# A Pair of Jack Planes



## D_W (11 Sep 2015)

I made these, the one in the front is for a large-handed friend, and the one in the back is mine. The handle is a bit large for my hand (lesson learned on a jack that the handle should be a bit shorter than the try plane handle since it's a two or three finger open grip on the handle, and that's it. The large handle looks a bit funny on both of them. 

Both of these are modeled after an old mathieson jack plane that wiley horne (who is probably not known here) sent to me when he heard I was interested in building some planes and knew that I liked mathieson planes. 

17 inches long, both of them, and the one in the back has a 2 1/4" english iron (can't remember the make, something NOS - hildick maybe), and the one in the front has an old chapin and stevens iron. Both are wonderful irons to sharpen.

http://s28.postimg.org/ps9kljk99/P1080390.jpg

http://s30.postimg.org/djgi9kstd/P1080387.jpg

I don't sand on these planes, personal irk, and they are made with the blanks sized from rough by hand, only using a cordless drill to do the initial mouth opening. Handles are rasped and then scraped instead of sanded, scraping them leaves an interesting texture on the end grain, a little bit of bite but not blistering, and it preserves the lines on the side of the handle (one of which was washed out by the flash on the front plane). 

American Beech. I've seen some comments, maybe it was here, about whether or not american beech is a suitable substitute for euro beech - they're similar, but american beech is a smoother feeling wood. Badly behaved if not sawn right, but if sawn pith perfectly on center, it is fabulous, bettered only by air dried apple, which is impossible to find in these size blanks now (the saw handle sneaking in is quartered air dried apple). 

I have some old jack planes, but none are as good as a freshly made and freshly fitted and bedded plane. Everything is so tight on a new one. 

Finish is boiled linseed oil and briwax.


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## swagman (11 Sep 2015)

Wonderfully crafted David. Excellent work. Without getting into the pro's and cons of double irons in general, do you still see a need for a double iron on a jack plane when its cutting edge is normally cambered.

regards Stewie;


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## cansdale (11 Sep 2015)

Nice work, D.W., something to be proud of for years to come. Enjoy them.


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## AndyT (11 Sep 2015)

Now I see who you are - I recognise these planes from your YouTube videos. Definitely the real thing. It's nice to see someone appreciating the established pattern and faithfully following it. Very nice work!


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## Bluekingfisher (11 Sep 2015)

Very nice and I am sure staisfying to know someone will be appreciating them for generations.

David


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## Mr_P (11 Sep 2015)

Great work and thanks for the extensive how to video guide.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9qjHMwL-dj4


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## D_W (11 Sep 2015)

swagman":3vxkenyx said:


> Wonderfully crafted David. Excellent work. Without getting into the pro's and cons of double irons in general, do you still see a need for a double iron on a jack plane when its cutting edge is normally cambered.
> 
> regards Stewie;



Hi Stewie, thanks for the nice comments - if I were limited to only one plane with a double iron, it would be the trying plane and not the jack. I could generally live without it on smoothers, too, if the surface were prepared by a proper try plane, which leaves a near finished surface. (when I say live without it, I mean it wouldn't be that much of a detriment to rate of wood dimensioned - we can obviously do all of the work with single irons and get a similar end result). 

The cap iron can be brought to close enough to use with effect on a jack, but I don't generally do it much because it's easier to deal with minor tearout and try to plane downhill at that step than it is to face any chip resistance on such a thick chip. 

The only other consideration is that on a double iron plane, it is extremely hard to generate chatter if it's fitted properly, that's really my preference for a double iron jack - and a lot of that solidness had to do with the old cap iron design that is a heavy truck spring style. I've seen people dropping bailey irons and modern flat cap irons in wood planes, but without that spring to really lock things up, it wouldn't be the same. 

I did have a single iron jack until not long ago, but I cut up about 7 or 8 planes at one point and harvested their irons because the irons were worth more to me than the planes. They were too hard to sell to anyone as planes, and that jack fell victim to that scheme (I still have a nice single iron jointer, though).

One other side comment, the things that are different in building a double iron jack, and where the feeding problems occur before proper fitting (which is fairly difficult until a few planes are under the belt) - those are less critical on a jack because it's only feeding in the middle. So, the one plane where the cap is needed the least is the one plane where it would be easiest to build successfully.


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## D_W (11 Sep 2015)

Mr_P":1gu3vamw said:


> Great work and thanks for the extensive how to video guide.
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9qjHMwL-dj4



Guilty as charged! Those videos are not safe for anyone who can't tolerate my very strong (nearly televangelism level - except with proof!!) preference for the double iron.

I've built twice as many planes since then, and am a little faster at it, but build them largely the same, and probably will until my jones to build them is over.


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## D_W (11 Sep 2015)

cansdale":15usa2ol said:


> Nice work, D.W., something to be proud of for years to come. Enjoy them.



Thanks! I hope they (mine and the one in front which is going to Chris Griggs from another forum) get used so hard that they are beat and show significant signs of wear. It would be a compliment if they were used until the iron was too short to stick above the wedge.


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## D_W (11 Sep 2015)

AndyT":bcth167v said:


> Now I see who you are - I recognise these planes from your YouTube videos. Definitely the real thing. It's nice to see someone appreciating the established pattern and faithfully following it. Very nice work!



Thanks, Andy. I guess I've never seen a double iron plane with the chamfer elements that we see on the older single iron planes, but it's nice to mix and match off of the things from the time. I'm sure some of the early double iron planes were made so, but I have never been lucky enough to own a double iron plane that came from the 18th century, despite literature describing their use in the mid to late 18th century.

At any rate, the established patterns make more and more sense the more we use our planes for more than smoothing. It's worth the effort to learn to make them.


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## swagman (11 Sep 2015)

Thanks David. Appreciate your thoughts on the subject. Your traditional techniques within planemaking exhibit a very high standard.

regards Stewie;


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## G S Haydon (11 Sep 2015)

It was great to follow your videos on YT David. I must try and finish mine although I know it won't look this good or work as well. Top class work and well done for promoting both the making of and using these fantastic tools.


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## D_W (11 Sep 2015)

G S Haydon":1jvtjuoe said:


> It was great to follow your videos on YT David. I must try and finish mine although I know it won't look this good or work as well. Top class work and well done for promoting both the making of and using these fantastic tools.



If you're ever in the states, let me know. I'll throw something together for you to take back. 

It would cost a mint to ship one to the UK, but it wouldn't weigh much if you could pack it in a bag.


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## D_W (11 Sep 2015)

swagman":3elxdjb2 said:


> Thanks David. Appreciate your thoughts on the subject. Your traditional techniques within planemaking exhibit a very high standard.
> 
> regards Stewie;



Thanks again for the nice comments, Stewie. It's nice to build something enough times to get incremental improvement. Hopefully nobody looks too closely at the eyes on the one in the back....or the fat top horn. I shortcutted some things on that plane because it was for me to have both just to have a new and tight open handled jack, as well as to test an offset handle (which I can live without, but I've gotten used to it). It's probably deserving of a little bit of correction to bring some parts up to spec, but it's the principle of the mechanic never takes very good care of his own car, I suppose.

I doubt that plane would stand a drop, but I leave the horns fat on my personal planes just in case - I've already dropped a closed handle fore on its handle, and fortunately it landed vertically on it - and survived with just some dinging on the top of the horn. I'm convinced most planes with broken handles were just dropped and not broken out of brute strength (that's not a very bold statement, but when you first start building, you wonder what the breaking point is - as big george - as well call him - muscled the stop strap of his maple jointer into a break. that was a delicate handle, a more delicate wood, and probably a stronger user than me, though I horse my own personal planes as hard as I can reasonably go).


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## G S Haydon (11 Sep 2015)

I'll start saving air miles David.


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## Tony Zaffuto (11 Sep 2015)

Good seeing you over here "D W"! Saw your planes on another forum, top job!

Now, are you going to get "G W" posting here also??????


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## G S Haydon (11 Sep 2015)

It'd be nice to se "W M" as well


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## D_W (11 Sep 2015)

I'll check with George. I don't think anyone has any influence on Warren, though.


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## Tony Zaffuto (11 Sep 2015)

D_W":1n3mg4zx said:


> I'll check with George. I don't think anyone has any influence on Warren, though.



A PM from you would help: this forum is far less than a bunch of bloggers and more of a place of craftspeople.


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## Benchwayze (12 Sep 2015)

D W,

I never mastered wooden planes, but you know; I think a nice piece of kit like either of those, could make the difference! 
Lovely work. =D> 

John


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## Mr_P (12 Sep 2015)

The more I use woodies, the more I wonder how the hell did the Stanley Bailey conquer the world.


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## G S Haydon (12 Sep 2015)

Good point Mr P, I think it has something to do with most of the woodworking being done by machines and it's a plane that can be made in mass production style much more easily than a classic woodie. However the Bailey is still a fine option and I'm more than happy to own and use 'em. 

Sadly to modern eyes the woodie can look and antique or a relic, that's so far from the truth. They are highly evolved for hand tool woodworking.


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## Cheshirechappie (12 Sep 2015)

Until I checked in William Lincoln's 'World Woods in Colour', I hadn't appreciated that Americam and European beech are different species, but they are - European is Fagus Sylvatica, and American is Fagus Grandifolia. There's a Japanese one, too - Fagus Crenata. It would appear from the information in the book that the American and European woods are very similar - much the same density, seasoning and working properties, the only noticable difference being that the American has a slightly more reddish tinge to it than the more creamy-brown European, which I think shows up in the photos.

One similarity, I suspect, is the difficulty in tracking down well seasoned quarter-sawn stock of thickness suitable for bench planes, which makes a project like this one hard even before it's started. Even the great Charles Hayward suggested making a wooden bench plane in two halves, cutting the escapement and wedge abutments by sawing and chiselling, then gluing the two halves together. Given the quality of modern glues, that would simplify making with little danger of failure at the glue-line. Doing it the 'old way' from the solid needs rather more skill with chisels and floats; rather more practice.

Nice one D_W - that's work to be proud of.


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## MIGNAL (12 Sep 2015)

Well they might be different species but they are still all fagus.


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## Derek Cohen (Perth Oz) (13 Sep 2015)

Mr_P":8ipcvjy5 said:


> The more I use woodies, the more I wonder how the hell did the Stanley Bailey conquer the world.



I think that mass production played a major role. At the same time, if all things were equal production-wise, there would still be differences - differences that now more relevant these days where the choices are there to be made by hobbyists (who are probably the major consumer of old and new handplanes). 

David had demonstrated here (and also the recent couple of years) that a _properly_ designed woodie, that is, one designed to maximise the influence of the chipbreaker, will outperform single-iron woodies that simply rely on a high cutting angle to tame tearout ... thicker shavings are possible with a lower bevel entry to the wood. 

However, performance is one thing - there are many personal preferences that come into play when one looks at ergonomics, that is, the feel and feedback from the plane in use.

Stanley planes feel very different to woodies. Woodies are higher and the wood itself absorbs the "vibrations" of cutting. Wood glides so much better over wood than iron does (even when waxed), and it is a no-brainer when used on the face of boards. It is a different story when used on the thinnish edge of a board. Whether a short coffin smoother or a long jointer, woodies just do not have the _immediate_ control that a lower Stanley offers. (This is also one of the big drawcards for bevel up planes, where the low centre of gravity is taken a step further).

None of this is to imply one is better than another, just that they impart a different feel and many will therefore have different preference, as is the nature of human beings. As with many things, it is also what one is used to using.

Regards from Perth

Derek


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## ac445ab (13 Sep 2015)

You did really a great work. Bravissimo!
And thanks for videos: they explicate very well all phases of building such a plane.

I would like to know your thinking about the wear angle of the plane. I see, you set it to 79 degrees and the mouth isn't very tight (correct for a plane intended for removing wood fast). In my experiences I found some difficulties to bring together the need of a tighter mouth, the presence of a chipbreaker and its position.
In my planes with double irons I had to set wear angle at least at 90 degrees or even 100 degrees for smoothers in which the chipbreaker was set very close to the cutting edge. 
What is your experience about wear angle in woodies with double irons and requiring a tighter mouth?

Ciao
Giuliano


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## D_W (13 Sep 2015)

Well, normally, I try to have the mouth on a try plane around a 16th, maybe a fat 16th. It does require the person setting up the cap iron to set it up properly, and there are times that you can get trash wood that doesn't make nice continuous shavings and have a plane want to load and maybe have the next pass force the junk wood up out of the plane. 

The mouth on that particular plane got out of control due to carelessness. 

Steve Voigt mentioned to me that the wears on some of the older planes he's seen (or seen pictures of) were around 90 degrees, which probably makes things easier, and I believe that's what steve is making in his smoothers - it gives an unfamiliar user some more margin for error, and there should be little need to condition the soles of double iron planes so the mouth should stay in good shape (the danger, of course, is that the mouth could open up to huge if the sole is planed off often just to make it look nice. 

The other thing you can do is make a plane with a very short wear, as caleb james shows with his single iron template. There are double iron planes that have that very short wear, too, mujingfang makes them. It gives less place for the shavings to get trapped. I think the wear on one of my continental smoothers is probably 1/4th inch tall or less. 

I like to make the wear back toward the iron, and have been making them more like 75 degrees lately, but I do it because I think it looks pleasing. I don't think it's necessary.


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## D_W (13 Sep 2015)

Derek Cohen (Perth said:


> Mr_P":3ecc7syf said:
> 
> 
> > The more I use woodies, the more I wonder how the hell did the Stanley Bailey conquer the world.
> ...



I like the old try plane style on edges better than a stanley plane, too, but if one uses a stanley or other metal plane to plane edges all the time, it takes a couple of weeks to get used to jointing edges with the wooden try plane or wooden jointer because the handle is oriented higher and the planes feel much taller on the joint. 

The fastest way I've found to joint boards that don't need a jack first is to leave the try plane or jointer set coarse, check the joint for fit (specifically for match planing) or against a straight edge, and then there are only minor adjustments to make. Those are better made with a smoother set for a light cut. I don't joint edges with a shaving thinner than about 5 thousandths, except for the smoother touch up. It makes correcting lateral issues a whole lot faster to do it with a heavy shaving. 

I like a metal plane for smoothing, though. I just haven't found anything else as good as a stanley 4.


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## D_W (14 Sep 2015)

Thanks, Chappie and Benchwayze. You guys have gobs of planes over there that are in good shape, but i see that at least on ebay, they're starting to bring some money. 

If nothing else, a wooden jack is nice to have, and of course, I like the middle step in wood, too. I had a lot of trouble with wooden planes when I first started woodworking about 9 or 10 years ago. I bought a couple, but didn't know why they didn't work well for me and assumed that you had to be able to plane downgrain all the time if you wanted to use a woodie. 

Nobody said much about double irons online or how to use them, and I heard a couple of guys say that if I wanted to use old planes, I should learn to make a wedge. That sounded unrealistic as a beginner. I could fix those planes now, but I made bad buying decisions and it wouldn't be worth the trouble with the ones I bought. 

Chappie, you're correct, getting the wood over here is a real problem. There is one good source for it, and it comes out of the kiln fairly irregularly, it's expensive, and even at that, beech in general has a pretty wide range of density and hardness so it never seems to work the same from billet to billet (or provide an identical plane). The trees are plentiful (beech), but finding it commercially is a problem for anything other than railroad ties and framing inside of furniture.


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## ac445ab (14 Sep 2015)

D_W":2g5bwlc9 said:


> Well, normally, I try to have the mouth on a try plane around a 16th, maybe a fat 16th. It does require the person setting up the cap iron to set it up properly, and there are times that you can get trash wood that doesn't make nice continuous shavings and have a plane want to load and maybe have the next pass force the junk wood up out of the plane.
> 
> The mouth on that particular plane got out of control due to carelessness.
> 
> ...



Grazie for your reply.

Ciao
Giuliano


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## Derek Cohen (Perth Oz) (14 Sep 2015)

By way of contrast, I was Googling for information on Trying vs Jointer planes, and came across this blog of Chris Schwarz on the subject. This is from 2010, and before the re-interest in chipbreakers. Definitely *not* intended as a swipe at CS (whom I think the world of), but an interesting contrast/reminder of what we believed so strongly in just a few years ago ...

http://www.popularwoodworking.com/woodw ... d-jointers

By reducing/removing the threat of tearout, the chipbreaker also changes the direction one runs the plane along a board, compared with one with a high angle bed.

Regards from Perth

Derek


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## G S Haydon (14 Sep 2015)

It's a good example of what changes over time. Thanks to David, Kees and many others I began to fully understand how to use a cap iron. I know there will be many that did do this all the time but I got the detail from those guys and I'm grateful of it.


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## CStanford (14 Sep 2015)

1) Hone the iron
2) Take a light cut 
3) Set cap iron close until the plane stops cutting. 
4) Then move it back a hair. 
5) Have another strategy for curves, modern thin veneers, and those times when 1-4 won't work.

You're welcome.

All of this has been in Planecraft since the 1920's and later through six or seven editions and special reprints.

I can't help but think of the surfaces that James Krenov, Art Carpenter, Alan Peters, Jere Osgood and those of that era were (are in the case of Osgood) able to achieve. They look(ed) damn good to me. Not sure how they did it, exactly, but I think it involved other tools and techniques than a hand plane only approach. It had to on the curved work, yet quality appears not to have suffered.

We're losing perspective, gentlemen. People who can barely work wood (compared to those in the list above) have somehow become standard setters and 'experts.' It's absurd. It's like Van Gogh following the lead of an eight year old with a box of crayons and a coloring book. Ridiculous. On. Its. Face.


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## G S Haydon (14 Sep 2015)

I love you're total no BS approach Charles .

I've seen it written too, not only in planecraft, but other sources as well. I'm never going to get close to those guys but I do enjoy learning things. Learning how to set a cap iron nicely has improved how my wooden planes work and has made me work more effectively.


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## Derek Cohen (Perth Oz) (14 Sep 2015)

> I can't help but think of the surfaces that James Krenov, Art Carpenter, Alan Peters, Jere Osgood and those of that era were (are in the case of Osgood) able to achieve. They look(ed) damn good to me. Not sure how they did it, exactly, but I think it involved other tools and techniques than a hand plane only approach. It had to on the curved work, yet quality appears not to have suffered.



I have no idea about the others, but as far as I can determine, Krenov did not use the chipbreaker to control tearout. Instead, he took "paper thin" shavings, to quote him in The Fine Art of Cabinetmaking. 

None of his writing, again as far as I can tell, mention using the chipbreaker. The pictures of his shavings in his books indicate that he was only interested in fine shavings (none have the look of a closed chipbreaker).

When he sent me one of his smoothers, I took measurements of everything. He had been using the plane earlier, and it was set for use (as he had last used it), and he included some of the last shavings he took. The mouth was tight - too tight to use with a close set chipbreaker. I recorded that the chipbreaker was set 1/8" from the back of the bevel. 

And yet he certainly achieved superior surfaces. That was what he was the master of.

Regards from Perth

Derek


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## CStanford (14 Sep 2015)

Most of the time we're asking the wrong questions. If you start from the rather safe assumption that the surfaces of the work of those I mentioned leave little if anything to be desired both in their overall quality and *homogeneity between flat and curved surfaces,* then I want the recipe for how they did it and all the way through the selection and application of the finish, which by the way is an inseparable aspect of all of this. 

If these guys scraped should we despise the scraper? If they used sandpaper, should we despite it? 

This scurrying around trying to interpolate angles, translations, and generally parsing to the nth degree some silly-a$$ed Japanese video really has gone quite far enough. The next think you know we'll be critiquing the cut of their respective lab coats, there really isn't much else is there? It totally plucks and pulls the whole issue out of any reasonable context.


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## Cheshirechappie (14 Sep 2015)

I know threads have a tendency to take on a life of their own and wander off in strange directions, but as we started with jack planes perhaps the discussions about how to produce a fine finished surface are too much of a departure. Maybe we should be looking at how to shift a lot of waste with minimum effort leaving a surface that needs only a little work with a try plane to make it fit for it's intended duty. What are the relative merits of single-iron and double-iron jack planes?


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## CStanford (14 Sep 2015)

It's the wrong question really. Some species can be very aggressively jack planed very rank and some can't or you'll leave a mess. Maybe a cap iron helps at this stage and maybe not. It depends on how close you dare get to the finish line with the jack before applying other planes. Sometimes you end up using the jack as more of a smoother than you do a jack. The species dictates the approach. To the extent that the cap iron can be set way back and taken out of the equation why would you not want a plane with a cap iron? You're left with choices, without one you're not.

I've been planing a little butternut recently, a very easy species to plane, and I've got the cap iron set pretty far back on my Marples and letting it take a fairly big bite. If I were planing something else not so agreeable then I'd simply move it closer and take less of a bite. 

I must be missing some nuance as this all seems pretty simple and long-settled workshop practice.


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## Bedrock (14 Sep 2015)

DW Going back to your original posting, the blade maker may well have been James (I think - I'm not close to the workshop atm) Hilditch, although I have a wooden jointer with a Hilditch Chip breaker, married to a Herring blade, a combination I have seen on a number of occasions. Andy T would be more likely to have the best information, if it is of interest.
Regards Mike

Shouldn't have written from the office - the blade is indeed "A Hildick", the cap iron on this plane has the tall chimney stamp, about which much was written some years ago.

Mike


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## CStanford (14 Sep 2015)

Derek Cohen (Perth said:


> > I can't help but think of the surfaces that James Krenov, Art Carpenter, Alan Peters, Jere Osgood and those of that era were (are in the case of Osgood) able to achieve. They look(ed) damn good to me. Not sure how they did it, exactly, but I think it involved other tools and techniques than a hand plane only approach. It had to on the curved work, yet quality appears not to have suffered.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



What was the pitch of the plane Derek?


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## D_W (14 Sep 2015)

CStanford":2qmd5bij said:


> 1) Hone the iron
> 2) Take a light cut
> 3) Set cap iron close until the plane stops cutting.
> 4) Then move it back a hair.
> ...



What you set is a scorched earth cap iron setting that would take a while to do, take only a light cutting, and not representative of practically setting the cap iron which can be summed more easily by more vague terms (which is what Warren does, and why people get upset because they want a recipe list like you provided). 

When the cap iron stuff started happening publicly, Bill Tindall and I mentioned behind the scenes that we expected that either nobody would pay attention to it or all of the sudden people would start looking in texts for past references and claim that they knew it all along. Turns out to be the latter. Like this. 

Except that someone who uses the cap iron a fair amount would know that what you referenced isn't a very practical method, it's time consuming and it ignores the bulk of work where the cap is more useful, and a setting where it is less intrusive (and generally more useful). 

Only warren ever described an accurate but vague method for setup, and quickly helped when I started posting findings (as in, there's no setting a cap iron until the plane doesn't cut - that's the kind of thing you'd do on day one in a beginner's class to show people that a plane will not cut if the cap is set on the edge of the iron). 

The only legitimate in practice reference I've seen (but it was after the fact) was that someone mentioned graham blackburn discussing the cap iron in a class. Apparently, the people that took the class were too dense to ever mention what they'd seen.

I'm still waiting for the pre-2012 mentions by anyone about setting the cap iron, because mostly the response to warren was verbal assault for trolling about the cap iron. Charlie, you've been on forums for probably a dozen years or more, and many have permanent archives. I'm sure you can bring up an example of what you put above talking about using the cap iron before 2012, right?

And most of the references since have been people saying they know how to use a cap iron, but they use something else to finish wood when it's difficult or slow to use a plane. Warren has a line for that, and it's accurate.


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## Cheshirechappie (14 Sep 2015)

There's a page or so in the book 'The Tool Chest of Benjamin Seaton' outlining some historical research on the Hildick dynasty. They were a firm of whitesmiths in the Birmingham area who leased a blade mill in 1692 in Coalpool (near Walsall, about 8 miles NW of Birmingham). The irons relevant to Seaton's planes were almost certainly made there, but in the 19th century, the family set up in Sheffield under the name Aaron Hildick. That firm traded for over a century, until as Ashley Iles notes in his autobiography, they bought out the firm of Henry Taylor some time in the late 1950s or early 1960s. For some reason, Hildick's changed the firm's name to that of the company they'd absorbed (maybe they thought the mane was more 'modern' and a better marketing proposition), and the Henry Taylor firm continues to trade to this day.

Irons marked 'Aaron Hildick' or just 'Hildick' crop up quite a bit. Occasionally, an older one marked 'Hildik' surfaces, too.

Edit to add - after a bit of rummaging about, I found this which slightly contradicts some of the information above -

"One of the main offshoot branches of the family occurs here and Aaron* will be followed here for a while as one of his descendants married back as a cousin into the extended family of Thomas (1665) offspring.



*Aaron (1705) married Martha (maiden name unknown). 



They had 8 children but although I have details of all of them I will follow only one, their eldest son Thomas b 1728 in Rushall. 

He married Mary Tennant in 1755 at St Mathews Church in Walsall.

Thomas 1728 also had a son Thomas b1758. This Thomas married Ann Worallo and their son Aaron b1795 married the Elizabeth Dukes featured below, where we get a hint of the Hildike origins and of the origins of family firm Aaron Hildick Ltd.



Aaron Hildick Ltd was based in Sheffield, the family had moved there from Walsall after Aarons marriage to Elizabeth Dukes. He founded the family firm together with his nephew Robert (1853), the son of Sarah Hildick who was Aaron and Elizabeth Hildicks eldest child.



Robert took over the firm when Aaron died in the late 1800’s although I have not yet found his date of death. The firm seems to have passed down this line through Roberts family, principally to Ernest Thornton, husband of his daughter Beatrice. Ernest died in 1940 and was sold to another company at the end of WW2. The firm produced very high quality blades for woodworking under the brand name “Diamic”, a name which exists today. The company was allied to Henry Taylor Ltd in 1948 and in 1974 the company became Henry Taylor Ltd (proprietor Aaron Hildick). In 1974 it became Henry Taylor (Tools) Ltd incorporating Aaron Hildick. The company is still in business, situated on Lowther Street in Sheffield and is one of the few firms still producing tools which largely depend upon the manual skills of the workforce."


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## D_W (14 Sep 2015)

CStanford":2p76m0xz said:


> This scurrying around trying to interpolate angles, translations, and generally parsing to the nth degree some silly-a$$ed Japanese video really has gone quite far enough. The next think you know we'll be critiquing the cut of their respective lab coats, there really isn't much else is there? It totally plucks and pulls the whole issue out of any reasonable context.



Hyperbole.

The discussions started before the videos were out, and then when it did come out, they (either from warren or anyone else who had learned to use the cap iron properly) were steered in a way so as to suggest that the video was proof that the cap does something, but not a good reference for actually using the cap iron in hand tools beyond that. 

Any of the legitimate discussions following that mentioned the same thing. No jigs, no specific measurements and no copying the video.

The sense of moving the cap iron around a lot is inaccurate, and the notion of moving it way off of the edge of the iron is also unnecessary for anything other than planing 2x4s in a construction setting.


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## D_W (14 Sep 2015)

Bedrock":2hd8agfa said:


> DW Going back to your original posting, the blade maker may well have been James (I think - I'm not close to the workshop atm) Hilditch, although I have a wooden jointer with a Hilditch Chip breaker, married to a Herring blade, a combination I have seen on a number of occasions. Andy T would be more likely to have the best information, if it is of interest.
> Regards Mike



Thanks Mike. That prompted me to go back and look, as i have other irons with the same mark (the foreground jack plane is out the door, so I can't check it). 

The maker is Aaron Hildick, but the irons are relatively modern looking in terms of finish (they are still tapered with the old style cap iron and top brass fixture on the cap). One of the reasons I seem to get all English irons is that the English held on to making attractive double iron sets much longer than the american makers. hardness is still slightly variable in the irons, but never to a level that affects usability. 

American makers (like what became Ohio Tool) took all of the visual extravagance out of their sets, removed the brass fixture (which isn't needed in steel) and generally made fairly ugly irons. I've had trouble with one ohio tool iron and one auburn iron and don't put them in planes while I have other better options. Not to say that most aren't good, they are, but it's not worth the risk when the wood costs 50 bucks or more.


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## Derek Cohen (Perth Oz) (14 Sep 2015)

CStanford":3qtfl3mf said:


> Derek Cohen (Perth said:
> 
> 
> > > I can't help but think of the surfaces that James Krenov, Art Carpenter, Alan Peters, Jere Osgood and those of that era were (are in the case of Osgood) able to achieve. They look(ed) damn good to me. Not sure how they did it, exactly, but I think it involved other tools and techniques than a hand plane only approach. It had to on the curved work, yet quality appears not to have suffered.
> ...



45 degrees, Charles ...







Mouth ...






Link: http://www.inthewoodshop.com/ToolReview ... other.html

Regards from Perth

Derek


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## D_W (14 Sep 2015)

CStanford":gv8esuy0 said:


> I can't help but think of the surfaces that James Krenov, Art Carpenter, Alan Peters, Jere Osgood and those of that era were (are in the case of Osgood) able to achieve. They look(ed) damn good to me. Not sure how they did it, exactly, but I think it involved other tools and techniques than a hand plane only approach. It had to on the curved work, yet quality appears not to have suffered.
> k a hair.
> 5) Have another st
> We're losing perspective, gentlemen. People who can barely work wood (compared to those in the list above) have somehow become standard setters and 'experts.' It's absurd. It's like Van Gogh following the lead of an eight year old with a box of crayons and a coloring book. Ridiculous. On. Its. Face.



Krenov's not a model to follow for productivity or practice. He apparently made his living mostly as a model maker and then with students (and later with books). 

If I were going to look for what works in practice, I'd at least want to find someone who made their living as a maker, and not an instructor. 

As far as the rest of the discussion, design and proportion are lacking for discussion purposes. I see your complaints often, but then you refer to a lot of danish modern or industrial design era furniture. If you want to awaken the sense of people, maybe you should take it upon yourself to learn and teach others about classical design, which looks far less dated. Instead of complaining about it. 

I don't care much if someone else sands or scrapes their furniture as long as they don't do a poor job designing. I don't care to sand at all, and I don't care to scrape when I don't have to. It doesn't mean that I'd care if anyone else did it. It certainly takes less time for me to make a piece of case dovetailed and moulded now without sanding than it would've if I finish sanded it, and it looks better, but better is to my eyes and the average person looking at one of my plain cases will never see the pins and tails (they're covered) and will not even know what a moulding is if it doesn't have the word "crown" in front of it. 

We do our work predominantly for ourselves, and there's no great reason for us to talk about much unless we want to bear the burden of figuring out how to do something better than we can just buy or see commonly. I talk about planes a lot because it was my objective to figure out the types and then how to make a plane better than one that I can buy (what's the point of making a throw away plane when used planes are cheap?). I have gotten to that point, but only because the subject planes that I like are 175 years old and they have moved some. Years ago, I'd thought about buying larry's planes, but they will leave you with extra hours of work if you want to actually use them for dimensioning, and so i never bought one and only made one of that design.

Thus, planes are what I talk about. If you're concerned about design, then you should talk about that, too. The only person I see seriously helping people with design questions is George - and warren does it from time to time. There is a need for it, I can plainly see that with what people make.


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## CStanford (14 Sep 2015)

David, you're focus is on the wrong set of woodworkers (me, for sure). I can't for the life of me understand your infatuation with relatively obscure craftspeople, with the exception of Graham Blackburn who has been strangely silent, in his otherwise prolific writing, about how he achieves the planing performance he claims. They've struck some sort of chord with you but one can't quite tease out exactly what it is.

When somebody mentions Krenov, Frid, Peters, Gilpin, Carpenter, et al. you counter with Warren Mickley? It's perplexing to say the least. Whether or not you care for the style of furniture these guys built is beside the point with respect to the issue we're discussing. These men achieved stunning surfaces and through a variety of techniques and tools (including the cap iron most likely). It's not even debatable. And they did it on flat surfaces, curved surfaces, veneered surfaces, and everything in-between and when this is pointed out to you all you can manage to come up with is Bill Tindal and Warren Mickley. I'm at a loss. Reason, the rational center, and more are totally getting lost in all of this strident and overwrought silliness about cap irons.


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## D_W (14 Sep 2015)

I mention warren because warren makes a living in a shop that doesn't use electric tools by making and restoring items. He doesn't write books, he didn't make models and he's not employed by any colleges. He makes his money by his work. I'm not particularly interested in krenov, nor anyone else who didn't have much of a demand for productivity. 

I would mention George also, but George has relied on power tools and has a lot of fascinations that have nothing to do with making furniture (he'll tell you outright that he's too interested, and to be honest, he can go up the ladder and make more interesting things than furniture can hope to be). George will also tell you forthright that he was pigeonholed into using a certain type of plane for anything he did at the museum because the curators told them what they had to use. He literally wouldn't have been able to take a double iron plane to his bench in the museum, or make them for the other people working there, because the curators were convinced they weren't common. 

It was reported from a single person that Blackburn gave a lecture called something like "any plane, any direction" that involved setting the cap iron. To me, personally, that was the appeal of the double iron, to be able to put a panel on the bench and work it without having to change sides regardless of whether the wood had unexpected hiccups in it or not. I would have to assume to make such a comment, he knows how to use the double iron or the first person who gave him a stanley plane would vex him. 

If I were interested in furniture (i'm not, particularly at this point, but I still expect to be able to make cases that are tasteful and make furniture with appropriate joints and then cover them up), I would want something equivalent (to learn) to hasluck's carving book. A treatise on furniture when it was fine, not when it became modern art.

I never mentioned Bill Tindall as a maker of anything. I specifically described Bill as the person who went to the trouble to dig up the video, but the video didn't change my direction on trying to find what made a practical plane for when planes were used to do anything a power jointer and thickness plane does now. I'd concluded everything in the wood central article before the video was ever retrieved, it just makes a handy tool for the dense crowds who argue "chris schwarz says" when you saying something along the lines of discarding the gaggle of gentleman's planes and putting three double iron planes under your bench. For two months before the video came out, I said the exact same thing, but all I got was "nobody else does that except for warren, it's not common". Then when the video appeared (which has nothing to do with hand woodworking), then dense throngs are somehow into it, and the predictable response is to try to imitate what the video said was optimal when studying something intended to be used on a maruka super surfacer. 

I mention warren, Warren makes. Your whole argument about curved surfaces is something you bring up on your own as if someone said that a stanley 4 should be used on them. Nobody should have to specify that they're doing flatwork when they talk about it, it's a given. 

(for what it's worth, I've seen you make some nice tight work that's on your etsy page - which inexplicably lists your location as vermont - maybe that's a suburb in tennessee...I don't know. I, and many others, sure wish you would spend time describing your own work and what you're doing and why - especially as it relates to design, rather than submarining everyone who posts something useful by inundating everything with extrapolation, hyperbole and straw manning. It's exceedingly rare I've seen you describe anything, though - despite ).


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## CStanford (14 Sep 2015)

Ignoring the bit players and supporting cast for a moment is there anything, specifically, about cap irons that anybody is realistically missing at this point? 

What issue or issues are still up in the air? I would honestly like to see these articulated by someone who had made it their business to know.

The thrust from certain quarters seems to be that if one doesn't achieve an absolutely pristine surface off the plane at all times and all places then one is 'doing it wrong.' Is this your position in a nutshell? How do you think this realistically squares with all the great woodworking around us?

If ever a pendulum swung too far this surely has to be it.


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## Cheshirechappie (14 Sep 2015)

CStanford":9qlyap1j said:


> The thrust from certain quarters seems to be that if one doesn't achieve an absolutely pristine surface off the plane at all times and all places then one is 'doing it wrong.'



The subject of the thread is jack planes. What have 'absolutely pristine surfaces' to do with jack planes?

Please forgive my asperity, but there does seem to be a bit of personal argument or needling going on here. Could we save the personal stuff for private messaging and stick to posting about hand tools, their history and techniques of using in the public comments?


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## CStanford (14 Sep 2015)

Nothing. So what?


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## D_W (14 Sep 2015)

I believe warren's view is that the surface is better off of a cap iron equipped plane, and perhaps he feels it's necessary. 

My view is that I don't care what you do as long as I don't see hook marks from sandpaper. 

My preference not to sand is my preference, not a rule for anyone else. I scrape anything that I can't plane, though it's uncommon on a flat surface. Efficiency is the issue that I am fascinated with, as in why would a double iron eliminate single iron planes. In a time when people were scraping to get by, I have to assume it's economic necessity. I'm interested in how that makes me get something done faster, especially in the once or twice a year I have to build something that resembles furniture or cabinets.

I doubt many other people do that (or care). Either of those. I would assume most people scrape and sand (or let's be honest, most people just sand when the group is opened to include people not particularly interested in hand tools). 

Let me pose a scenario that would be interesting to an intermediate woodworker:
* you build a case
* you wrap the case in mouldings that you've cut, carefully keeping crisp lines - to hide the joints
* you've planed the case surfaces before assembly, but now you have to finish them
* the wood is cherry (or soft maple or something else that may not scrape optimally)
* you inevitably come up with some spots where you've touched the case with hide glue on a finger tip by accident, etc, and the mouldings you couldn't plane to fitness because the wood quality was lacking. Or perhaps you have a joint where some glue crept out after attaching a base or a top. 

What do you do?

You can certainly sand all of it, but it does take quite a bit of time to sand all of that.

It's something you can figure out and learn with some sweat equity, but I don't see running a progression of sandpaper over everything as having very good time economy, and it doubles the amount of shellac you'll use to get the piece sealed. Not that the price matters, but it's another time specific thing. 

(I would scrape all of the areas that are lacking from planing, and if there is a noticeable difference in the surface, use the top side of the scraper that is left polished and without a burr to brighten the surface with light pressure, and not do anything to the already planed surfaces). It would be a minute or two and that's it.

But more important than that, I'd have decided what the style of the moulding would be, whether or not I need to build planes to complete it, what the proportions of the case are, how I'd attach (and hide the attachment) the case together and what the front trim and back would be. 

Aside from the practical bits and pieces about finishing the case quickly without inundating yourself by sanding a progression of papers over the whole thing, what about the rest. How often is that stuff discussed? I can't say much. If i have a design question that I can't solve via books, I inevitably have to call George.

(you've done a poor job assuming that I've ever suggested that it's a necessity for everyone else to plane and forgo scrapers and sand paper. that's warren's view and not mine. I think the plane does a better job, of course, but it doesn't matter much if the whole piece is ugly to begin with)


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## D_W (14 Sep 2015)

I'd like to shift back to the planes, now that we've established the irons as Aaron Hildick - at least the front ones. I've got about four with that mark, maybe more than that. 

In regard to the manufacture of irons in sheffield, and my previously discussed bits and pieces about the later irons maintaining the earlier look despite being obviously relatively modern process...

... do any of you guys in country know much about the history of that? In the US, it's standard practice to buy a brand after the company fails and stamp it on something that is not related to the original maker. Is that the case with the more modern irons?

I can tell on the stones that the modern irons are oil hardening steel, not water hardening. Many of them are solid, even though tapered, and a bit thinner than the older laminated irons, though plenty thick to stop you in your tracks when you've got them locked down tight with the cap iron set appropriately. 

Later today, I may pull out my box and note all of the various English marks on them. I buy them on looks (if an iron looks proper for the period of planes I'm trying to build, that's good enough for me) and whether or not the cap iron is in good shape - they are often pitted badly or have been dented badly on the corners, which poses a terminal problem in a double iron plane.


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## AndyT (14 Sep 2015)

Cheshirechappie":2o4nn3kf said:


> CStanford":2o4nn3kf said:
> 
> 
> > The thrust from certain quarters seems to be that if one doesn't achieve an absolutely pristine surface off the plane at all times and all places then one is 'doing it wrong.'
> ...



Seconded.

I know we all had a bit of fun in the 'modern plane irons' thread, collectively de-railing the topic and getting all sorts of miscellaneous chat into the mix, but this thread is leaving me bewildered. It feels like there must be a lot of history among a group of participants that I'm not aware of. Maybe it was on another forum? 

Whatever the story is, I prefer a forum where a point is raised and constructively discussed, and if someone wants to discuss something else, they start a new thread, and explain what it is about.


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## D_W (14 Sep 2015)

One other side comment, that's of little interest, but I'll mention it, anyway. I don't know of anything other than hide glue to sink the handles in these planes and do it in a way that someone down the road will do when the handles become loose. They are tighter than the older planes I've purchased (about two thirds of the planes I've bought to try to use to learn what's good - so as to find good subject planes to learn from - the handle will come loose and need to be reglued if the planes are used in heavy work). 

So, I've now made two planes that have gone to an ardent vegan, the front one included, and the first time I hadn't thought about it and used hide glue. The second time, I thought about it...and used hide glue. What will said vegans use to reglue if the handle comes loose? Polyurethane glue?

Anything else easily repairable that I come up with that fits a tight joint (hide glue, fish glue, gelatin-based glue) is animal product. It's an interesting little conundrum, but one I'm not that eager to solve (chances of sending many more planes to people aren't too great, and chances of that and finding more vegans is probably also not that great). The front plane is going to Chris Griggs, who some here might know (who is vegan, but who tolerates the hide glue even if he doesn't love it). I intended to give it to another former forum member who sent me stuff when i set out to make planes, but he is MIA and I can't get a hold of him. The back plane is quickly made and a bit ugly in the details, I made it for me and that's OK to me for planes that stay in the shop. 

Someone else is making planes of this style for sale, and i would assume that more people will begin dimensioning by hand once the use is brought up. I'll reserve the parking space for complaints about how expensive it is to buy one that someone made by hand since I have taken donations on the materials in returns if someone asks to pay, but sometimes they are just free. I wouldn't want to make a plane like the front jack for less than about $300-350, and as stingy as I am, that creates a conundrum where I want to spend a fifth of that on a really nice vintage one. Unfortunately, it's hard to know what's great to buy until you know how to fix older planes, and it's hard to really know how to fix and diagnose older planes until you make some.

So, even if I have trouble unloading future planes for the cost of materials (they can just pile up in my shop for all I care if that's the case), I hope that folks who want to dimension wood by hand take it on (and by that, I mean more than just a novelty where you use a jack plane once in a while), I hope people buy older planes, study them and fix them and use them. I would assume by the recent cost of decent planes on ebay, there is starting to be some demand for planes that have little wear.


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## D_W (14 Sep 2015)

AndyT":2c69haes said:


> Whatever the story is, I prefer a forum where a point is raised and constructively discussed, and if someone wants to discuss something else, they start a new thread, and explain what it is about.



Agreed, I'd prefer to discuss the planes, as I've invested a lot of time and expense and the discussion of the rest that's unrelated advances nothing.


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## AndyT (14 Sep 2015)

D_W":31k87z50 said:


> In regard to the manufacture of irons in sheffield, and my previously discussed bits and pieces about the later irons maintaining the earlier look despite being obviously relatively modern process...
> 
> ... do any of you guys in country know much about the history of that? In the US, it's standard practice to buy a brand after the company fails and stamp it on something that is not related to the original maker. Is that the case with the more modern irons?



There are many examples of Sheffield marks being traded as intellectual property long after the demise of the original maker or his company.
For instance, virtually the whole of the Marples range could be had branded as "I Sorby" if you preferred. If you wanted one of their planes branded John Moseley, you could have that as well.

There is also the philosophical question of "who is the maker" - a Sheffield brand was more like a guarantee of a level of performance, applied to the work of someome who may have been an employee of, but was more likely to be a sub-contractor, to the company who owned the brand.


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## D_W (14 Sep 2015)

AndyT":32uf95z2 said:


> D_W":32uf95z2 said:
> 
> 
> > In regard to the manufacture of irons in sheffield, and my previously discussed bits and pieces about the later irons maintaining the earlier look despite being obviously relatively modern process...
> ...



Thanks for the clarification. I'd suspected a lot of, especially the later irons, are made in the same place. The irons are done in a way that makes it seem like the same place is doing them, and the stamps are similar enough that it looks like the same maker made the stamps on the more modern irons. They are definitely less deeply marked than the older ones, but that's not surprising given that they are steel all the way to the top.

There was some of what you're describing going on in the states, but the large makers dominated the markets and made things in house out of economy and control, so what we call hardware store brands here are less common than the main makers. Same is true of rifles, etc, though once the makers of the tools and the rifles, etc, became sold names of reputation as you describe.


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## woodbrains (14 Sep 2015)

D_W":b82b08q3 said:


> So, I've now made two planes that have gone to an ardent vegan, the front one included, and the first time I hadn't thought about it and used hide glue. The second time, I thought about it...and used hide glue. What will said vegans use to reglue if the handle comes loose? Polyurethane glue?
> 
> Anything else easily repairable that I come up with that fits a tight joint (hide glue, fish glue, gelatin-based glue) is animal product. It's an interesting little conundrum, but one I'm not that eager to solve (chances of sending many more planes to people aren't too great, and chances of that and finding more vegans is probably also not that great). The front plane is going to Chris Griggs, who some here might know (who is vegan, but who tolerates the hide glue even if he doesn't love it). I intended to give it to another former forum member who sent me stuff when i set out to make planes, but he is MIA and I can't get a hold of him. The back plane is quickly made and a bit ugly in the details, I made it for me and that's OK to me for planes that stay in the shop.



Hello,

I wonder what vegans expect happened to all the creatures, birds, squirrels, etc. that once lived in the beech tree that became the plane? I would just use hide glue and forget about the issue! :lol: 

I suppose, thinking about it, being vegan is rather like those who say they exclusively use hand planes and never sandpaper. More of an ideal than a practical achievement, even if they fool themselves into thinking they have managed it! 

Mike.


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## CStanford (14 Sep 2015)

D_W":11qizr6e said:


> I believe warren's view is that the surface is better off of a cap iron equipped plane, and perhaps he feels it's necessary.
> 
> My view is that I don't care what you do as long as I don't see hook marks from sandpaper.
> 
> ...



I think the greats would simply tell you it takes almost as long, and sometimes longer, to prep a surface to standard and finish a piece (admittedly their very high standard) than it might have taken to build the entire thing in the first place. Perhaps you're insinuating the notion of speed at a step in the process where all the best absolutely precluded it. This is my takeaway from any decent book I've ever read on the craft. Maybe a review of available literature, and a more careful and wider selection of sources would clear up misconceptions and clarify a philosophy and approach. 

Once a piece is constructed the work is only roughly about half completed.


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## D_W (14 Sep 2015)

woodbrains":33l8rbdz said:


> Hello,
> 
> I wonder what vegans expect happened to all the creatures, birds, squirrels, etc. that once lived in the beech tree that became the plane? I would just use hide glue and forget about the issue! :lol:
> 
> ...



It's a noble concept, and most of the vegans I've met in real life are less militant than the average click bait news story about anti-meat protests. It's just not something I'd ever undertake. I think it's easier to avoid sandpaper than it is animal products, though!

As for those other things (the squirrels, etc), if the passed the porch of my relatives, they probably got shot and eaten. I'll keep using the hide glue, not sure what Chris will do if he ever separates the handle from the base, but that's probably his issue to worry about, I guess. I like repairable glues, but I"ve never used anything but hide and epoxy, except one stint with gorilla glue on the base of a case years ago (I didn't like it).


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## D_W (14 Sep 2015)

CStanford":359ekk94 said:


> I think the greats would simply tell you it takes almost as long, and sometimes longer, to prep a surface to standard and finish a piece (admittedly their very high standard) than it might have taken to build the entire thing in the first place. Perhaps you're insinuated the notion of speed at a step in the process where all the best absolutely precluded it. This is my takeaway from any decent book I've ever read on the craft. Maybe a review of available literature, and a more careful and wider selection of sources would clear up misconceptions and clarify a philosophy and approach.
> 
> Once a piece is constructed the work is only about half completed.



I don't have misconceptions about it. I'm not building show furniture, either, maybe that's the difference. My approach is as I stated it. the wood is planed to the point of needing nothing or almost nothing before assembly and then final scraping in areas that can be planed occurs after assembly. Inevitably, something gets touched or made dirty and you can't put finish over it after that point. No further surface prep on inside surfaces. 

I would assume that most of the finish work historically was done by someone who was skilled in finish, perhaps as a trade. the only time I've approached a large percentage of build time being after assembly was on the first things I made where I sanded entire pieces in three steps, then sealed and then lacquered them and rubbed out the lacquer. I guess gallery furniture might have a finish like that, I don't know, I don't really like that kind of stuff (heavily built finishes), but I"ve seen it sloppily done on local gallery furniture. 

I don't think the stuff done to contest winning quality is as common as made, sanded and finished with a thick finish rather than a nice one. 

As you may have guessed, I haven't read a whole lot about it. I'm going for a look (which is generally shellac) and not a process.


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## CStanford (14 Sep 2015)

[/quote]

What was the pitch of the plane Derek?[/quote]

45 degrees, Charles ...







Mouth ...






Link: http://www.inthewoodshop.com/ToolReview ... other.html

Regards from Perth

Derek[/quote]

Haughty and audacious in its simplicity. And, oh those surfaces!


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## D_W (14 Sep 2015)

CStanford":3p1b06as said:


> Haughty and audacious in its simplicity. And, oh those surfaces!



Better than a $35 stanley 4 how?


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## CStanford (14 Sep 2015)

D_W":6x5nja4u said:


> CStanford":6x5nja4u said:
> 
> 
> > I think the greats would simply tell you it takes almost as long, and sometimes longer, to prep a surface to standard and finish a piece (admittedly their very high standard) than it might have taken to build the entire thing in the first place. Perhaps you're insinuated the notion of speed at a step in the process where all the best absolutely precluded it. This is my takeaway from any decent book I've ever read on the craft. Maybe a review of available literature, and a more careful and wider selection of sources would clear up misconceptions and clarify a philosophy and approach.
> ...



I remember reading an article by Tom Wishhack in I believe an old Woodwork magazine about his penchant for wax-only finishes and his routine was not un-arduous. I still have that issue somewhere, accompanied by photos of work with this finish, and the surfaces were stunning. There's a lesson in there somewhere.


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## CStanford (14 Sep 2015)

D_W":1ftedoh1 said:


> CStanford":1ftedoh1 said:
> 
> 
> > Haughty and audacious in its simplicity. And, oh those surfaces!
> ...



No, not at all. In fact I think he used Stanley irons and chipbreakers in a lot of the planes he made. Not all but some. Obviously not in Derek's plane.

The fascinating thing about Derek's post is that he doesn't think Krenov used these planes in a configuration that would have brought the cap iron into play (much). That is what my comment was referring to. 

So how should we digest this? Here's a guy known for his surface quality seemingly, and I suppose paradoxically, not using a cap iron much at all. And not even a high-angle plane...

But is it a paradox at all? Can a ("the" ?) standard bearer for beautiful wood surfaces be doing anything considered paradoxical? 

An interesting question to me at least.


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## D_W (14 Sep 2015)

Take a look at the surface on the plane in this thread - you can only see the bevel for effect because the light does not reflect back off of anything else. It is quickly cut with a stanley plane. Nothing else.

It is linseed oil with wax over the oil. Nothing else. 

Until we are talking about thin veneers, which are a pain to deal with since the fibers are often separated somewhat making them suck in finish, I really don't know what part of anything else would require (curved surfaces) more than scraping, and if scraping didn't satisfy, burnishing with shavings. 

I'm not really looking to imitate the studio furniture makers who manage to take the longest time possible to come up with a nice surface. I'm looking to get it off the tool on the lathe, off the plane on a flat surface, and on mouldings at this point, off of the scraper.


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## D_W (14 Sep 2015)

CStanford":2a7o2r07 said:


> D_W":2a7o2r07 said:
> 
> 
> > CStanford":2a7o2r07 said:
> ...



I've seen quotes attributed to krenov (too far back now to recall where, but in some sharpening related topic) to suggest that krenov expressed a preference for easy planing wood. 

The answer to your question is pretty simple, though, and it's implicit in a proper set for a cap iron (which is one that's not eye bleedingly close on difficult woods). 

Shavings on the order of a thousandth do not tear out unless the wood is horrible. So, if as derek describes, you're willing to take many very thin shavings (not a very practical solution following a jack and try plane unless the try plane was set finely), then it works fine. When you have six panels to do and your other option is to take one pass at 5 thousandths and then one more at 1 or 2 thousandths, things are done much faster. 

In short, if you're willing to do what Krenov did, it will cost you time. If you're making more money on books, classes, and salary from a school, it probably doesn't matter much how much time you take.


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## CStanford (14 Sep 2015)

I'm not quite following you. I think Krenov finished off the plane quite often. How was his approach different than yours? He used machinery. He wasn't taking half-thou shavings to go from 4/4 rough to 3/4 finished.

I didn't realize you were that production oriented. Are you doing this for a living now?

I've never gotten the impression that taking very fine shavings with smoother was not an orthodox approach.

"When you have six panels to do and your other option is to take one pass at 5 thousandths and then one more at 1 or 2 thousandths, things are done much faster."

David, there is simply no way this results in savings of a substantial amount of time (to the extent it will even work), moreover is presumes the woodworker (Krenov or whomever) never adjusted depth of cut. This is all a huge stretch. Where is this coming from?


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## D_W (14 Sep 2015)

Earlier this year, under duress (threat of overspending on some junk), I made this case, planed finish, including the mouldings at an angle:

I assure you it isn't lacking because I didn't spend gobs of time on the flat surface going through scraping and sanding. One coat shellac, two coats wax. 

http://s3.postimg.org/gfs89otgz/P1080105.jpg

http://s13.postimg.org/hqw9j8fw7/P1080103.jpg

Stanley 4, of course. Pre assembly one thick shaving, two thin. Post assembly, I re-planed the flat surfaces on the top to flush the moulding and had to do quite a bit of scrape on the moulding inside. I apologize that the moulding isn't something more interesting, but it's just a case for a kid's bedroom. 

I guarantee that there is nothing at all lacking on the flat surfaces. I could've been more attendant to the needs of the mouldings, but didn't figure that they'd ever see enough light to be worth more trouble. 

I expect a finish like this right off of the plane, even if the finish is sheer. 

Much standing time was done at this shelf, and slobber dropped down onto the bottom moulding in large quantities, so I still have a chance to fix my sin and spend another 20 minutes in the moulding coves and right the wrong. The flat surfaces are superb. 

The T&G I should've been nice enough to wax, but I didn't - one coat of shellac and then pinned on. It will never see as much light as the camera provided here. This wood was overall terrible quality, a reject pallet at a local retailer. The mouldings were not reject pile stuff, but their quality isn't much better. It's low density stuff with not much color (which someone advised me has been taken out of the FAS grade for cherry because it's too hard to get good pink cherry at the mill level now).

nonetheless, I expect the surface to only improve as the wax is refreshed.


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## Benchwayze (14 Sep 2015)

Hi Mike. 

You won't find any sandpaper in my shop. Just the odd sheet of 'wet and dry', for rust cleaning and flattening purposes!  

John


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## D_W (14 Sep 2015)

CStanford":1p08vxa1 said:


> I'm not quite following you. I think Krenov finished off the plane quite often. How was his approach different than yours? He used machinery. He wasn't taking half-thou shavings to go from 4/4 rough to 3/4 finished.
> 
> I didn't realize you were that production oriented. Are you doing this for a living now?
> 
> ...



I don't finish off of a machine most of the time. As you well know, I have mentioned multiple times that the largest time gain is at the penultimate step. I'm sure krenov could vary his shaving thickness, but I'll bet he was pretty cautious in quartered wood. If he wasn't, he'd have tearout with his setup. I won't. It's pretty simple.

The difference between what krenov does and what I've done just in the smoothing step would be half an hour, I'd bet, unless he has agreeable wood. Any edges showing get the same treatment, not just the flat surfaces. If the machines leave any tearout, then it's more to work through. 

If one doesn't use machines for everything, it's more than a half an hour of time savings for the prior step, and while planing is nice, planing a million small shavings when forced. 

I don't do it for a living, do you? I do expect to forgo sanding and not spend gobs of time taking tiny shavings. That's a pretty simple goal.


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## D_W (14 Sep 2015)

Correction, I must've sanded parts of those mouldings, because that's what I said I did when I posted the original pictures. Maybe that's why they look so dull!! 

I don't know why I said I don't have the proper radius for them, as I've got a gaggle of curved scrapers. Who knows what I was thinking at the time, but looking at the pictures of the mouldings vs. the rest of the case, not the right thing. It would've taken no more time to find a fitting multi-radius scraper as that's what i'd normally do on those. that can be righted when the slobber marks are repaired.


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## CStanford (14 Sep 2015)

I build for a living, yes. Not always furniture though.

I don't think most fine furniture makers are concerned about a half hour at the stage of the game where the smoother is being brought into play, and especially so on the broad surfaces that will be the most seen, well, because they're the broad surfaces. 

I personally don't approach any project expecting to forgo anything, but that's the pessimist in me coming out. Nor do I feel a sense of defeat, or even that much dread, if sanding becomes necessary. A lot of the time I plan on sanding in a linseed oil finish anyway. So I have sandpaper in hand by design. Gene Landon used it, no reason us mere mortals need to be ashamed or think that something needs 'fixing.'


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## Sgian Dubh (14 Sep 2015)

CStanford":1yvlaju5 said:


> I think the greats would simply tell you it takes almost as long, and sometimes longer, to prep a surface to standard and finish a piece (admittedly their very high standard) than it might have taken to build the entire thing in the first place ... Once a piece is constructed the work is only roughly about half completed.


Charles, the estimating guidance (that I'm familiar with anyway) for production work usually suggests allowing ~30% of a furniture manufacturing job to prep work and polishing. In this case, prepping usually involves things like planes, scrapers, power sanding and/or hand sanding, or variations of those prepping tools/procedures. Polish application primarily involves spray finishing, although there may be hand application of certain agents, e.g., dye, Danish oil, etc. In other words, a job estimated to take 100 billable hours is likely to break down into ~70 hours building and ~30 hours prepping and polishing. 

**Edit to add*. Said another way, if it takes 70 hours to build a piece, it's likely you'll need to allow approximately 42% of additional time for prepping and finishing, i.e., 70 X 1.42 = 99.4.

I'm sure there are other build + prep + finish proportions people are aware of and use in their estimates or bids. And, of course, there are jobs where the finish application may take much more or less time, but those occasions are usually spotted fairly easily, e.g., a French polishing job, multiple coats of linseed oil, or a spray finish buffed to high gloss won't fit the 'standard' ~30% allowance. Slainte.


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## CStanford (14 Sep 2015)

D_W":11t6zgwh said:


> Correction, I must've sanded parts of those mouldings, because that's what I said I did when I posted the original pictures. Maybe that's why they look so dull!!
> 
> I don't know why I said I don't have the proper radius for them, as I've got a gaggle of curved scrapers. Who knows what I was thinking at the time, but looking at the pictures of the mouldings vs. the rest of the case, not the right thing. It would've taken no more time to find a fitting multi-radius scraper as that's what i'd normally do on those. that can be righted when the slobber marks are repaired.



I feel like you're making the easy parts hard and the hard parts easy. Moldings are the one place where you really do want a finish off the plane, you don't want to have to scrape them because of all the hassle of finding or making shaped scrapers and sandpaper can ruin crisp features. Stock selection is at a premium, and the barest shavings a requirement.


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## D_W (14 Sep 2015)

CStanford":16diqp20 said:


> I build for a living, yes. Not always furniture though.
> 
> I don't think most fine furniture makers are concerned about a half hour at the stage of the game where the smoother is being brought into play, and especially so on the broad surfaces that will be the most seen, well, because they're the broad surfaces.
> 
> I personally don't approach any project expecting to forgo anything, but that's the pessimist in me coming out. Nor do I feel a sense of defeat, or even that much dread, if sanding becomes necessary. A lot of the time I plan on sanding in a linseed oil finish anyway. So I have sandpaper in hand by design. Gene Landon used it, no reason us mere mortals need to be ashamed or think that something needs 'fixing.'



Honest question, Charlie. Why don't we see more of your stuff? 

I'm assuming that "stanford woodworking" on etsy is you, as I've seen your florida gators chairs on it, despite the story saying it's in vermont. Is that correct?

I just went out there, and the listings are expired.


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## D_W (14 Sep 2015)

CStanford":2jg9gwcp said:


> D_W":2jg9gwcp said:
> 
> 
> > Correction, I must've sanded parts of those mouldings, because that's what I said I did when I posted the original pictures. Maybe that's why they look so dull!!
> ...



Take a close look at them. I didn't sand or scrape anything to the lines, so all lines are crisp. I would rather threaten a less than perfect finish than remove a crisp line. My first thought as an amatuerish amatuer is that the easiest way to spot things done by someone who hasn't tought much is that lines are rounded over, so I always try to preserve them as a matter of separation. If they aren't completely unharmed, the whole effect is lost. 

You are spot on with the comment about stock selection - price and time dictated in this case, and I recall being disappointed in the stock quality (which wasn't cheap). It's unusual not to be able to finish off of a moulding plane unless the stock is poor like this. 

The stock off of the "cheap" pile, despite the marks, ended up being more dense and better planing than the 8/4 stick I used for the base. I have other better cherry stock on hand, but it's reserved for finishing my kitchen. 

All of that included (kitchen stock, plywood, planemaking supplies) and I'm out of storage space for project wood on something like this, so it's ad-hoc basis.


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## CStanford (14 Sep 2015)

Derek brought up that Etsy site a while back. It is not me. I live in Memphis and that site is out of Vermont as you mentioned. I assume Etsy has a mechanism that would prevent somebody from Los Angeles saying their shop is in New York. That said, it doesn't matter in the end because it's not my site.

I'll post some pictures of a couple of roofs I've fairly recently framed, with a helper of course. More money in it and that's where the work is.

I definitely don't build furniture on spec. Can't afford to. Wish I could. I'd be in the shop right now doing just that.


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## D_W (14 Sep 2015)

re: the furniture, I would've liked to have known your secret if you could build furniture for money. I don't even know who *buys* it here, even surgeons, etc just buy manufactured furniture and turn it over at a high rate. 

It's an interesting coincidence that store's not you. I thought for sure I'd seen the caned chairs that you made with florida gators colors, and the store had a mix of shaker and danish modern when the listings were up. 

Whoever it is, they've listed a lot and sold little. My mother sells little things on etsy, and lots of them. I don't see how it's worth the time, but it's her time and not mine. i've never seen much big sell there - perhaps because I'm interested in things that people refuse to pay much for.


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## woodbrains (14 Sep 2015)

Benchwayze":1qfi7xxv said:


> Hi Mike.
> 
> You won't find any sandpaper in my shop. Just the odd sheet of 'wet and dry', for rust cleaning and flattening purposes!
> 
> John



Hello,

If you don't have to use sandpaper, then good for you, I don't like sanding myself. 

Incidentally, even Krenov had a few sheets of fine sandpaper in his bench drawer, it was other people who stated he didn't use it and it is their legend that gets repeated. It was his aim rather than a rule and he did use it, but lightly, he didn't want to dough over any detail the tool made. I quite like some of his knife marks, which burnished the wood and would have been ruined if sandpapered. 

I made some planes when I was at the college; the college used to sell sandpaper!

As said earlier, Krenov did use machines, he wasn't a hand tool only maker. 'How else?' (Would he do it) he would explain. He did use scrapers, too, though I don't know to what extent. He had one once, made from half a sole of a Stanley compass plane! 

In David Finck's book on making Krenov style planes, there is a section on scrapers. He advises that all scraped surfaces should be sandpapered, as it is vastly different to a planed finish. It is his opinion. As much as I would like to disagree, in most cases, I would find it hard to, actually. Krenov seems to endorse the book, I wonder what he would have thought of this.

Mike.


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## D_W (14 Sep 2015)

Interesting thought on scraping. I guess it might be the case in softwoods (that sandpapering is necessary). 

Most of the woods we use commonly here are probably 800 to 1300 on the janka hardness scale, except for pine (which a lot of us don't use, but it's not uncommon to see people making things out of it). 

Some of those things scrape well and some don't. Anything soft, especially quartered, can look fuzzy of of a scraper, but you can still forgo sanding and get away with it if you have some soft plane shavings handy. I never work the tops of my card scrapers. If I have to fix something I can't plane, I scrape, then I use the top (which is worn smooth) to burnish the spot and then rub with shavings. It ususally looks similar to the planed surface and absorbs finish similarly. 

I'm curious as to why all of us are that sensitive about what other people do. I don't like sanded surfaces that much, and the mouldings on the case I pictured vs. the shelves and the top show why, but I wouldn't look at a nicely designed case. I wouldn't think too much of my own bookcase either other than maybe "that's a fairly thoughtful little bookcase for ..well, for a cheap bookcase", and I'd think the same if it was sanded, and might try to peek in the corners to see evidence of dovetails or how it's joined. 

Point being, if krenov has a reputation for not sanding, and finck thinks something should be sanded, what do you think?

I love excuse projects like the shelf I pictured because I can do them as fast as I can physically think to (including smooth planing and dovetailing - no harm in that, they're hidden, and applying shellac and wax) and then see how they turn out. I wouldn't dare work that carelessly on something that would sit in front of my wife's face most days in bright light. It's interesting to see how quick work turns out. 

Charlie and I know each other from elsewhere, obviously. I don't think charlie cares what I think (I know he doesn't), and it would be highly unusual for me to do something based on charlie's opinion (I did buy a primus plane once because he gushed over them. That didn't turn out well, I can't think of any other times.). Garrett Hack is supposed to be an authority on planes, which is really what interests me the most, but I don't think I've had too much regard for his opinion - only the people I talk to offline do I have a lot of regard for - we work to make ourselves happy and that should be good - and possibly those we actually know. If I called George Wilson to talk to him and sent him a picture of something asking for advice, and he said "you know, I'm really disappointed with what you did there, it just shows a lack of judgement and it's ugly", then that would have a bigger effect. And he's not afraid to say stuff like that, though he wraps the poo in sugar before he delivers it, so it's not said quite like that.


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## D_W (14 Sep 2015)

By the way, has anyone yet pondered building a plane out of solid like these? That's really what I'd like to see more of if people want to do it.

Maybe someday I'll send one of these to charlie as a spoof. I can't imagine what his reaction would be. I don't have his address, so I"d just have to find his picture in that other thread and paste it on a package and write "To: Grumpy in Memphis, ship to the man in the picture"


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## CStanford (14 Sep 2015)

D_W":jr3yk8as said:


> re: the furniture, I would've liked to have known your secret if you could build furniture for money. I don't even know who *buys* it here, even surgeons, etc just buy manufactured furniture and turn it over at a high rate.
> 
> It's an interesting coincidence that store's not you. I thought for sure I'd seen the caned chairs that you made with florida gators colors, and the store had a mix of shaker and danish modern when the listings were up.
> 
> Whoever it is, they've listed a lot and sold little. My mother sells little things on etsy, and lots of them. I don't see how it's worth the time, but it's her time and not mine. i've never seen much big sell there - perhaps because I'm interested in things that people refuse to pay much for.



Nope, I've never done any sort of seating in orange and blue.

I did a set of handrails for a church, quite nice actually, years ago. That netted some work and then that netted some work. It's all essentially word of mouth. Most people had seen something that I had built first hand so if they had a similar need there really wasn't much need for a 'sell job.' I'll never be fast enough or live in an area rich enough to make a lot of money on one-offs. I did do some work for an interior designer out of town and that was nice but tapered off. It's just knowing people I guess. There's no real money in it unless you're super talented and famous both of which I am not.


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## custard (15 Sep 2015)

CStanford":mxl1i2zs said:


> I'll never be fast enough



I read your post about a 20 hour table build. Not fast? You're the Tokyo Bullet Train of the woodworking world! 

In fact following your post I was motivated to get the price book you referenced and compare it with a number of old British price books (they all paint the same picture by the way...supersonic build speeds. There's something a bit odd going on there that's worthy of further investigation. Maybe apprentice labour wasn't explicitly declared but actually delivered much of the grunt work? Who knows, but many of those price book timings just don't add up.)

It's interesting, whenever I hear one professional craftsman talk about another it's only a matter of time before the whole speed thing comes up. A professional is nearly always benchmarked by how fast they are, and it's rare to meet the craftsman who is satisfied with how fast he builds.

The workshop where I trained drummed the _need for speed_ mantra into you every day. As you worked your way through the apprentice pieces, you made every piece once to reach the required _standard_, then again to reach the required _speed_. And the quality standard was always a lot easier to achieve than the speed standard!

I've always been a bit sceptical of this approach. To me it's like the folk stories about man versus machine. The American railway worker competing against a powered spike driver, or the Cornish Tin Miner competing against a steam shovel. The thing that's crucial in all those stories is that the man always wins...but then drops down dead from exhaustion. I've never found that a very inspiring message. 

In furniture making I think it reflects some deep rooted belief that if the maker was only a bit quicker then they could compete with factory made furniture. 

Never going to happen. Indeed the moment the situation is even framed in price/speed terms then we've already lost the battle. 

The best analogy I can think of is Saville Row tailoring. If you buy a striped shirt in Saville Row or Jermyn Street the stripes on the yoke will line up with the stripes on the arms. Yes, the buttons are a bit nicer and it's south sea cotton, but basically it's all about the stripes. And in London's financial district there's a secret club, it's formed of those people whose stripes line up. It's like MCC ties, they recognise one another from fifty paces.

When I'm talking to a prospective client I talk in the same language a Saville Row tailor or a Jermyn Street shirtmaker uses with a new client. I show them what ultra thin drawer sides and drawer slips actually look like. I invite them to experience the smell of Cedar of Lebanon or Camphor Wood drawer bottoms. I illustrate the difference between a top made from carefully matched, sequential boards, versus one made using boards in whatever order they happen to arrive. And I basically spell it out that even though none of this adds much to the practical utility of a piece, they do make it an altogether more pleasant thing to live with. I'll sometimes toss in the old phrase about the only furniture worth owning is that which you've inherited, and imply they're laying down a legacy for their children and grandchildren.

Hey, I'm as impoverished as the next maker. But I'm clear in my mind that shaving build times by 10% isn't the solution, because even if I do I'll immediately drop down dead!


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## woodbrains (15 Sep 2015)

Hello,

Custard speaks sense, well, at least to me! 

There is a point where you can work faster and no longer enjoy the work, or make a mistake that takes longer to rectify than doing it right but steady the first time. You can design out details that take time and then dislike the thing you've made, because you see the lack of detail even though the customer might not. You may even start to excuse yourself by saying things about the work not being as good as you could have done if only you'd spent a bit longer. It might be great for the short time it took, but who cares, it is not fabulous? Are we going to provide disclaimers with our pieces? If it is just OK for 20 hours imagine what it could have been in 40? No, you get no marks for that, I'm afraid. The piece speaks for itself and has no concept of the time it took to come into being. People judge it only by what it can say. I stopped professional furniture making because I made the shortcuts, tried labour saving and hurrying and justifying leaving out detail and still I could not sell enough to make a living. And I learned to hate making that stuff. Speed was no consolation and client satisfaction did not pay my rent. The compromises were just to much, so I stopped completely. It was mainly due to the area I live, but I could not sell the quality I wanted to and did not want to lose quality with speed. I wish every day that I had my workshop so I can make things again, but reality for me at least, is that I cannot sell it. So now I do something I hate a bit less and will not kill me through exhaustion.

Mike.


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## D_W (15 Sep 2015)

Speed may not be the right term for me to use in discussing the double iron, rather economy of effort. 

Speed implies that you're going to go faster and faster until you're hurrying, but economy of effort would be a better term because you're not hurrying with it, but getting through with things faster. 

The straw man extrapolation that takes place every time this is brought up in the presence of some people ignores the fact that it's less effort to use the double iron properly, and in order to do decent work without hurrying (I'd prefer to keep a rhythm of work that allows you to continue working but observe while you're going - as opposed to hurrying), we all have a collection of experience with various things that allow us to do things more easily without adjusting a design.


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## Cheshirechappie (15 Sep 2015)

Some of those old Price Books should be read with a bit of caution. Certainly in London, and possibly in other major cities, there were enough cabinet tradesmen about in late Victorian times to allow them to specialise quite narrowly. There were chair specialists, case work specialists, veneering specialists and so on. That built speed. Also, the wage rates to even quite skilled tradesmen were not (by anything approaching modern standards) at all generous - hence the old saying, "Carvers are starvers".

I rather suspect that joiners and cabinetmakers in the smaller market towns, more used to a variety of jobbing work, didn't take much notice of the Price Books; quite possibly didn't even know of their existence.


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## Jelly (15 Sep 2015)

custard":e3pnj91b said:


> In furniture making I think it reflects some deep rooted belief that if the maker was only a bit quicker then they could compete with factory made furniture.
> 
> Never going to happen. Indeed the moment the situation is even framed in price/speed terms then we've already lost the battle.



Indeed, having worked in a factory making joinery products, they can be made to run with ruthless efficiency; it's an environment where Just In Time production and the Kaizen/Toyota Managment System can be put to very good use; very little wasted material, very little wasted time...


Capitalising on the "Saville Row" example; a lot of the tailors and shirtmakers have now started offering a made to measure service, where they have a lot of patterns that will fit a lot of shapes _quite_ well, and they measure you to choose the best pattern to cut... you get the stripes that line up exactly, for a fraction of the price, made in a semi-industrial manner... just not quite as perfect as if you were going the whole hog.

In this vein, a maker who could find backers and wanted greater commercial success could create a line of pieces which employ traditional "proper" joinery and use carefully matched timbers, but are made in a factory which has been set up for the purpose of manufacturing their designs in an optimised but "authentic" way... 

If the industrial aspect of the design is really good, one can go as far as to offer people a custom size or material option on a product they 've seen in the showroom (we did this with windows; the parts are produced during the next run the machining line does in the nearest standard size, then modified to specified size by a smaller team with more traditional hand-adjusted machines, and fitted together by a joiner; said joiners also made custom orders which required specialist attention from start to finish).

The three major issues would be: 
 Ensuring that the individual production cells had the right skill mix, as one needs someone who can acquire a level of skill in a particular aspect of production, do it over and over accurately without getting too bored, and then switch to learning a new skill quite quickly
 Ensuring consistency of supply for the materials
 Convincing the public they really could have traditionally made furniture for the price of an "oak furniture land type jobbie"


Of course, this probably wouldn't help the poor old custom furniture makers who didn't take that track... or maybe it could awaken the public's desire for something more custom, more original, more exceptional; rather a revolving door of well thought out, cheaply made flat-packs of Swedish tat; Hard to know until someone succeeds at it really.


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## G S Haydon (15 Sep 2015)

Nice points Jelly,

I think Custard sounds like a very, very fine furniture maker, aptly described with the Savile Row description. I'd love to have him make something for me .

When it's work time we have to look carefully at reducing waste and making a process as efficient as possible. After reading the "Toyota Way" six or seven years ago it's been an ongoing process at our workshop. An example of this would be improving set up times on tenoner, a Wadkin EKA 5 Head machine with cut off saw http://www.wotol.com/1-wadkin-eka-tenon ... id/1021696 . To reduce our batch sizes and flow the work better means more tool changeover, the goal with changeover being SMED. By reducing variation and making things consistent we have reduced setup time to 14mins from 25 mins. No customer needs to pay for poor process. This saving improves quality as the setup is more repeatable too. Now we are at 14min we'll review again and keep improving. It's interesting to talk about the pace of work too, takt time . 

That's why I understand (at least I think I do) D_W's thoughts on the double iron wooden planes. They are likely the best way of converting material from sawn stock with minimal further steps. If they weren't any good the trade would have chewed 'em and spit them out very quickly. They instead did that to single iron planes.


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## D_W (15 Sep 2015)

G S Haydon":1r6j4fu1 said:


> That's why I understand (at least I think I do) D_W's thoughts on the double iron wooden planes. They are likely the best way of converting material from sawn stock with minimal further steps. If they weren't any good the trade would have chewed 'em and spit them out very quickly. They instead did that to single iron planes.



And they did that when the double irons were substantially more expensive than single irons. 

I lurch a little in my chair when I see kaizen, just in time, etc. It's just good sense if a tenoner takes a long time to set up, to engineer work flow to minimize setups, and to examine if setup can be made faster. 

But when the entire life of us gets unitized into a comrade-ish group of people bean counting every single thing and going "lean" to the point of not allowing people with desk jobs to sit, etc, it makes me wonder.

(graham - that, of course, really doesn't have too much to do with your tenoner, more just a general statement. I worked in the '90s in a shop that went just-in-time, and it reduced costs and inventory, but it made some things a real pain. Plus they had all of us doing exercises before work, which was bizarre in rural america. Someone heard "the japanese people exercise before work, so we will, too".)


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## G S Haydon (15 Sep 2015)

Agreed, if it's bean counting you're not going to see the benefits. I like to think of it as bagging easy wins. Where do we keep the manual for a machine? There is a QR code on the machine with a direct link to the manual. We're at a stage where we are flowing work much better, avoiding large volume of wip too. I never expected this discussion to come of the back of a pair sweet jack planes.

Regarding exercise, I know I should do some but first thing in the morning? I like having an interest that keeps me active, hand tools woodworking does that nicely. I'm sure rural Devon would also not be the place to begin a 7am aerobics session.


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## CStanford (16 Sep 2015)

custard":18jgxk71 said:


> CStanford":18jgxk71 said:
> 
> 
> > I'll never be fast enough
> ...



Oh my gosh, a two-drawer hall table. Haven't we all built a half dozen of these at least? Walnut is just so amenable, such a lovely wood. I take no credit for the speed. I just pushed the plane and watched the wood cooperate. 

That table is probably the only thing in my repertoire that isn't a one-off.


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## Tony Zaffuto (16 Sep 2015)

I agree Charlie! Seems after we build one, others see it and want the same of something similar. I have right in front of me, a "short legged side table" built in about a 24 hour period (over several days) for a wide screen TV, built after at least 3 other tables. This was about 6 or 8 years ago, and in that period of time, I've learned to go slower-MUCH SLOWER, so as to keep the wife at bay from similar projects that get old.

I also agree on walnut, but it doesn't agree with my allergies, so I go to my second choice of cherry. Anyone here use any butternut?


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## CStanford (16 Sep 2015)

Yep, butternut is a honey.


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