Questions, questions, questions

Sounds to me like you...

Scott Burr in Ben Lomond CA

>Have the 4.5 and the 5 reversed. The 5 is a jack plane and should be used for initinal material removal and general flatting (i.e. set for a deep cut). Then you follow up with the 4.5 set for a very fine shaving to do your final smoothing. Other than that it sounds like your aproach is correct. Save the 7 for edge jointing and flattening large boards.

Keep up the good work...work? this is fun!

Re: Questions, questions, questions

Jim in Burlington Ontario

>You need that #7 in service and ready to roll. It depends on wether it was red oak or white. I start scrub if it's really rough then 5 then 7 last very fine cuts with a 4 1/2. You might want to splurge and get Rob Cosman's rought to ready video. Should take about 45 min IMO.

Re: Questions, questions, questions

Larry Marshall

>The thing I do differently is to begin with a scrub plane. Mine's not a true scrub plane but rather an old Record #4 where I've ground a good sized radius (about a 3" radius as I recall). This allows you to peel wood away pretty quickly to get the board to thickness and to remove most of any cup that exists.

I enjoy handplaning a lot so this process is appealing to me. That said, when I need a lot of boards for a large project, I hand the wood to my tailed apprentice to get it to thickness. I can hear the hand-tool lightning gods loading up now:-)

Cheers --- Larry

www.woodnbits.com

Re: Questions, questions, questions

Jonathan Peck -N.Y.

>Larry,

I think you've found your soul mate. You still haven't picked up that scrub plane yet? You know you still want one.....bad! Please ping me on the weekend so I'll remember to throw that #80 in my bag for you.

Later

Re: Questions, questions, questions

Bill Houghton, Sebastopol, CA

>Preparing stock by hand is a matter of progressing from serious hogging of wood that leaves the surface pretty rough to finer and finer approximations of flat and smooth.

I'd suggest a scrub plane. People make them from No. 3s and 4s. I haven't done this because I have a Stanley No. 40 I picked up used (though I have a sort-of No. 3 that I plan to modify some time, just so I can compare it to a true scrub). I like the scrub.

Once you've got it more or less true, you use other planes, jointer or jack being the commonest, to get it flat, followed by a smoothing plane as needed.

I did more or less what you did in my earlier years, and it takes a LONG time. With a scrub and intelligent use of the other planes, you cut the time in half.

Re: Questions, questions, questions

Michael R

>I have a no.40 also, but before I got it, I modified a no-name no.5. I set the frog back all the way and ground a fairly shrp curve into the blade so it doesn't cut full width. Depending on the situation, I often like the extra size and weight of the no.5.

Re: Questions, questions, questions

Kerry in FortSask

>Thanks for all of the advice. Sounds like I should be looking for a scrub plane of some description. I'm so reluctant to mess with the #5 that I have because it seems to work so nicely as it is now. It's the first plane that I've lapped the sole on and filed all the mating surfaces flat. I'm going to lap the sole and re-sharpen the blade on the #4 1/2 and will try it for final smoothing next time. Maybe I'll put a radius on the #4 blade and try that for use as a scrub, I kind of wanted to get an old Stanley #4 anyway for a smooth plane.

I started lapping the sole of the #7 last night but I need to get some coarser material to remove metal faster. There appears to be a slight hollow in the front of the sole, towards one side right around the front knob.

Thanks again,

Kerry

One more idea...

Jonathan Kaplan (OR)

>All the above comments are right-on, of course, but one additional thing to think about is this: why thickness wood at all when using hand-tools? Of course, if boards are warped, etc., you need to get them all flat and then to the same thickness, but in general, there is often no good reason to make a board thinner... Sometimes there is a good reason, and then the scrub etc. is the way to go, but often I've found it just doesn't matter that much how thick the board is, as long as it is flat and even...

Best,

jk