Plane, scraper, sandpaper???

Re: Plane, scraper, sandpaper???

Scott Post

>You'll get a variety of responses on this, but here's mine.

I usually sand to get rid of the tiny ridges and to even things out. Planes and scrapers leave burnished areas that show up in the finish. I've mentioned it before, but I actually ran a test by taking planed, scraped, and sanded test pieces to work and having non-woodworkers pick their favorites. They generally preferred planed wood when unfinished, but liked the sanded wood better when a finish was applied. It had a more even sheen, with no shiney or dull spots. I plane or scrape to level the surface quickly and remove areas of tearout then give it a quick sanding to even out the surface. And I do mean quick - it only takes a few swipes.

As far as what grit to go to, it depends entirely on the wood. I never bother sanding heavily grained woods like oak and ash past 120 grit. It's a waste of time since the sanding scratches get lost in the grain and will never be seen. On tight grained woods like maple I'll sand to 220. I never bother going past 220 because you won't see a difference under the finish and you actually run the risk or poor adhesion.

Re: Plane, scraper, sandpaper???

Eric Hedberg

>Pete,

The quality of the finish (getting the fire etc.) is best with the plane, better with the scraper, and good with sand paper. A plane slices the wood cells but more effectively than a scraper. Sandpaper abrades (grinds, chews) the surface down smooth which is why you lose the look. I am quickly moving away from sandpaper (tough when you live near 3M) to planes and scrapers. I use a scraper only if I encounter wood that just will not avoid tearout. There is skill and tool quality considerations when you don't use sandpaper, but there are lots of solutions to that. Sanding combined with scraping (planing) can be useful, but don't forget the residue grit in the wood is dulling your edge. Eric

Re: Plane, scraper, sandpaper???

Pam Niedermayer - Austin, TX

>I try to save the sandpaper for the finish, not the wood, same applies for rottenstone and pumice. So ideally, it doesn't come into play until a coat or two of finish has been applied.

Pam

Re: Plane, scraper, sandpaper???

bob m

>Pam,

Wouldn't planing produce areas that would absorb the stain differently?

Bob

Re: Plane, scraper, sandpaper???

Pam Niedermayer - Austin, TX

>Well, maybe sometimes on some woods/cuts, but I consider that part of the character of a piece. However, my personal preference is for all the hand work to show; so I don't want to sand that away. Besides, I hardly ever stain anything, other than coloring that comes along coincidentally with shellac, oil, etc.

Pam

Re: Plane, scraper, sandpaper???

Steve Knight

>the sand part is sanding makes a better feeling surface if it is something you handle. but it does matter how far you sand though it depends on the wood. if you jsut use a oil/wax or thin finish and plan on handling the piece sanding father will make it feel better. Plus it makes the grain stand out more. I used to sand my infills to 1200 grit. it made all the difference.

Re: Plane, scraper, sandpaper???

Pam Niedermayer - Austin, TX

>That's just not true. Sanding makes a more uniform surface; but if that's what you want, slop on the filler, you'll get retail furniture smooth, exquisite feel, but not wood.

I like the feel of real wood worked by hand.

Pam

Re: Plane, scraper, sandpaper???

Scott Post

>I highly recommend getting a copy of Flexner or Jewitt's book and watching Jewitt or Klausz's video. These guys know how to use planes and do use them to level surfaces. However, at the end they sand. It doesn't muddy the surface, ruin the grain, or eliminate the mythological "deep shimmer". It simply allows the surface to give back an even sheen once the finish goes on. And sanding is just a tiny, tiny piece of prepping the wood. It's just a few quick strokes after the planes and scrapers have done the bulk of the work.

There are some pieces of dogma that tend to really get perpetuated on the Internet, most of it by folks who, frankly, haven't built much. (I'm not aiming this at you personally, Pam) There's another woodworking forum (non-handtool related) that I really like because it's populated by professionals and serious hobbiests who take a very practical view and are quick to discount some of the more persistent internet myths. I don't think any of them would brag about owning one of everything Lie Nielsen makes - these guys and gals build things. I know things I took as fact got thrown out the window when I really started building stuff. Everyone said planed surfaces were better but the first large tabletop I built taught me otherwise. Unless you're putting on an awfully flat finish an uneven sheen on any surface of appreciable size looks horrible. It doesn't look like craftsmanship - it looks sloppy. I don't sand narrow surfaces because that uneveness doesn't show up. For example, I fit two full overlay doors with a block plane this morning to get them perfectly flush with the cabinet sides along the entire length of each stile. I didn't sand the door edges because my eye won't pick it up. The surface off the block plane is fine. I did, however, sand the door panels.

On the issue of toolmarks, it sounds really quaint to talk about the look and feel of a hand tooled surface, but thats another internet myth that got dashed pretty quick the first time I had it show up on a piece. In particular, I have two pieces (a bed footboard and a coffee table) where if the light hits them just right I can see a plane track. It drives me nuts. Sure, they look hand crafted, but hand crafted in the sense of those pine spice racks with the heart shaped cutouts they sell at the craft mall. I don't take tool marks as a sign of craftsmanship anymore then horribly uneven dovetails. Using hand tools doesn't mean we should set our sights lower.

Re: Plane, scraper, sandpaper???

Pam Niedermayer - Austin, TX

>Scott, I have watched those videos, have truly done my homework; and I think it unfair to characterize what I said as advocating an artsy/crafty piece. I'm also trying to be a professional, and to that end I know I often have to aim for the retail furniture plastic finish, so I've learned how to do that.

However, in my personal work I feel free to not sand, sometimes to not even finish; so I do a lot of Japanese smoother work, which produces an incredibly smooth finish that's often burnished. This is the major difference between the Japanese/wooden planes and the western metal planes. It probably takes longer to get that finish with a Japanese smoother than using sandpaper to get a perfectly smooth finish, probably takes a lot more careful stock selection, and I need a lot more practice, but it is possible.

Now with a sophisticated client I feel free to plane, maybe scrape, nothing more to prepare for finishing. I sand the finish coats. And there's nothing amateurish about any of it.

Pam

Re: Plane, scraper, sandpaper???

Dennis

>Well Scott your my hero of the year, and your correct.

As a matter of fact i never agreed with the educated consumer theory either.

Dennis

remove nospam for email

Re: Plane, scraper, sandpaper???

Scott Post

>A finish that looks like plastic is result of finishing technique - not surface prep. 37 coats of polyurethane without leveling between coats looks like plastic. A properly applied finish won't look like plastic regardless of whether the wood was planed or sanded.

Re: Plane, scraper, sandpaper???

Pam Niedermayer - Austin, TX

>I said plastic to emphasize the smooth feel and look, as accomplished with fillers and the like, not the 7 coats of poly applied to bars.

Pam

Re: Plane, scraper, sandpaper???

Christopher Schwarz

>I vowed to keep my mouth shut on this thread, but I can't.

I build stuff, and I know Pam does, too. I've built a lot of pieces without sandpaper. The table on the cover of our November issue never saw sandpaper � and it was dyed and stained. The Eames table in our February issue (just out). Same way on the curly maple top (I had to sand the bent-lam legs). No sandpaper. Just a wicked sharp #4 and a card scraper to clean up a couple trouble spots. I built a 60" diameter red-oak kitchen table this year with two 12" leaves. No sandpaper. Pickled finish and no problems. You can plane a large surface and it can look fantastic when finished.

But with some stuff I have to resort to sandpaper for a few swipes (pieces built with interlocked mahogany, ugh). And there's not a bit of shame in it. In fact, many traditionally trained woodworkers would say that proper surface prep should *always* be plane, scrape and sand. I won't argue with them that it produces a sound surface, but I'm going to sand as little as possible.

I've done some comparisons side-by-side with scraped, sanded and planed surfaces. And when I sanded, I used a monster Fein RO sander and treated it like a piece of production work (not a couple swipes with 220, in other words). I can tell a difference between planed and RO sanded surfaces. Others could tell a difference, too.

I actually don't think that's what's in contention here, though. You can't tell me that an RO surface (120, 150, 220) will look the same or better than a planed or scraped one (and I don't think you are). You also can't tell me that a couple hand swipes with 220 will destroy the "chatoyance" of a planed surface � you're not seriously scratching the surface or generating that much dust.

So plane, scrape and then sand if you have to. Just make it look as good as you possibly can.

Chris

Scott, It is not a myth

Link Van Cleave

>Hey Scot, Interesting post. You said that there were myths perpetuated by people who didn't build anything. Some of these things might

be mythological to you because you can't do them, that doesn't mean they don't exist. Last time I checked my friends Jim Krenov, Dave

Finck, Seth Janofsky, Nicholas Goulden, to name but a few have built a few things. I sure hope those guys aren't the ones perpetuating

those myths you are talking about. You debunk these myths by your extensive experience I see. You tried it once, it didn't work and so

it must be a myth. Hmmm. You said you took some samples to "work" for people to chose which one's they prefer. Work , you mean

woodworking is not your work. You are a amateur. Nothing wrong with that. In fact it is a good thing. It means you have more time to get

better at planing. I find it funny that you think some of these things are internet myths. The knowledge or myths as you call them have

been around a lot longer than the internet. You must get most of your information from the internet though. You also said your first table

top taught you that hand planing large surfaces was not a good method or didn't produce a good surface. Your first table you say. I

think it should have told you that you needed practice. If you have poor technique don't blame the method. I don't think tool marks are

quaint, I think they are valid on certain types of furniture. And I can assure you that Krenov's furniture (and mine for that matter ) doesn't

look like pine spice racks with hart shaped cut outs. When done properly, in the right wood, hand planed surfaces are beautiful to look

at and touch. You need the right planes, finely tuned and the right wood. Of course it doesn't make since to go to all that trouble if you are

going to cover it with a film finish. A hand planed surface needs a light in the wood type finish. You can see and feel a difference, and if

that is what you like then great, but it isn't a myth. Some wood just won't let you hand plane it, no matter how fine the opening or sharp

the blade. With these woods you scrape and sand and do what ever it takes. In a lot of my jobs I end up sanding. I remove milling

marks with a hand plane, (because it is fast and accurate, keeps edges clean and true ) then I sand with 220 or finer. When I have

woods that hand planing will really bring out the character I want I do it. It is not always appropriate as a final treatment. I don't do it on

kitchen cabinets, or plywood for example. What I am trying to say here is I am not down on sanding, I just feel like you are not debunking

"myths", you are making some of your own. Hand planed surfaces don't look bad, or like pine spice racks. They have a unique look and

feel all their own. It's not always easy to achieve but it is in no way a myth.

LVC

What did people do...

Dan clermont in Burnaby

>Before sandpaper? When did sandpaper become an option?

TIA,

Dan Clermont

I think all of you are wrong, and I...

Christopher Fitch @ Memphis

>... am right!

:)

I have followed this discussion with some interest and I have realized that all of you are missing some salient points.

A month or so ago I decided to repeat the Christopher Schwarz test of planing vs scraping vs sanding to see for myself what is better.

Disclaimer: I, unlike everyone else on this board, am definitely an amateur. In addition, I would like to think that I have a brain and use it from time-to-time. I certainly do well enough at my regular job as Manager of Platform Engineering at my company.

;)

I took a piece of scrap cherry and used my bandsaw to resaw it into three equal pieces. I planed all three pieces to a similar state using a #5.

Then I planed one piece using a Ray Iles Infill, scraped one piece using a Veritas cabinet scraper, and finally I sanded the third piece from 120 grit up to 320 grit.

After that I applied the same finish to all three pieces, a mix of BLO, Turpentine, and Polyurethane using a brush.

In the next few posts I will post some pictures and commentary about my results...

Part1

Christopher Fitch @ Memphis

>Here is the image of the planed cherry.

It's hard to tell in the picture, but the surface is not ideal. I had to apply 4 coats of the finished to get any buildup. I was suprised by this and disappointed in the look of the piece. The finish is splotchy at best and I do not know why it ended up this way.

Part 2

Christopher Fitch @ Memphis

>Here is the image of the sanded cherry.

I only had to apply three coats and I noticed the difference after two coats. The finish sat up better for lack of a better phrase. I was very suprised that the finish worked so well on this piece.

Part 3

Christopher Fitch @ Memphis

>Here is ... wait?!?!?! Where is the scraped cherry piece? oops sorry I cannot find it.

But the scraped piece acted just liked the planed piece. It was disappointing to say the least.

What is shown is a piece of walnut that was treated similar to the planed cherry. I planed it with a jack and then used my infill on it for the final surface treatment.

There are some significant differences. The walnut was finished with some water-based lacquer and then was rubbed out following Dresdner's steps for a rubbed out finish.

The results were startling and were gorgeous.

Comments...

Christopher Fitch @ Memphis

>I know it's hard to tell the difference from the pictures but it's there.

I took the pieces in to my wife and asked her point blank what she liked the best out of the three cherry pieces. She picked the sanded piece right off. I asked her to make sure and she confirmed her choice. Then I showed her the walnut and she loved that better than the others (obviously).

So what does this all mean?

A number of things in my opinion:

1) Beauty is in the eye of the beholder or put a different way, someone saying something looks better than something else is subjective. Arguing about it is, not to insult anyone, foolish.

2) There are far too many variables involved in this whole discussion to hope for an absolute such as "planed surfaces looked better than sanded surfaces". My experiments proved to me this point. I could not attribute the differences in the cherry pieces to wood or to anything else definitively. My GUT feeling is that cherry does better with that type of finish if you do some sanding. The planing steps gave awesome results on the walnut.

3) With different finishes and different techniques and different experience levels, one will receive different results. (No duh Christopher). What this means is that what works well in one set of circumstances, may not work well in another. The fact that wood is a hetergeneous material means that we can never be certain of the results we get.

oh well...

that's my opinion...what do I know, I'm just an amateur.

:)

Christopher F.

Re: I think all of you are wrong, and I...

Pam Niedermayer - Austin, TX

>OK, so which salient points did all of us miss?

And as an aside, there are quite a few very experienced woodworking professionals on this board, I'm not one, yet.

Oh, yeah, and there are quite a few experienced software and hardware engineers on the board, of whom I am one, whatever that means. If you mean that to imply and/or verify some ability to use a brain, it has about as much validity as other stereotypes (yes, Virginia, I've known a lot of dumb software developers, not that you are one).

As to your experiment, I planed cherry, my Japanese smoother fell in love with it, never even needed any further finish.

Pam

Re: Plane, scraper, sandpaper???

Mark Harrison -- in Sydney, Australia

>This discussion is quite timely for me.

I am in the process of building night stands at the moment. These are similar (though not identical) to the pieces by Michael Dunbar in FW 142. Similar in form though not materials. I am substituting my local materials for those of the NE of the USA.

The primary wood is colloquially referred to as Red Gum (either Eucalyptus camaldulensis or Eucalyptus tereticornis, they're fairly similar). This stuff is HARDDDD. I haven't used Hard Maple (acer sacharrum) but the guides say that that Red Gum is way harder. How much depends on which test you believe.

What I can tell you is that this is almost impossible to plane or scrape and expect to get a consistent finish. I have tried a HNT Gordon smoother, Stanley 112 and hand scraping. The Stanley 112 and hand scraping gives a better finish than planing but the best finish, by far, is obtained by sanding. The grain on this timber is so interlocked that even scraped there are distinctly smooth and rough patches in bands.

Yes, the tools that I have tried are wickedly sharp and while I am an amateur, I have been doing this long enough to have half a clue. Maybe not much than half, but that depends on the day you ask me :-)

My discussions with Australian craftsman tend to confirm my observations.

One other thing I did try (on a test piece) was my Veritas LA block plane. Funnily enough, this wasn't too bad and if I was the owner of one of the larger LA smoothers (LN or LV) I might be tempted to give it a try. However, I'm not that lucky so the point is moot. I'm not intending to smooth plane all the material with a block plane. I don't have hard deadlines but I would like to finish this sometime :-)

Re: I think all of you are wrong, and I...

Mark Harrison -- in Sydney, Australia

>Pam,

I just looked at the time you posted this; either you need to get out more or you have been out and just got back :-)

I have a question about your HNT smoother and the mouth size when adjusted to use. Do you have a feeler guage set? If so, could you tell me what yours is and I will check mine tomorrow and report back as well.

One of the problems I have is that the plane seems to block to block too easily. This could be a carbon based failure on my part as I am still not 100% sure that I am doing the right thing with it yet despite having 18 months with it.

Regards,

Mark

Re: I think all of you are wrong, and I...

Christopher Fitch @ Memphis

>#2:

"There are far too many variables involved in this whole discussion to hope for an absolute such as "planed surfaces looked better than sanded surfaces". My experiments proved to me this point. I could not attribute the differences in the cherry pieces to wood or to anything else definitively. My GUT feeling is that cherry does better with that type of finish if you do some sanding. The planing steps gave awesome results on the walnut."

For you, results were great on cherry with a plane. That's cool...

For me they weren't. Oh well, better luck next time...

For me, planing on walnut with the same plane I used on the cherry gave the results I had hoped for.

As such this lead to my point #3:

"What this means is that what works well in one set of circumstances, may not work well in another. The fact that wood is a hetergeneous material means that we can never be certain of the results we get."

Carrying this out further, what works for one woodworker may not work for another. It's not good or bad.... it's just the way it is. Just as one person stating they like sanded vs planed is not good or bad.

Hence Point #1:

"Beauty is in the eye of the beholder or put a different way, someone saying something looks better than something else is subjective. Arguing about it is, not to insult anyone, foolish."