Bevel up in a Bevel down plane?

Never did it on purpose ...

Stephen Kirk in Quakertown PA


>But, I haven put accidentally put the iron in upside down. I could usually tell right away because it didn't cut too well. I think to run a blade bevel up you need a different bed angle, or something like that.

Re: Bevel up in a Bevel down plane?

Denis Ch�nard, Orl�ans, Ont.


>If we take a regular bench plane with the frog at 45 degrees and the blade ground at 25 degrees, that would give you an effective angle of 70 degrees, which could be used for wood with really gnarly grain. Would be quite hard to push, though.

But my impression is that doing this in a plane not designed for it might not work very well. You might not be able to close down the throat, for one thing.

But then I've never tried it myself.

DC

Re: Bevel up in a Bevel down plane?

woodburnbob


>The answer to your second question is no.

The answer to your first question is it depends.

Let's assume a Bailey style plane with a 45 degree frog and a blade with a 30 degree bevel. Bevel down it will have a 45 degree cutting angle and a 15 degree relief. Before making radical thought experiments, you need to have a sense of the purpose of these angles and the outcome of varying either or both in standard arrangement.

Anyway, just flipping the blade bevel up, there will be a 75 degree cutting angle and a 45 degree relief. Obviously, you would need a huge force to push the blade even in soft wood. You will crush and tear wood fibers and have ugly chatter. At the most minimal depth of cut (< 0.001") you might succeed in skimming shavings if the wood is very flat, your plane sole is very flat, and your plane is very rigid. If the blade is sharp you will quickly fracture the cutting edge because there is no edge support with a 45 degree relief. Imagine using an expensive and fine straight razor as a card scraper.

Now if you take your thought experiement a bit further, and produce a 100 degree cutting angle and grind for a different relief (say, 10 degrees) your have a perfectly appropriate scraper plane.

That is, if you regrind your blade with a 55 degree bevel (45+55=100) and a 35 degree back bevel you'll have a pretty good scraper plane in bevel up mode. I've done it, grinding on my Tormek. It turns a stock Bailey #4 into a semi-useful scraper plane.

The problem is that you may have to experiment with the 55 grinding degree angle to get the best scraping angle, which varies with use. That is the great benefit of having a #112 style scraper...the exact angle can be easily varied.

Re: Bevel up in a Bevel down plane?

Warren in Lancaster, PA


>There used to be a transmission shop near my house. One day a guy drove down the road in reverse from 8 miles away looking for that shop. You can drive that way, but who would want to?

Re: Bevel up in a Bevel down plane?

paul womack


>What would happen if you inserted an iron bevel up when it should be bevel down? Is this ever done for special situations or reasons?

HNT Gordon planes use this - it turns the normal bevel into a back bevel, which has the effect of greatly increasing effective angle.

BugBear

Re: Bevel up in a Bevel down plane?

Pam Niedermayer - Austin, TX


>I was about to make this point, too. What's more, it works great. However, if you plan to do this regularly you'll probably want to buy an additional blade since using one as a scraper dulls, actually rounds over, the blade significantly. To get it sharp you'd have to flatten the back and/or increase the bevel angle to take out the round. This process will shorten the life of the blade to the point that it makes more sense, especially once sharpening time is factored in, to buy the extra blade.

Pam

Ok- I get it. Thanks.

Joe in a Cleveland suburb

I do it all the time...

Scott Burr in Ben Lomond CA


>In my Stanley 101. With the blade sharpened @ 30 deg you can flip it over and have a little York piched smoother! Cool...

Re: Bevel up in a Bevel down plane? *LINK*

Chris Scholz


>An in-between solution is the "wedge behind the balde" arrangement. Supposedly works well for Chinese planes (one modern incarnation of the Chinese planes are some HNT Gordon planes). There is also a US patent on that arrangement.

Chris




Wedge behind the blade

Re: wedge behind blade

Pam Niedermayer - Austin, TX


>Very interesting, but it seems the blade's edge would easily be unsupported, which would be bad. To avoid, the wedge would have to have a perfect shape.

Pam