Starship enterprise plane.

[woodbrains]

Hello,

Thanks again Andy, those planes are beautiful. Timber framing makes sense, I can well imagine these being used to good advantage on large, rough beams. I wonder why (or maybe there are) there are no British equivalents? I suppose the finish straight from an adze was good enough, when done with skill.

Mike.

 

[Just4Fun]

So if the conclusion is that the handles make 2-man operation possible, possibly using a rope, does this tell us anything about the possible use of the "holes" in the Goodmanham plane? Or am I over-thinking things by seeing some commonality between these two?

 

[woodbrains]

So if the conclusion is that the handles make 2-man operation possible, possibly using a rope, does this tell us anything about the possible use of the "holes" in the Goodmanham plane? Or am I over-thinking things by seeing some commonality between these two?

Hello,

I think they are just hand grips, front and back, that the user could get their fingers around. But who knows, we can never ask the original owners! Perhaps those who have reproduces the planes would get a true sense of how they were used.

Mike.

 

[AndyT]

I was privileged to be able to have a go at using the reproduction of the Goodmanham plane that rxh made, at one of Richard Arnold's events.
The surprising thing was how easy it was to use. The grips just fitted my hands naturally - I didn't need to change my technique at all. It cut really well, despite the high bedding angle.

 

[heimlaga]

The use planing of chair parts and such on a bench as seen in the video was more like a secondary use of an "oxhyvel" which the plane type with tho crosswise handles is called in Swedish

It's main use was for rough planing floor boards and boat planking and ceiling boards and ship spars and such. The board was laid on a low bench where two men sat straddling it facing each others and holding the board in place with their butt ends and their full body weight. The apprentice used both his hands to pull on the forward handle while the master pushed the rear handle with both hands. They planed a short lenght at a time and moved themselves or the board as work progessed.
I should have at least two such planes in the garage attic.

Full size adzes were in Finland and Sweden mainly used to adjust the bevel of ship frames before planking and to adjust the top of floor joists before laying floor boards. Actually they are known as "spantyx" locally which translates as "ship frame axe".
I seems like the English used adzes a lot more than we did.