Jacob
What goes around comes around.
Don't think so on either count. Metal plane much better on difficult timber because of the very fine adjustment and the overall solidity.
Shall I continue lapping this sole ?
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JobandKnock
Amateur curmudgeon
Yes. You can wind a metal plane blade in and out quickly. All you can do with a wooden plane is tap the blade outwards - if you need to reduce the cut you need to remove the cutter and wedge and start again with the blade set flush to the sole. Then you tap out and the wedge is tapped in snug. There is no reverse!
Ttrees
Iroko loco!
Wonder why Follansbee uses them so, as he doesn't like to hang about.
Easy to see from David's videos, which applies more to me for the timbers I have, as the cap iron
is set around the same spot.
Not too many folks are working difficult timbers as efficiently on the tube.
Tom
Easy to see from David's videos, which applies more to me for the timbers I have, as the cap iron
is set around the same spot.
Not too many folks are working difficult timbers as efficiently on the tube.
Tom
JobandKnock
Amateur curmudgeon
There's always the matter of personal choice. In the 1920s to 1950s carpenters and joiners in the UK increasingly chose to buy metal planes over wooden ones, despite wooden ones being cheaper. Why?
Whatever else by the 1960s we have only 4 or 5 wooden plane makers left here in the UK (AFAIK Marples, Salmen, Emir and Griffiths but there may have been others). Of those two were mainly selling to training establishments or DIYers (Salmen and Emir) whilst Marples had a large trade in other tools, including metal planes. By 1970 they were all gone. If wooden planes had been seen as that wonderful by the majority of users, surely they would still be with us? After all, they are cheap
I find it noteworthy that in Germany, even their makers have diminished and survival has been down to adopting thin blades and adjusters (ECE Primus - same family that started Emir in the UK in the 1930s)
Whatever else by the 1960s we have only 4 or 5 wooden plane makers left here in the UK (AFAIK Marples, Salmen, Emir and Griffiths but there may have been others). Of those two were mainly selling to training establishments or DIYers (Salmen and Emir) whilst Marples had a large trade in other tools, including metal planes. By 1970 they were all gone. If wooden planes had been seen as that wonderful by the majority of users, surely they would still be with us? After all, they are cheap
I find it noteworthy that in Germany, even their makers have diminished and survival has been down to adopting thin blades and adjusters (ECE Primus - same family that started Emir in the UK in the 1930s)
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Jacob
What goes around comes around.
Personal choice.
I quite like having a go with a woody but the simple fact is metal planes are superior in every way, with one or two exceptions. Don't let that put you off having a go though, it's all harmless fun, unless you are trying to make a living!
Adam W.
A Major Clanger
hitting the toe, retracts the blade, no need to take it apart. ECE wooden planes have a handy adjuster, but I find it a drag to remove the blade, so mine collects dust under the bench for most of the time.
JobandKnock
Amateur curmudgeon
I find that doesn't work with moulding planes (about the only wooden planes I use these days)
Adam W.
A Major Clanger
They need to have a smoothish tang for it to work, any rust'll stop it dead against the wedge.
Jacob
What goes around comes around.
And hit the heel. Moulding planes nearly all have a rounded heel for whacking with a mallet. Not exactly precise adjustment - the blade can simply drop out and fall to the floor!
Ray Iles does a lovely job for not much money.
https://www.oldtoolstore.co.uk/contact-us-2-w.asp
https://www.oldtoolstore.co.uk/contact-us-2-w.asp
Adam W.
A Major Clanger
That's why you should turn it upside down and wack the toe on the bench. Iron no fall out that way.
But that requires a certain amount of plane savvy.
Jacob
What goes around comes around.
Smart thinking!
Adam W.
A Major Clanger
Plus you don't gash up the heel with a hammer and obliterate the number that way.
They deserve to be treated proper like, seeings they've made it this far.
They deserve to be treated proper like, seeings they've made it this far.
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Jacob
What goes around comes around.
No you hit the rounded top edge of the heel and only with a wooden mallet. That's why it's rounded, on most of them anyway. Also comfier to the hand.
JobandKnock
Amateur curmudgeon
Smoothish tang? Not that common IMHO
Adam W.
A Major Clanger
Just rub it over your oil stone, it'll make it smooth enough on the high points.
As if there's a hard rule.
A steel convex faced hammer works far better, but you have to use them to know it. The bigger the plane, the better steel works. Convex face leaves burnishing and the odd mark straight on the back of a plane, but nothing else. It would pummel the roundover.
You're busy talking about constant adjusting, constant sharpening and little actual planing. I'm not sure you'd notice what it's like to use a plane doing actual dimensioning, and I'm not talking about softwoods and test pieces.
It's excusable for folks who were trained in the 50s/60s/70s - the plane is a small economic part of the picture, but would've been much larger working by hand.
JaK is correct that you always start with the closest sized timber if you can, but that's not necessarily practical for a hobbyist outside of whatever is available retail. One can buy and split or resaw large timber by hand, which is pleasant work, but it's not quick.
The wooden planes disappear for the most part (at least in quality) when machine planing becomes popular. Hand saws disappear in quality around when the circular saw becomes popular and can be afforded.
Richard is hitting on why nobody has seen what I'm talking about here - nobody does enough of it to know and there's no great reason to unless you like it (I like it). Volume of work done with wooden planes over several hours in anything other than smoothing will be close to double, though. BT, DT - from cherry to beech (beyond that, you pick straight figured woods, there's no issue. If you pick poorly sawn woods that are running out on the surface and would've been culled, but call that figure, that's generally something you'd rather plane off with machines. You can do it by hand, but you have to rely on the cap iron early in the process which means you aren't taking scallops out of a surface, but more like a heavy set jointer.....in wood that has no dominant grain direction. That's rough going. BTDT and learned a lesson about buying #1 common here instead of FAS - #1 common has a knot here and there, but the sawn direction of the rest of the board is a far bigger problem. For a power tooler, it will just leave questions of blotchy finishes).
Jacob, it's almost comical how you state things that are definitive and simple, except they're not actually correct. I sometimes wonder if you're playing a part and never breaking kayfabe.
re: the sharpening time - the wooden plane irons and a modern stanley iron should take about the same amount of time if one has a crystolon stone. The only case where there's a difference would be if you were constantly nicking irons and had to grind lots of damage out.
If I sharpened a woody iron and a stanley iron from start to finish stones only, no grinder, it would be - at the very most - an extra 30 seconds. Perhaps 15. But a wooden plane set properly will plane more wood with a ward iron than a veritas custom plane will with V11, and the V11 abrades less than half as fast. The iron won't plane more feet, but the plane will plane more feet - I've done the two next to each other set at about 80% max depth - for whatever reason (probably metal friction and plane design), the beech try plane will take more off per swipe with the same effort. About 40% more in thickness, and far less sole friction.
I suspect the only person on this thread who may have a concept of this difference is adam.
JobandKnock
Amateur curmudgeon
It isn't rust that's the issue - if you look at the tangs on many moulding planes you'll find they are fairly rough (i have some rounds and hollows, madevin the 1920s, I believe, which have rarely if ever been used bu the tangs show firge marks). TBH I can't say that I have seen many moulding planes where they weren't a bit rough, nor can I recall seeing any which looked as though they had been flattenedby the user in the way you suggest
I think most of the tangs have rusted and been cleaned over time (But most are just rusted if they're still rough - like gritty/grainy feeling).
I have two sets of planes with irons that have never seen appreciable rust, and they definitely were never finish ground and glazed above about 1" higher than the bit (as in, there's evidence of glazing an inch up from the blade, but then they appear to be generally as forged. Just not rough. More like lumpy. One would fit the planes so that the last bit of the iron isn't really determining much, anyway where it contacts the top of the plane body. The lower inch and a half or two is where the critical fit would be).
Those are both older griffiths sets that I paid a princely sum for - actually, kind of surprised to see how wonky the irons are in the tang, but it's a skilled wonky - someone was able to forge them close to shape with little trimming and that was that. The bottom parts where it counts are finely done and well ground.
I have two sets of planes with irons that have never seen appreciable rust, and they definitely were never finish ground and glazed above about 1" higher than the bit (as in, there's evidence of glazing an inch up from the blade, but then they appear to be generally as forged. Just not rough. More like lumpy. One would fit the planes so that the last bit of the iron isn't really determining much, anyway where it contacts the top of the plane body. The lower inch and a half or two is where the critical fit would be).
Those are both older griffiths sets that I paid a princely sum for - actually, kind of surprised to see how wonky the irons are in the tang, but it's a skilled wonky - someone was able to forge them close to shape with little trimming and that was that. The bottom parts where it counts are finely done and well ground.
