SWAP - My £22 Groz No.5 for your Clifton or LN

[bobscarle]

Firstly, I guess I had better say that although I would swap, I do not expect to get many offers.

This is a serious post though. I have just finished edge planing 3 ash boards ready for glueing up into a larger board. I would have used my Rexon planer but I have recently had a desire to use more hand tools, so I decided to plane by hand. I used, as above, my £22 Groz No.5 Axminster special. I was taking full length, full width fine shavings. The boards have a smooth surface and they fit together nicely ready for their date with the glue bottle.

Now, I had convinced myself that I would need to spend around £200 in order to buy a top quality plane, a Clifton, LN, Veritas, etc. as mine would not be up to the job. But I am now having second thoughts (is it possible to climb back up the slope?). What difference would I see with a better plane? Is this really a a good test or is it a case that most planes will take decent edge shavings? So, suppose the plane fairy paid me a visit during the night and happened to leave a new No.5 Clifton , how much better would it be?

I also tried planing other woods as well as the ash. Walnut planed nicely as did a piece of old oak. Planning against the grain was not so good but I thought that all planes suffer with this.

Bob (who is a little confused)

 

[Vormulac]

You don't *need* to spend a fortune to get a plane that works, I recently planed a 2x4 smooth and square with a nasty little French gadget called a Rabot Kid 24 which uses stanley knife blades! (it was the only plane available at the time) It would have been easier with a better plane, but it was still doable. Last week I received a rather aged Record #05, all I did was lap the back of the iron and hone the edge and I was taking full width shavings of just under a 1/1000 within 10 minutes of getting it out of the box (and I am not an experienced woodworker by any means!).
I'm sure that a L-N, Clifton or *insert favourite pricy plane maker here* would be even better, and I still aspire to own those beautiful tools, but it is possible to do very nicely with more readily available equipment.

V.

 

[woodbloke]

V's quite correct, you can make an ordinary Record, Stanley or one of the clones work as well as an expensive version but there's a lot of hard work and and grimy ingrained fingers involved. If you have a look at my post on this forum you'll see what's possible with a plane ordinaire. Admittedly, I am taking it to the 'n' degree which is not necessary (I just want to see what it turns out like). There is also the satisfaction I 'spose of taking a pigs ear and turning it into the silk purse - Rob

 

[Bainzy]

From what I understand, when the wood is easy to plane there isn't much discernable difference between a well honed Stanley or Record type plane and a Clifton/LN, but the harder the task becomes the more you notice the virtues of the more expensive planes. Plus Lie Nielsen's won't shatter when you drop them since their bodies are made from ductile iron, and the rest of the parts are bronze so won't rust.

 

[lurker]

This is a symptom of blokes & their toys: I also do a bit of fly fishing and people there will try to convince you that unless you spend £600 on a rod you might as well not bother turning up.
I have a few expensive rods (aquired 2nd hand!!) but the one with the best action (which is what you are looking for) cost me $15 ( a tenner at the time) from Walmart!!

 

[bugbear]

F

Now, I had convinced myself that I would need to spend around £200 in order to buy a top quality plane, a Clifton, LN, Veritas, etc. as mine would not be up to the job. But I am now having second thoughts (is it possible to climb back up the slope?). What difference would I see with a better plane? Is this really a a good test or is it a case that most planes will take decent edge shavings?

Depends very much on the grain direction - obviously with an edge being small, there's statistically less rom for "nasties" like reversals.

If a piece of wood is easy to plane (which ash can be), yeah, any plane will do.

It sounds like you've been semi-lucky, since all manner of simple faults can make a plane mis behave rather badly. Cheaper planes (with poor QC) are more prone to simple faults...

Experience (and/or information) can teach you how to identify and fix faults, and (of course) more expensive planes with better materials, machinin and QC have fewer faults.

All fairly much "as expected", I suppose.

BugBear

 

[Mittlefehldt]

From what I understand, when the wood is easy to plane there isn't much discernable difference between a well honed Stanley or Record type plane and a Clifton/LN, but the harder the task becomes the more you notice the virtues of the more expensive planes. Plus Lie Nielsen's won't shatter when you drop them since their bodies are made from ductile iron, and the rest of the parts are bronze so won't rust.

This is true and also why, as I understand it, that years ago a basic Stanley would do the job and little or no complaints. The wood available a century or more ago came from older growth forests where the logs would have thirty or more feet with out a branch. the wood from such was staighter, and virtually knot free, as a result fairly easy to work.

These days such stuff is rare unless you find reclaimed wood. If the plane works then use it, if you find it is not doing what you want then check for what you need to replace it.

As an aside, Ash here in North America is very straight grained, I use to love splitting firewood when I got a piece of ash, a bit of frost in the wood and it would almost fall apart under the axe, in nice straight sections.

 

[dchenard]

Personal experience here, I bought a Groz #5 a year or so ago, with the plan of turning it into an "in-between" plane to use between the scrub and the jointer. Just for the fun of it I wanted to see how well that plane could be tuned. The sole was a b***h to flatten, took over an hour, but the rest went fairly quickly. A good sharpening, and I was planing bird's eye maple without regard for the grain direction. Not bad for CAN $35 (about £16 at today's exchange rate)... I bought a second one to give to my brother-in-law, and this one took only 10 minutes of sole lapping.

Now, last week a local store had Award #4 planes on sale for $17 (or less than £8 ). Curiosity got the best of me, and I bought one. Lapping the sole to get the toe, heel and mouth sections flat took less than 5 minutes. The blade took a lot longer to flatten, but eventually I got to sharpen it. No other fettling was done, I didn't touch the frog at all. I took the plane to a piece of white birch, and I was taking 0.001" shavings. Against the grain. With a mouth opened 1/8". Certainly worth the purchase price

Now none of these planes would have worked properly without fettling, expensive planes require little or none. And expensive planes feel more substantial, have better machining and finish, adjusters have less backlash, etc., all this providing for that quality feel that inexpensive planes lack. But they do perform well, quality planes will have the edge in difficult grain, in tame wood the Groz, Award, Anant planes will do the job nicely.

DC

 

[ByronBlack]

If your pleased with the result and it does the job you expect of it, then why bother with anything else?

I've changed my outlook on tools over the course of my 'education' and i'm coming to realise that if a tool does the job you expect of it, then keep it, only when you get to a stage where the tool isn't up to the task should you think about upgrading. IMVHO.

The why I see it is, way back when in the midst of ages, woodies were the only option and some fantastic work was produced so I guess it comes down to technique more than the actual tool itself - Krenov being an obvious example of this I suppose.

 

[Alf]

On the whole I reckon if you want to buy a cheap plane that may or may not need some work (depending on how lucky you are) and has no built in adjustments worth the name, you'd have a much higher chance of ending up with a good plane by buying a few old woodies...

Cheers, Alf

 

[bobscarle]

Thanks everybody for your responses, very interesting they are.

I realise of course that there is an element of "You get what you pay for" but it did surprise me that a cheap plane worked really quite well. Now this may be due to a good example of the plane, or, more likely, my inexperience. Yes, I had convinced myself that I would have to spend a lot of money and that still may happen. I guess you are right, if a tool does what you expect it to, then there is no need to change it. Even with an expensive plane I would still have the ability to reverse engineer the silk purse.

Bob (Who is now slightly less confused)