Flattening a plane sole.

[Paddy Roxburgh]

For shooting board use, it's neither here nor there whether the sides are square to the sole, really, it only matters that the iron is.

that is true but a square side means that an even set doesn't need to be adjusted when the board comes out, and at a fiver a plane why not?

 

[wizard]

depending where you are in Cornwall just fished this out of my scrap bin may have the screws as well if you want it its free to a good home. and its very flat.

Well I know a bargain when I see one. If there's no other takers, Wizard would you be prepared to send the sole up to me if I cover postage ?

its in the post

 

[Bod]

Hi,

I recently bought a Faithfull No.4 hand plane, and I like it but checking the sole with a straight edge, it doesn't seem very flat (I don't have any feeler gauges so I don't know hoe much, but a lot of light is coming through). It is convex along the length of the sole, and convex across the sole - all apart from a slight hollow in the middle about 1cm in diameter.

I've been trying to flatten it with some silverline 80 grit sandpaper (roll, not sheet) on some 4mm float glass backed with a tile. I change the sandpaper when it seems to lose the "bite" which is probably about 10-15 minutes. It seems to be taking forever though, I've spent many hours trying to make it flat, but I don't really seem to be making much difference. I can see by the scratch pattern that I've not yet made it down to the hollow in the middle, and while I'm not bothered by such a small hollow, it does show that I'm not making any progress.
I understand that the plane sole doesn't have to be perfectly flat (for example, a slight hollow behind the mouth wouldn't make a difference) but as the plane is convex and what seems considerably so, I would really like to flatten it out.

Does anyone have any suggestions on how I can get the sole flat?

Have you tried using this plane?
If it works, with a sharp blade, then maybe not much needs doing.

Bod

Many thanks!

 

[AESamuel]

Didn't expect to see so much animosity in such a simple thread!

Thankyou very much to all who have offered advice, when I get an afternoon I'm going to spend some time with the plane!

 

[bugbear]

Don't get me wrong, I would definitely like to have that plane sole, it would just be quite a hassle for me to make my way up to Redruth as I don't drive.

Maybe you're right about the filing, perhaps I could use selective sanding for the rough work - a corner of a sanding block and some 80 grit sandpaper - using the float glass as a touch plate. I can always use a finer grit if I'm worried about taking too much metal off at once.

I've never heard "touch plate" as a term, but I know what you mean.

I would suggest buying sheets of wet 'n' dry paper, probably a sheet each of 60 (or 40, if you can get it), 120, and 240 grit.

Cut the sheet into 2 inch strips, and make a couple of 2" sanding blocks to carry the strip. It's the sanding blocks that give you localised metal removal.

One block should be fairly flat, but the other should be domed (so the area worked is quite small). This dome can be easily made by rubbing the block on a flat sheet of sandpaper (which is instructive, when you think about it ).

The normal way of working would be to use a surface plate made "dirty" with marking blue, and then to hack away any metal (high spots) that has been marked. If you're using glass, I would support it using something springy like a router mat or towel,
so the glass can have its own (flat) shape, and not the shape of the (not flat) MDF or ply you're resting it on.

When working a plane sole NEVER go near the mouth with the domed sanding block, always use the flat one, and this
probably applies to the edges, but to a lesser degree.

Use your coarsest grit, and don't be too delicate, until you have worked the whole sole. You might now choose to work through the finer grits, but for more control, and a better cosmetic finish.

This method has two big advantages;
The small blocks mean that the pressure on the abrasive stays high. Lapping starts quick, as the high POINTs are abraded.But as the high points become high areas, pressure goes down, and speed of metal removal goes down.

This method also has (almost...) no tendency towards convexity. You could, with care, remove a convexity, although when using this approach it would probably be faster and easier to hack in a concavity and then work outwards.

BugBear

 

[bridger]

It seems silly to muck about with abrasives papers trying to flatten plane soles when files and scrapers are so much faster and more precise. Chinese surface plates are scarcely more expensive than flagstones of the same material.

 

[bugbear]

It seems silly to muck about with abrasives papers trying to flatten plane soles when files and scrapers are so much faster and more precise.

Scrapers are too precise (and slow), and filing flat is quite a tricky skill. I evolved my variant on scraping to address these issues. More details of the process, and its reasoned developement on my web pages.

orginal (with back story)

http://web.archive.org/web/200905291005 ... atten.html

Distilled down:

http://web.archive.org/web/200901141057 ... heory.html
http://web.archive.org/web/200901141455 ... ctice.html

Chinese surface plates are scarcely more expensive than flagstones of the same material.

Agreed - I own one (14 USD, post free ). But many people have already have flat [enough] glass. An old hall mirror (car boot!)
would serve nicely, for instance.

BugBear

 

[Eric The Viking]

Agreed - I own one (14 USD, post free ). But many people have already have flat [enough] glass. An old hall mirror (car boot!) would serve nicely, for instance.

Absolutely. There's a lot of "unnecessaries" about this.

Flat for practical purposes is what we want, or at least flat enough so any not-flat bits aren't a nuisance. It's easy to forget the size and shape of the sole are determined by aesthetics and cost as much as practicalities (lots of planes are decorated, and why not?).

I probably should have done a diagram to make my approach clear (rather than use a lot of words)* but the big advantage of what I was suggesting - or any flat plate grinding approach - is that it de-skills it for the novice.

For most of us, flattening a plane sole is something we do once, or once-per-plane. It's not something I care to spend time on getting good at! So I want a method that's hard to mess up, even if there's a bit more grunt needed and it takes a bit longer.

My dad told me recently that when he was at school (70 years ago), he was taught how to make a surface by scraping. They started by hacksawing a piece of steel into a rough block, then squared it up and scraped the biggest flat side. They were 'done' when it stuck to a reference surface because it was flat enough to expel the air between the two. His point was that it took them a whole term of lessons to do this, and that modern children have no tenacity! I think the switch (applied in class, in his day) might have 'encouraged' tenacity though.

Frankly the whole thing would've put me off metalwork for life!

E.

*Converted to a Microsoft-free life over Christmas. Still getting used to a few things like drawing packages.

 

[Phil Pascoe]

My friend as an apprentice had to file a huge ball bearing into a (near ) perfect cube. I suspect that was more to do with sadism than teaching.

 

[rafezetter]

It seems silly to muck about with abrasives papers trying to flatten plane soles when files and scrapers are so much faster and more precise.

Scrapers are too precise (and slow), and filing flat is quite a tricky skill. I evolved my variant on scraping to address these issues. More details of the process, and its reasoned developement on my web pages.

orginal (with back story)

http://web.archive.org/web/200905291005 ... atten.html

Distilled down:

http://web.archive.org/web/200901141057 ... heory.html
http://web.archive.org/web/200901141455 ... ctice.html

Chinese surface plates are scarcely more expensive than flagstones of the same material.

Agreed - I own one (14 USD, post free ). But many people have already have flat [enough] glass. An old hall mirror (car boot!)
would serve nicely, for instance.

BugBear

I've had a look at the above links, and while the text is extremely informative - if a little overwhelming in the "can I do this?" department, all the pictures are going to a dead site. If you have the originals for this - would you be able to re-post them to a free hosting service? (I use photobucket, but there are others)

(from what I can see all your web hosted pictures from this site are now down).

 

[n0legs]

My friend as an apprentice had to file a huge ball bearing into a (near ) perfect cube. I suspect that was more to do with sadism than teaching.

That was called proper engineering education, went through similar myself .
"flat and square, flat and square" I can still hear his voice after 30 years :lol:

 

[rafezetter]

My friend as an apprentice had to file a huge ball bearing into a (near ) perfect cube. I suspect that was more to do with sadism than teaching.

Teaching, assessment and hazing all in one... elegant. Sadistic; but elegant

I wish more schools taught the way Eric's dad was, maybe then the kids would exit the other side something a bit more animated and appreciative of what surrounds them than the current zombies we get from many schools now.

 

[bugbear]

I've had a look at the above links, and while the text is extremely informative - if a little overwhelming in the "can I do this?" department, all the pictures are going to a dead site. If you have the originals for this - would you be able to re-post them to a free hosting service? (I use photobucket, but there are others)

(from what I can see all your web hosted pictures from this site are now down).

I've found a free hosting service, and uploaded my (backed up) site;

http://www.woodworkinfo.site88.net/

How good this host is, I know not.

So here (for the moment) are working versions of the above links, with all the pictures:

http://www.woodworkinfo.site88.net/flatten.html
http://www.woodworkinfo.site88.net/flatten_theory.html
http://www.woodworkinfo.site88.net/flat ... ctice.html

(most of the pages were last edited in 2009, so expect link rot)

BugBear

 

[bridger]

The OP of this thread reported spending many hours with abrasives and getting nowhere. With files and scrapers one can get pretty much any plane within woodworking tolerances of say .010" in a half hour or so. From there on out its pretty much a flat curve of time for flatness. Extreme tolerances are possible, but as woodworkers we can disregard them

It seems silly to muck about with abrasives papers trying to flatten plane soles when files and scrapers are so much faster and more precise.

Scrapers are too precise (and slow), and filing flat is quite a tricky skill. I evolved my variant on scraping to address these issues. More details of the process, and its reasoned developement on my web pages.

orginal (with back story)

http://web.archive.org/web/200905291005 ... atten.html

Distilled down:

http://web.archive.org/web/200901141057 ... heory.html
http://web.archive.org/web/200901141455 ... ctice.html

Chinese surface plates are scarcely more expensive than flagstones of the same material.

Agreed - I own one (14 USD, post free ). But many people have already have flat [enough] glass. An old hall mirror (car boot!)
would serve nicely, for instance.

BugBear

 

[bugbear]

The OP of this thread reported spending many hours with abrasives and getting nowhere. With files and scrapers one can get pretty much any plane within woodworking tolerances of say .010" in a half hour or so. From there on out its pretty much a flat curve of time for flatness. Extreme tolerances are possible, but as woodworkers we can disregard them

Yes, but he was "Lapping", a process that I, like you, find slow and ineffective, which is why I don't do it.

I explained all this is some detail earlier in the thread.

Most woodworkers don't have scrapers, or have the fitter's apprentice skills to use a file accurately.

Edit; Joshua Rose in "Modern Machine Shop practise" (1897) says:

The filing process was continued with fine Groubet files, and testing the plates, rubbing them together sufficiently to mark them without the use of oil. Very short file strokes must be employed, and great care taken to apply the file to the exact neccessray spots and places.

Then, instead of using the scraper, No 0 French emery paper was used, wrapped around the end of a flat file. The plates being interchanged and trued with No. 0, No. 00 was used, and the testing and interchaging repeated. These grades of emery were then wrapped or folded around the curved end of a piece of wood, the plates interchanged and rubbed together as before, and the emery used as described for the scraper. Subsequently, Nos. 000 and 0000 French paper were similarly applied until the plates were finished.
.
.
.
In skillful hands this process very far surpasses, both in the superiority of its results and in rapidity of excecution, the scraping process, leaving a brilliant polished surface, so smooth that it feels as soft as satin, and the contact becomes so complete that no bearing marks can be distinguished.

Fun reading all round, actually:
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/39225/39 ... 9225-h.htm

BugBear

 

[JohnCee]

Does anyone have any suggestions on how I can get the sole flat?

Send it to Ray Iles.