Reworking new planes to act like old and well used ones
For more information on planes, see our beginner site Common Woodworking.
Introducing thoroughbred plane sole changes
Steps to reworking the soles of planes for real woodworking
Smaller bevel-up planes
I have mentioned this smaller bevel-up smoothing plane made by Veritas of Canada a couple of times now. I first met with the plane a couple of years ago when I met with the engineers and designers to see just what was behind the scenes in bringing new and innovative designs to hand tool enthusiasts. I couldn’t help but feel that this plane was destined for good things and though I have seen reviews from time to time, I must say that cannot praise the quality of the design and what it brings to market. Scarcely has any tool, plane, impressed me so much.
I have used all of the Veritas range of planes for a substantial period now and know them to be very well made. I have used just about every other type of plane too, old, new, wood, cast iron, plastic!!!! I am well acquainted with them all. It’s somewhat controversial today in my saying that bevel-up planes cannot fully replace bevel-down planes, but I stand by this because I know it to be perfectly true. My experience working planes at the bench throughout my ten hour days most days helps me analyse these things and though I may be seen to be controversial, that’s never my intention. Countering misinformation gets more and more difficult because so many opinions that have little or no real basis from those with a real working knowledge. Only time will tell about bench heights, bevel-ups and usually after the damage has become irreparable. So I blog in hopes that some will listen.
On then to BU planes.
Using the small bevel-up plane at first left me reserving my use of it because of a couple of things. I was reluctant to do to this particular plane what I really wanted to and always do to all my personal planes and the school planes and that is bevel the outer rim or corner of the plane’s sole with a very shallow bevel all the way around the underside corners where the sides, front and back and heel meet the sole of the plane. This relieving is not something plane makers have ever done as far as I know, but decades ago I questioned why old cast metal planes felt so much better on the wood than any new one, regardless of the maker, the quality or anything else. In two seconds I knew the very obvious answer, and on all the planes I owned I did what I said, I beveled the soles. The difference this one act made totally transformed the planes and made them pure joy to use.
The drawing shows the bevelled area
Though the heel of the plane is stepped, I still felt there was arise that these edges
In working the plane, I have found I can joint edges to about 24″ long with very little effort. It is especially good on stock 3/4″ and thinner and I love it on 1/2″ stock such as drawer sides. I have jointed edge three feet long so far and found it works very well. I use the plane for breaking corners trimming the rims of boxes and drawer fitting. It takes a little more for me to surface plane because of surface grain tear out, but I do do it from time to time. I bevel or round the corners of the iron just as I do on the bevel down bench planes and this has the same effect of preventing step-down track from the width of the blade.
On the shooting board this plane is highly effective and especially so on lighter weight stock. I should think violin makers would like this plane for shooting the curly maple necks and finger boards as would guitar makers too. The bouts would be a breeze on curly maple and with the plane being so small it would handle the 2mm,1″ wide material easily. Box makers should shoot for one of these planes too.sharpened to 15,000, this plane will trim, shape and refine fine work like no other.
The smooth and well-finished hardwood handles are wonderful in the hand. They fit comfortably and hold up under the stresses of planing very well. Thy feel so solid and never flex, something you especially don’t want in planes and saws.
The closing of the throat is very similar to some of the older block plan from the Stanley and Record stables of pre- and post-war eras. Don’t be surprised if this plane doesn’t replace your block plane, although I am not at all suggesting that it should. Closing the throat opening prevents the fibres rising ahead of the cutter and tearing out the awkward grain. Most work with this plane will be finer work, so I have mine set pretty tightly.
I suppose the whole of this article sums up my conclusion really. It’s a really fine plane and I like to use it for finer work. This next few weeks I will use it as much as possible to see if there is any change of mind now that I have made the changes to the plane. The work I did took only a few minutes. I am glad I did it.
YouTube video:
If you want a 7-minute video showing the refinement go here. W did this some time back and it shows a practical way of outer-bevelling accurately.
I like the versitility of having more than one plane…..
I think that that is true. Veritas and Lee Valley look for feedback. What I am suggesting is that people simply customise their planes to personal needs. When we bought planes in the sixties we had to do so much to them to make them do what they needed to do, but I remember this with such a fondness. Listening to my mentor. watching his deft hands show me where to start. I learned and retained more in that hour than I ever have since.
Score one for me – I actually started doing this to my own planes as I was learning to use them – about 3-4 years ago. Pual, your logic on this matches mine to a tee. I do this with Stanley’s, Record’s, woodie’s, and the 4 Veritas planes I have. All planes, bench, block, palm, etc benefit from this. I too have wondered why Veritas and LN do not radius/bevel the corners. I think due to added production cost
Right, let’s see what we can do.
I think it has less to do with added cost than it does the demands of the shaving maker who puts a straightedge on the sole and machinist’s square on all corners to test for flatness and squareness before he starts making shavings. Since machinists run woodworking magazines here in the US, everything is measured as to how it compares to some Platonic ideal of flatness and squareness. Any deviation is seen as a fatal flaw. Even the owner of Lie-Nielsen has said they use rotary lappers, not because they are needed, but because that level of flatness is demanded.
The world of wood machining a few thousandths of error compounded through construction of casework means it is fatally out of square with no ability to correct because the blade of a table saw deflects too much to correct even a few hundredths of an inch of error.
If the manly and technologically advanced table saw requires this level of accuracy, then a plane must require it as well. Since these Normites dominate the woodworking press in the US, their opinions dominate what is written. I watched a popular woodworking show where the host ripped a 44″ wide cherry board into 7″ wide strips so he could run them over his jointer and through his planer. Then he glued them up again so he could have a table top 42″ wide. Next time give me the gorgeous slab and I’ll flatten it with my 100 year old wooden jack and make a 44″ wide table.
Even the patron saint of hipster woodworking, who is over time getting closer to real wood working, grumbles about his machines being out of alignment. He talks about how this plane or that saw is better, but never really demonstrates the understanding of fundamentals that keeps me paying my subscription to WWMC every month.
I saw the ads for, both, the Veritas and Lie-Lielson low angle planes about 20 yrs ago and was intrigued with their claims of ease of use in taming wilder grained woods. I bought a low angle smoother from Veritas and a low angle jack from Lie Neilson with every intension of keeping the one I liked best and sending the other back. They are both still in my plane well and very quickly became my go-to planes for their respective tasks.
I have, over the years, run into the same issues as Paul here as far as gouging work, especially when edge jointing. Very frustrating and I have often thought of easing the sharp side edges to help eliminate this issue. I was always afraid that might be fixing one thing just to cause some other, unexpected, problem that would then be irrevocable. After reading this post I’ll be out in the shop today with file and stones. Thanks for the insight Paul.