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## CStanford (1 Dec 2016)

D_W":3n4enh4b said:


> CStanford":3n4enh4b said:
> 
> 
> > "...though I still prefer a fine mouth on my smoother and cottony shaving fine setting on the depth adjuster. Finishing strokes are super fine anyway on my work."
> ...



Dave, I got this little bit of all hand work done today before Happy Hour:

All from rough stock that had not been touched until today (granted, it's poplar), twenty mortises, haunched if applicable, twelve tenons (is that right?,,, damn wine!), legs tapered on the two inside faces, all glued up. This is for our kitchen. The back rail (not pictured) is also four squared and the tenons are laid out but not cut. The top rail and front apron (also not pictured) are also four squared but no joinery has been laid out on them yet. Oh yes, I also laid out the half template for the front apron design on Bristol board.

http://s804.photobucket.com/user/charli ... /Huntboard

Cheers!


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## D_W (1 Dec 2016)

good for you?


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## CStanford (1 Dec 2016)

I'd like to think so. I thought it was a rather productive day, all things considered and all before 3:00 p.m.


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## D_W (1 Dec 2016)

El Barto":80ohkbhp said:


> Out of interest, when buying Bailey planers on eBay etc is there any way of telling if the item truly is one of the older models? I got a No. 5 planer off there a while back and it has moulded plastic handles... they reek of poor quality.



Type 20 is probably the first type that's considered a dud (in the american made planes), but there can be duds of any year. 

My advice would be to find a plane that looks clean and that has an iron with points at the top (not rounded corners), and where the frog goes all the way to the casting and leaves no gap. Points suggest something a little earlier and a bit more consistency with hardness.

I have had a lot of stanley 4 planes, but have one right now. It's a type 20. The iron was relatively soft, but I made an iron in the past and stuffed it in instead - you can always find something vintage wherever you are if you get stuck with a newer soft iron. The rest of the plane is wonderful - it adjusts smoothly and easily and the frog extends all the way to the casting. 

At any rate, what I'm getting at is that the plastic handles are offputting from a visual standpoint, but I never minded them that much if they didn't have a seam. I have had bad experiences with planes that had them for reasons other than the handle, though. 

Wood handles and irons like I mentioned and you should be fine. If you find you're not, sell what you got on ebay and try again.


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## D_W (1 Dec 2016)

CStanford":1f7t3n29 said:


> I'd like to think so. I thought it was a rather productive day, all things considered.



Planing poplar doesn't prove much in the context of getting a one plane does all kind of thing (custard's demonstration of flattening a ribboned bubinga slab did, though), but I must admit to being a little jealous that so far today, I haven't spent any time in the shop and definitely won't be able to until at least Saturday.

I have no wine at home, either - except fruity stuff that my wife likes, so I guess there will be no relief tonight. I prefer wines a little closer to my personality profile.


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## CStanford (1 Dec 2016)

Well, Dave, I wasn't out to prove anything with regard to planing.


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## rafezetter (2 Dec 2016)

Racers":2aovyakm said:


> Its something I struggle with, I find the best way is to lap the cap iron on a diamond plate resting on the blade, the thickness gives you a clearance angle and by using the blade as a base it comes out parallel to the cutting edge.
> 
> If you don't get a good fit shavings will clog the blade very fast.
> 
> Pete



This is a brilliant idea, I have a few cap irons in my woodies that are not quite as snug as I'd like and several attempts hasn't really improved them much, I can use my small credit card diamond sharpener to finish off after checking the blades first.


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## bugbear (2 Dec 2016)

NazNomad":148pvskb said:


>



Heh. That cap-iron is a little _too_ close, even by D_W standards - it's covering the blade completely. :lol: 

BugBear


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## CStanford (2 Dec 2016)

El Barto":qqme9s24 said:


> Doing a bit of sharpening today and on a couple of second hand planes the chip breakers don't sit perfectly flush with the iron.
> 
> A few goes on the stone gets an improvement but still got gaps on both sides. Is it just a case of working the breaker on the stone until it's square and flat?



I'm sure somebody must have already mentioned it but you need to figure out if the breaker is high in the middle or the plane iron has a bump or it's a little of both. Hopefully, it'll just be the breaker since the steel is soft and easy to remove. You can easily put selective pressure on the breaker where it's high while rubbing it on an oilstone or sandpaper on a flat surface. 

This video may be of some help. Maguire has a no-nonsense, direct approach to getting tools ready for work and not making a career out of hand plane tuning. As with any woodworking instruction there will always be those who have quibbles. Judge it for yourself.

If your cap iron is just a wreck, sometimes it's easier to replace it on the vintage market or aftermarket new.

http://www.theenglishwoodworker.com/pre ... ker-video/


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## ED65 (2 Dec 2016)

El Barto":pj3katdo said:


> Out of interest, when buying Bailey planers on eBay etc is there any way of telling if the item truly is one of the older models?


Yes but you're going to have to immerse yourself a bit in the culture of Stanley planes to be able to reliably spot what's early, what's _early _and the stuff from later (which in Stanley plane circles is after WW2).

CStanford has posted the link to one of THE reference sites, you should also look through the rather unfortunately titled Patrick's Blood & Gore.

As you'll see one of the easy reference points for really early ones is the keyhole-shaped hole in the lever cap (prior to a change to a kidney shape), along with no name cast down near the nose. But as lever caps can become separated from the plane they were originally associated with you can sometimes find an older one on a later plane so you have to look at other details as well. Ditto early blades could be in a later plane, later (even present-day) irons could be in an early one because the previous ones were worn down near to the slot, were believed to be too rusted to salvage, or the body just became separated from its iron set.



El Barto":pj3katdo said:


> I got a No. 5 planer off there a while back and it has moulded plastic handles... they reek of poor quality.


Don't let plastic handles alone put you off, some decent users are sold with plastic handles. And your Stanley could have the best examples of those going! No kidding. I picked up a plastic-handled no. 4 of English manufacture recently for next to nothing (basically free with the Acorn I was buying) and the material the handles are cast in has a nice feel, but more important than that the rear handle (the part you'll invariably read called a tote on American sources) is the best shape of any of the smoothers I own, actually superior to the later-era rosewood handles that Stanley produced where some compromises were made on shape for reasons of production efficiency, at the expense of ergonomics.


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## El Barto (2 Dec 2016)

ED65":usy211n8 said:


> El Barto":usy211n8 said:
> 
> 
> > Out of interest, when buying Bailey planers on eBay etc is there any way of telling if the item truly is one of the older models?
> ...



That's interesting. I hadn't quite written off the planer but the handles didn't exactly inspire confidence. I haven't put it to enough use to really know if it's any good, nor would I really know what to look for anyway!


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## skipdiver (2 Dec 2016)

I have plastic handles on my number 5, which i bought in error off t'web and to be honest i don't mind them. Mine is an old Bailey which had a broken wooden handle and now has a plastic one but i also have a much later number 4 which had a plastic handle when i bought it new as a young man with no knowledge of provenance. It's rubbish compared to my other planes and i hardly ever use it.


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## D_W (2 Dec 2016)

As a second comment to the modern planes - the type 20 smoother that I have and like is the one plane I have gotten that had a soft iron in it. I'm convinced that the iron is similar to what David Charlesworth talks about when he mentions the very soft irons of the 70s. No clue why they were made like that. 

Just this last year, I purchased a sheffield made plastic handled stanley plane for 20 bucks to see how it would work. The iron in it was actually quite good (that is not a statement that all of them will be, though). It was much later than the 1970s. Unfortunately, the adjuster was cast so oversize that it didn't fit in the slot on the cap iron and the whole thing was literally suspended several millimeters off of the frog with zero hope of ever actually touching the frog. I enlarged the hole, but never found enough favor for the plane otherwise (it had a huge mouth, which I'm not a fan of on a smoother, because it makes it hard to do things like bevel the ends of small parts). 

I do much appreciate having the extra screws, posts, a decent iron and a cap iron from that plane.

I wouldn't write off that plastic handled plane quite yet. If the iron and cap iron are as good as the one in my plane, and the rest of the plane is functional without having a giant mouth, then it should work pretty well. I just got a dud.


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## skipdiver (2 Dec 2016)

The Stanley number 4 i bought with plastic handles would have been late 70's.


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## David C (4 Dec 2016)

I thought it was worth mentioning that the top/beveled surface of a c/b needs to be well finished as well.

Approximately 1 1/2 degrees of clearance angle will be formed on the underside, if a small wooden prop is used for the top of the c/b. This prop should be about 3 mm below the surface of the stone. The edge of the stone only can be used and the short honing stroke is at rightangles to the length of the stone.

The persistent wire edge problem can be solved by working each face in turn, using fewer and fewer strokes, on finer and finer stones.

This is conveniently managed if the c/b is held in an Eclipse type guide.

This work is shown in my plane sharpening DVD and a new version will be available soon. The old version is on sale from my website shop.

Best wishes,
David


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## D_W (4 Dec 2016)

I generally go through three steps with the cap iron, depending on the type:
* the old woody type or on old infills are often neglected - I work on the 80 grit lap, then on a mid grit stone and then a strop with dursol polish. That makes the wire edge weak if it stays
* on the stanley type, usually just something like a mid grit diamond hone, a fine oilstone and then strop off the wire edge on a strop with dursol polish. 

The cap irons that I've seen on most old planes lead me to believe that the users weren't using the cap irons to control tearout, even on infills that have a fairly large mouth. I wonder what the users were doing, but I guess it doesn't really matter. 

I think I prepared my last plane last night (except for newly made woodies that I have no idea who they'll go to), but this stuff should generally be easy and more is made of it than there is to it.


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## lurcher (4 Dec 2016)

i have all pre 1950 record planes and have them all with the stay set cap ironand i think this is the best thing as it sits 100% flat to the blade giging the whole blade mor ridgidity i had all the problems with the original cap iron blade marriage until i was in a mates joiners shop and he showed me the stay set cap iron if its good enough for record and clifton then its good enough for all of us.


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## D_W (4 Dec 2016)

I've got some of each from record and prefer their copy of the Stanley type, but I guess it's a personal choice.


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## El Barto (4 Dec 2016)

CStanford":yp3miz2h said:


> El Barto":yp3miz2h said:
> 
> 
> > Doing a bit of sharpening today and on a couple of second hand planes the chip breakers don't sit perfectly flush with the iron.
> ...



Just seen this. Thanks for the link, I actually had already seen the video and a few of his others - really enjoy his approach, like you said, no nonsense.


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## CStanford (5 Dec 2016)

Good luck with your woodworking.


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## El Barto (9 Dec 2016)

CStanford":20cujura said:


> Good luck with your woodworking.



Thank you. 

Incidentally, I got the plane restored and the cap iron flat (or at least close to flat) and have put it to use. 

At first I tried The English Woodworker's method of placing the cap iron VERY close to the edge of the blade. It worked for a bit and then started to cause some really nasty tearout and clog up quite badly. I took the cap iron and blade to the stone and strop and gave it another go, same problem. Any ideas what might be causing this? I placed the cap iron about 2mm from the blade and the problem went away, but still interested to know what I might have been doing wrong.


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## Racers (9 Dec 2016)

Sounds like the cap iron isn't fitting properly you still have a small gap that the shavings are getting caught in, the further away settings gives the shavings time to curl away from the gap.

Pete


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## Corneel (9 Dec 2016)

Not enough clearnace angle under the tip of the capiron, so you still have a gap at the very edge? Or is there still a wire edge clinging to the capiron edge? And how tight is the mouth? I would open it a bit to 1mm or so.


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## CStanford (9 Dec 2016)

El Barto":1yekkooc said:


> CStanford":1yekkooc said:
> 
> 
> > Good luck with your woodworking.
> ...



The board needs to be pretty flat for super close cap iron settings to work this is especially so if the plane sole is a little convex and sort of bobs its way down the board cutting deeper in spots and refusing to cut in others.

You need to see if the shavings are jamming in the throat of the plane or jamming between the cap iron and the cutter. Huge difference. If jamming in the throat then move the frog back a little to open it up. If jamming between the cap iron and cutter then you may still need to do a little work on the cap iron. Note that you can get the cap iron so close that it causes the plane to stop cutting altogether and/or it immediately jams with material. It needs to be moved back a little from there to state the obvious.

If you've back beveled the iron a very close setting may not work at all but you shouldn't need one as you'd be planing at a higher effective angle and eliminating tear out that way -- a perfectly legitimate way to work.


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## D_W (9 Dec 2016)

I agree with the sentiments above. When you take the plane apart, if there are shavings between the iron and cap iron, there is a fit issue still. If there are not, then:
* cap iron was set too close (which should just result in a scraping cut, but it will create a clog - however, that will not create tearout unless you are planing directly across grain
* there isn't enough clearance between the mouth and the cap iron. A mouth of a 32nd to a 16th is fine on a smoother, if it's really tight, back it off.

It'll be worth the trouble when you get it to work.


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## custard (9 Dec 2016)

El Barto":33ardq5m said:


> I got the plane restored and the cap iron flat (or at least close to flat) and have put it to use.
> 
> At first I tried The English Woodworker's method of placing the cap iron VERY close to the edge of the blade. It worked for a bit and then started to cause some really nasty tearout and clog up quite badly. I took the cap iron and blade to the stone and strop and gave it another go, same problem. Any ideas what might be causing this? I placed the cap iron about 2mm from the blade and the problem went away, but still interested to know what I might have been doing wrong.



Was it you Barto that said you often pass through Hampshire? I'm a bit snowed under getting stuff out of the workshop for Christmas, but if you're still struggling in the New Year then drop by the workshop and we'll get your plane sorted, you can help yourself to some hardwood off-cuts at the same time if you want something to practise on. I'm on the coast, mid way between Bournemouth and Southampton. 

Good luck!


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## El Barto (9 Dec 2016)

custard":3fniweuu said:


> El Barto":3fniweuu said:
> 
> 
> > I got the plane restored and the cap iron flat (or at least close to flat) and have put it to use.
> ...



That'd be amazing! My mum is just outside Andover so I'm often down there and will be for Christmas. Even if you need an extra pair of hands over Christmas or the New Year I'd be more than happy to come and help in exchange for some tips (will try not to pineapple anything up too badly :twisted:  ).

Edit: Having said that all in my earlier post about the plane, I was definitely seeing an improvement with it the more I used it, especially after moving the cap iron away from the edge and opening the mouth a bit. Like D_W said "* cap iron was set too close (which should just result in a scraping cut, but it will create a clog - however, that will not create tearout unless you are planing directly across grain" - I'm sure this was the problem. I may have been mistaking tearout for scraping?!

And like CStandford said, the board needs to be flat for my initial setup to work... and it wasn't. Thanks all for the comments.


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## custard (9 Dec 2016)

Great that you're seeing an improvement in your plane, but not so great if you have to move the cap iron right back in order to stop shavings getting trapped. 

DW has done a great job publicising the benefits of a closely set cap iron, and there's no denying that it's a transformative technique. With a closely set cap iron you don't have to fear tear out even on wild grained and difficult timbers, consequently you're spared the faff of scraping, back bevels, high pitched frogs, and all the other paraphernalia that I've previously had to use to get a clean finish on highly figured timbers.

It would be a real shame if the only way you can get your plane to perform is by setting the cap iron far back, and it really doesn't have to be that way. 

Try David Charlesworth's trick of setting up a simple platform 3mm lower than the height of your stone, and use that to clean up the cap iron mating surface consistently and accurately. Then get the back of your plane iron good and flat and you should be good to go.

But no problems if you can't get it resolved, let's swap PM's in the new year and we'll get your plane singing in double quick time!

Good luck!


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## El Barto (9 Dec 2016)

custard":19ftp2ao said:


> Great that you're seeing an improvement in your plane, but not so great if you have to move the cap iron right back in order to stop shavings getting trapped.
> 
> DW has done a great job publicising the benefits of a closely set cap iron, and there's no denying that it's a transformative technique. With a closely set cap iron you don't have to fear tear out even on wild grained and difficult timbers, consequently you're spared the faff of scraping, back bevels, high pitched frogs, and all the other paraphernalia that I've previously had to use to get a clean finish on highly figured timbers.
> 
> ...



Thanks, I'll give it another go. Incidentally when I hold the assembled cap iron and plane iron up to the light, the only visible gaps are very slightly at the edges - nothing in the middle. This led me to believe that a gap in the middle wasn't the problem. However ... I'll go back and give it another go.

If I understand David Charlesworth's technique correctly, is it basically the same as what's being done in this video (except with a 3mm difference rather than whatever is being used here)? https://youtu.be/fVfJxDFNinc?t=211


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## custard (11 Dec 2016)

El Barto":qpal6ngu said:


> If I understand David Charlesworth's technique correctly, is it basically the same as what's being done in this video (except with a 3mm difference rather than whatever is being used here)? https://youtu.be/fVfJxDFNinc?t=211



That's exactly right. 3mm or 12mm probably wouldn't make much difference on the highly arched cap iron you find on most Bailey style planes, but there are other other designs of cap iron (such as the Record Stay Set or the Lie Nielsen design) which need the shallower angle that 3mm delivers.

Once you've got more experience honing and sharpening then you won't need this support ramp, but if you're just starting out then a ramp like the one in the video you linked to will ensure you're consistent and accurate, which in turn will get you to a satisfactory conclusion more quickly than just rubbing away with your wrists flapping up and down so the angle keeps changing all the time.


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## El Barto (11 Dec 2016)

Thanks Custard


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