Ian Dalziel
Established Member
With Chris’s recent purchase of the Sauer& Steiner, I really fancied one and was about to order when I came across the shepherd infill kits. Being a hands on person I decided to give it a try. I did a bit of checking about the web and spoke to David Charlesworth about his. Most people I spoke to didn’t have great things to say about them (company not the planes) the early model kits required a lot more work ie around throats etc but modern cnc and laser cutting has taken a lot of the difficulties out of the process.
I bought 2 kits:~ thumb plane (see pictures)and the 24 ½” jointer (will be run in GWW)
Emails and phone calls were transferred and it took 8 days from order for the kits to arrive from Canada with the usual customs bite. Not well packaged and a few bits missing but an email sorted that and the missing bits appeared a few days later.
Adequate instructions for the thumb plane but the wrong instructions for the jointer
They estimated 8-10 hours build time for the thumb plane…I took around 40-45 I stopped counting but I did make the the other bits from scratch which itself took more time than I thought. In all fairness it was a basic kit with no woodwork What it did do was give me a good feel before I start the jointer…I also made a few changes ie adjuster and lever cap.
The kit itself comes straight off a milling machine, not quite what I expected but I suppose how else would it come. What I didn’t like was the square slot for the original bridge and the holes were predrilled which were in a bit of a state, these are obviously done before the rolling process and they weren’t nice round holes after. The front bun hole I got to drill which made a difference. Also when peining the dovetails together the base twisted around the mouth area which made honing a long and laborious process. I didn’t notice how bad until I started to hone The jointer kit has nice round holes. The blade kinda shocked me as it was ‘as is’ just out the heat treatment and took a fair bit of honing and its very hard. I wanted to drill it for the adjuster but cobalt drills wouldn’t even mark it so I had to grind a half moon slot for the adjuster mechanism
I’m glad I tried the thumb plane first as it has given the insight into how the double splayed dovetails work and also what not to do when building it.
The infills and wedge are rosewood, polished with shellac
It weighs about the same as my LN block plane and is lovely to hold and use, I have given it a 0.5 thou mouth which I might open but for now I’ve had enough filing.
For anyone contemplating one you are looking at a lot of filing but they are lovely little planes
Ian
I bought 2 kits:~ thumb plane (see pictures)and the 24 ½” jointer (will be run in GWW)
Emails and phone calls were transferred and it took 8 days from order for the kits to arrive from Canada with the usual customs bite. Not well packaged and a few bits missing but an email sorted that and the missing bits appeared a few days later.
Adequate instructions for the thumb plane but the wrong instructions for the jointer
They estimated 8-10 hours build time for the thumb plane…I took around 40-45 I stopped counting but I did make the the other bits from scratch which itself took more time than I thought. In all fairness it was a basic kit with no woodwork What it did do was give me a good feel before I start the jointer…I also made a few changes ie adjuster and lever cap.
The kit itself comes straight off a milling machine, not quite what I expected but I suppose how else would it come. What I didn’t like was the square slot for the original bridge and the holes were predrilled which were in a bit of a state, these are obviously done before the rolling process and they weren’t nice round holes after. The front bun hole I got to drill which made a difference. Also when peining the dovetails together the base twisted around the mouth area which made honing a long and laborious process. I didn’t notice how bad until I started to hone The jointer kit has nice round holes. The blade kinda shocked me as it was ‘as is’ just out the heat treatment and took a fair bit of honing and its very hard. I wanted to drill it for the adjuster but cobalt drills wouldn’t even mark it so I had to grind a half moon slot for the adjuster mechanism
I’m glad I tried the thumb plane first as it has given the insight into how the double splayed dovetails work and also what not to do when building it.
The infills and wedge are rosewood, polished with shellac
It weighs about the same as my LN block plane and is lovely to hold and use, I have given it a 0.5 thou mouth which I might open but for now I’ve had enough filing.
For anyone contemplating one you are looking at a lot of filing but they are lovely little planes
Ian
