Storing Planes

Re: Storing Planes *LINKS*

William R. Duffield on the Cohansey

>Don't put them under your bench. Dust will fall on them, on a cold, damp night they will collect moisture, and they will rust. DAMHIKT!

A better place for them to make them easy to use, is a plane till. Search the old and archived messages and WC Articles and WC Shop Shots for several good examples and discussions, including this one by Dave Anderson.

Even better than an open saw till, especially if your shop is not carefully climate controlled, is a wall mounted tool chest that can be closed up at night to keep condensation from initiating rust. Bob Key has a very good example on his website.

The best place for them, if preservation is important, is in a tightly closed, sealed wooden tool box. Do not set it on a concrete or dirt floor. Note that a metal box is not an acceptable substitute, as it does very little to prevent incursion of moisture and condensation.

Do not seal the inside of the toolbox with poly. That defeats the purpose of the wood. A spit coat of 1# shellac on the inside or some oil should be sufficient. And use well seasoned wood to build it.

Re: Storing Planes

Jack Guzman from Maine

>In the current(October)issue of Popular Woodworking Chris Schwarz makes a cabinet just for planes. Check it out.I think it's a little small but the idea is interesting.---Jack

Re: Storing Planes

Joel Oswald

>Yes, I saw the one in Popular woodworking, but to small for me. That plane till is just exactly what I'm looking for I think. Thank you very much. Now if my dad would get going with redoing the garage, I could make it.......

Re: Storing Planes

Darrell in Oakville

>I just string'em up by their knobs. Sounds cruel, but it works. I tried shelves years ago, but in order to get the storage density and rummage-free access I wanted, I had to switch to this crude and ugly method.

Darrell

Wood Hoarder, Blade Sharpener, and Occasional Tool User

Re: Storing Planes

Angus Barclay, in New Zealand

>For space efficiency, you can't beat hanging them vertically.

Build yourself a wooden cabinet, put enough dividers for the 11 planes you've already got and more spaces for the inevitable additions to the set. I have room for only one more in my tool cabinet, which isn't enough. Hang the planes using loops of string (I used old shoelace).

regards

Angus Barclay

Build a box

jim_reed@marietta

>I built a box and added more shelves as the collection grew. Next box will be shallower and wider. I like to have 'em close by so I can grab the appropriate user by its heel real quick.

Re: Storing Planes *LINK*

Jonathan Peck - N.Y.

>This is how I've been storing mine, but it didn't take long to outgrow. My shop is climate controled due to it's proximity to the boiler/AC room in the basement. Got a little de-humidifier and rust is afeared to come in


Plane Storage

Re: Storing Planes

joel

>Divide your plane into 2 groups - those you use and everything else. By use I mean regularly use. In my case that means about 5 planes plus a shoulder plane that goes in a drawer in my bench. The other 5 go in instant access space, stored sharp and set in the bottom of my tool box, away from dust.

The "actually use" selection is small because to store all my planes in premo space like this would be impossible and I would find myself hunting to get the 5 planes I use all the time.

The other 60 or 70 planes go in my collector's toolbox or in a closet. If I need a narrower shoulder plane, or a side rabbet plane or a bullnose plane, I know where they are but I save a lot of wear and tear on the planes by not having them constantly in the way. In addition by fixing the space you get optimium space for your always ready tools and you never outgrow it. Periodically I have upgraded or changed preferences, so one of the 5 will get demoted and the other promoted.

Incidently my collection toolbox is in the living room so it's easy to show off.

I do the same thing with all my tools so I have a complete workshop full of tools that I actually use, saws too, in a small tool box and a few drawers in my bench. Less to put away, less to clean up, less to collect dust, and most important all readily accessible.

Re: Storing Planes *LINK*

Dan Clermont in Burnaby

>I hang my planes similar to Bob Key's cabinet.


My Cabinet

Re: Hanging Planes for Use

William R. Duffield on the Cohansey

>I might point out to Joel and others that the method that you and Bob employ makes the planes much more readily available for use than hanging them from loops of string. You can get the plane down and put it back with one hand, while fiddling with the string takes two hands and a bit more time, every time you use it. For oft used planes, the extra time to make and install the brackets should pay back in the long run.

Re: Storing Planes

Mike Lietzow

>Hi Dan,

How deep is your cabinet? TIA.

Cheers,

Mike

Sr. William...

Scott Burr in Ben Lomond CA

>Thanks for you first words. I WAS planning to store mine on a shelf under my bench (if I ever complete it). Now I need this post:(

I'm a firm belever in boxes for some planes (those with lots of parts i.e. combo planes). I never finished the insides of these. Why use a split shelac coat on the inside? Also what are your feelings on finishing the outside of a plane box?

Re: Sr. William...

William R. Duffield on the Cohansey

>Maybe I should have said the spit coat of shellac is the most you should need on the inside. It just makes the inside of the box a little easier to keep clean, and makes it look a little more "finished", in case you want to show off your planes in the box. Leaving the inside unfinished should have no serious deleterious effects.

Note also that when I wrote "tight fitting, sealed" I didn't mean that you need to apply a waterproof finish to the outside. Just make it fit tight enough that cold, damp breezes and sawdust won't blow through in the night. Once you have it shut up, the insulative properties of the wood will slow cooling and condensation, and the wood should also absorb some of the moisture from the air, allowing less to condense on your metal tools. The wood should give the moisture back up, as vapor, when you open the box in the morning when the air is warmer and drier.

Of course, with the fog you guys get out there, you might not even be able to see the chest from across the shop in the morning :^)

Re: Storing Planes

Wendell @ Murphy, TX

>How is your ECE scrub store in the cabinet? Seems like you have to do something different from the metal body planes but I can't tell what from the picture? It almost looks like you're using a magnet with the metal strike button on the heel of the plane.

Wendell

Yet another question

Wendell @ Murphy, TX

>How does the shelf for the block and router planes work? From the picture it appears that the front lip of this shelf sticks out past the front of the cabinet. Does the door have a hollow space for other tool storage that allows it to close or does the shelf fold down when you want to close the cabinet? Sorry for all the questions. I really like this design and building storage for my shop is big issue for me right now. The last project I worked on, I swear I spent more time looking for tools in my piles of clutter than I did actually working wood.

Wendell

The chest across the shop?

Scott Burr in Ben Lomond CA

>Try your hand in front of your face sometimes ;).

Thanks for the further explanation.

Re: The chest across the shop?

William R. Duffield on the Cohansey

>I remember the first time I went up to Big Basin, Jan. '79, IIRC.

"Big trees? What big trees? I don't see no trees."

I was back there this Spring. What a difference a little condensation can make.

Re: Hanging Planes for Use

Bill Houghton, Sebastopol, CA

>Sir W and others,

What's your opinion of the security of Dan's (and Bob Key's) method of attaching the planes to the wall in shaky country? I've been considering that type of plane cabinet, but open (yes, I know about rust, yes, but I haven't got room for cabinets with doors in my shoplet), and I worry that when the Big One or even the Moderately-Sized One hits, my planes will all get shaken out of their little brackets and wind up on the floor, broken, along with my heart.

Notice the high level of denial here - I'm assuming that (a) the building won't have fallen down) and (b) I won't be flattened under tons of debris.

I'm kind of resistant to the idea of magnets, which would be the obvious solution, since many of my mechanic's tools are permanently magnetized by various experiences, and it's a pain dealing with all the iron filings that appear to generate spontaneously.

Re: Hanging Planes for Use

William R. Duffield on the Cohansey

>I don't live on the shaky side, so I'm not an expert. SWMBO would not let me live out there, not after experiencing a 6.9 in Taipai several years ago.

First, I think these cabinets probably use French cleats, and that would have to be changed before you even considered securing the individual contents. Second, I think you have a really valid concern. You should seriously consider some sort of positive locking mechanism, which would probably put you back to two handed operation, at least for removal, unless you got really tricky. OTOH, have you considered ductile iron? :^)

Storing planes in 'quake country

Angus Barclay, in New Zealand

>I hang planes by their knobs. Each plane is in its own separate compartment of a wall-hung cabinet (see photo in my earlier message in this thread). The cabinet has a positive latch (sliding bolt) on the door and is hung on a french cleat but also held in place with a bracket screwed to the wall so it can't jump off the cleat when, not if, one of these hits.

Never lost a tool to a quake yet.

regards

Angus Barclay

(posting from quake country)

Re: Storing planes in 'quake country

Bill Houghton, Sebastopol, CA

>Thanks, Angus. Right now, my planes sit on shelves in cubbyholes under the bench, but I'm running out of room - I've noticed that tools in close quarters mate and give birth to more tools, a problem that seems only to accelerate as more tools crowd into the limited space.

I've been playing with the idea of a plane till for a while - who knows, maybe this winter I'll get to go beyond fantasy shoptime.

So Angus: here in California, in earthquakes the ground goes up and down. Does it go down and up there in NZ?

Hey, Scott! (OT)

Bill Houghton, Sebastopol, CA

>I tried e-mailing you at the address on this message, and it got rejected. Are you mad at me, or is it the fog?

We got our first serious Fall Fog this morning - hard to feel my toes until about 10 am, and the pilot assembly on our gas heater seems to have died, with delivery taking about two weeks (it's a great little Irish space heater made by Waterford - looks like a wood stove but without the wood-schlepping - but parts are a bit hard to come by).

Re: Storing planes in 'quake country

Angus Barclay, in New Zealand

>Hello Bob,

in a quake here the ground moves mostly down, then down some more ... because I live on a steep hill and quakes set off landslides. But the long-term (in human, not geological terms) trend is for the land under this town to rise a bit with each quake, so I guess it will all even out eventually.

For storing your planes in a shaky place, you really should find room to fit doors to your cabinets, no matter how small your shop. Cabinets in my tiny 10ft x 16ft shop have doors which provide another place to store tools.

regards

Angus Barclay

(who has ugly cabinets to match the ugly bench)

Hey, Bill! (OT)

Scott Burr in Ben Lomond CA

>That's weird. I get all the spam in the world and can't receive good email...this sucks. I'll look into it on my end tonight.

Scott, Not ready to light the pilot on the heater quite yet...