My first try on planemaking - a shoulder plane

[Pekka Huhta]

I've wanted a small shoulder plane for a long time, but never found one that I would have liked. I don't like the new ones too much and the old ones don't come up that often.

I decided to build one myself:

It's actually a metallic variation of the Krenov concept: just two cheeks and a lot of bits and pieces in the middle. The sole is a separate piece of thin tool steel, riveted to the plane. The mouth is adjustable, so the front part is just riveted to a movable piece of brass.

The infill is teak burl, wedge is just teak. The whole thing was riveted together with 6 mm rivets

Both the sole and iron are cut from an used circular saw blade. It can be hardened, but I have to use the plane for a while before I know wether it will hold an edge.

I used just a hacksaw, files and an electric drill for making the plane. OK, for the iron I used a grinder and for rough finishing of the sides a belt sander, but otherwise it's basically a hand tool made with hand tools. :wink:

Pekka

 

[skipdiver]

Very impressive.Amazing what you can do with hand tools and determination.Looks like it will be nice to use.Perhaps you could use a modified chisel for the blade if that one doesn't wear well.

 

[bodgermatic]

That is inspirational, thanks for sharing!

 

[marcus]

That's lovely - great job!

Marcus

 

[Paul Chapman]

Great job, Pekka =D>

Cheers :wink:

Paul

 

[Waka]

Nice plane.

 

[George_N]

That is a really nice plane Pekka. Is the "frog" also made of steel?

 

[Pekka Huhta]

That is a really nice plane Pekka. Is the "frog" also made of steel?

No, the parts around the wedge are 8 mm thick brass. It just has a quite thick layer of oxide on top of it, so it doesn't look... brassy. It's the same stuff as for the movable front part, in the front I just filed the part about 0,2 mm thinner so it would move smoothly.

Without the adjustable mouth it would be very simple to build. It was quite simple already, but needed some brainwork to make it work.

If I would build another one, I probably would use thicker material on the sole - and high carbon steel instead the recycled sawblade. It was sheer hell to drill, it work hardened during drilling and burned a pack of drill bits in the progress. A thicker sole would support the iron better, now I have an intuition that the back of the mouth may be a bit springy for any harder work. Well, it's a finishing plane anyway.

Pekka

 

[Philly]

Excellent work, Pekka!
Love it,
Philly

 

[Racers]

Hi, Pekka

Really nice plane. How big is it?

Pete

 

[pedder]

the recycled sawblade. It was sheer hell to drill, it work hardened during drilling and burned a pack of drill bits in the progress.

For sawblades use this.
http://www.kingwerkzeuge.de/universalbo ... /index.htm

Universalbohrer Normallänge

One bit for more than 50 holes. Than resharpen.
Btw nice plane
Cheers Pedder

 

[Digit]

Know all the problems Pekka, but the rewards as the first shavings come away are great. I'm nine tenths away from completing a special, it's for a one off job, so I've knocked up out of offcuts of Beech. And it looks like it! but the satisfaction is the same.

Roy.

 

[Pekka Huhta]

Hi, Pekka

Really nice plane. How big is it?

Pete

The plane is 19 cm long and 14 mm wide (about 7½" x 5/8"). It weighs about 850 g. I first thought about making the whole mid-section from brass, but the plane would have ended up weighing more than a kilo.

The size was determined just by the size of scrap metal pieces from our factory dumpster. It's all recycled stuff: scrap 3 mm steel sheet, scrapped 8 mm brass plate and some old offcuts of teak. Even the screws and rivets were picked from the trash

Pekka

 

[Corset]

Very nice that. Bet it's a good feeling to get a shaving with your own tool.
Owen

 

[Pekka Huhta]

the recycled sawblade. It was sheer hell to drill, it work hardened during drilling and burned a pack of drill bits in the progress.

For sawblades use this.
http://www.kingwerkzeuge.de/universalbo ... /index.htm

Universalbohrer Normallänge

I have a set of cobalt drill bits, but they are a bit too hard to be used with a handheld drill. Half of the bits on the set have been broken as the bits break right away if you bend them during drilling.

If I just could get enough feed and relatively slow revs, the steel would not harden too much. But then again there's a limit what you can do with a hand drill anyway.


It really was satisfying. It is almost strange to see the plane finished, after all the time that went into building it.

I think total building time was something around 15-20 hours. Not a huge project anyway.

Pekka

 

[Javier]

IF that's your first plane I can't wait to see your tenth. Nice job!

 

[Pekka Huhta]

Returning to a somewhat old thread.

IF that's your first plane I can't wait to see your tenth. Nice job!

I'm not woorking on the plane number ten yet, but here is #2

The brass knob in the front is just a thumbscrew for the adjustable mouth, which works just the same way as on the shoulder plane.

A few shavings:

It might still be a while for the tenth plane, but I have numbers three to five pretty much covered up, depending on how you count them

Pekka

 

[Philly]

Looks real nice, Pekka. What timber is it made from?
Philly

 

[Pekka Huhta]

It's oak, as I had some scraps lying around. I don't know if it splinters on the corners or moves too much, but that is to be seen. If it starts splintering or behaving badly, I can always screw on a brass sole. And the japanese planes are all oak anyway, so it can't be all that bad for planemaking.

I was surprised how well it works. I had thought my Spiers as the ultimate smoother, but after sharpening this one up, closing the mouth to about 0,1 mm it produced far smoother surface and thinner shavings than the Spiers. It seems I have to focus tuning the Spiers up next

Pekka

 

[Mr Ed]

Very nice Pekka

Can you show us a picture of the adjustable mouth arrangement?

Cheers, Ed