Adjusting a plane

Re: Adjusting a plane

thomd

>For me, I mostly find a hammer that will progressively seat the blade with each tap, neihter too heavy or light. Mostly I don't bother looking at it. I just make a tap and take a cut. I mostly sight to judge if it is level. I mostly look from the front. If you look from the back you don't see as good a line, since from that angle the bevel can reflect light. I also use my fingers on either side of the blade in the "V" for vistory postion.

You see a lot of pictures of guys taping while the plane is upside down and they are sighting the plane bottom. Not the most stable position to do woodwork in . I wonder if they cut dovetails in that stance. In a lot of workshops there probably never was particularly good light, I mostly do it by feel and how the cut looks. I don't find the posing position is all that good for anything other than getting the blade parallel.

Eye sight

Jim in Burlington On

>Personally I struggled with that very problem. Tried David Charlesworth's method, the sighting method from either end. Finally bought a bench magnifing glass with the round florescent bulb's. Now I can see the difference the light makes the black edge is visible from either end.

Re: Adjusting a plane

Derek Cohen (in Perth, Australia)

>John

I have never had much success trying to gauge the projection visually, other than to judge whether the blade was parallel with the sole. I use a finger tip to feel the amount of projection at the sides and the centre, and make a judgement this way.

Regards from Perth

Derek

Re: Adjusting a plane

Roy Anderson

>Here's the method that I use. I found this on someone's web site, but I don't remember who's, so apologies for stealing your idea if you read this.

I always carry a scrap of squared wood in my apron for adjusting plane depts. I just run the squared edge along the sole of the plane across the throat. It feels the depth of the blade and helps you see the depth of the blade. This method is very precise because, unlike the finger method, the wood extends over the throat without flexing. It doesn't depend on having the best lighting, and it's very useful for checking the side to side cant of the blade. See pic.

My plane adjusting time has been greatly reduced with this method.

Re: Adjusting a plane

Tony M

>I saw a pic of this old guy adjusting a plane that way, but he probably doesent know what he's doing :)

Re: Adjusting a plane

David Charlesworth

>It was Krenov who wrote about sighting from the back which clearly must work.

If you use a cambered blade, the wooden shim, (I use a much thinner one), say about 3/32" thick, is very useful to help adjust lateral.

You can detect the vanishing point of the blade at either side.

When young, I used to sight from the front but age definitely has an effect on eye sight, so the shim is exceptionally useful if you don't see as well as you used to......

Once lateral is correct, I retract blade and wind slowly out, taking test shavings off the edge of a piece of scrap. (Metal palnes with adjusters). Nothing is more disheartening than gouging a panel when all you wanted was the lightest, finishing, clean up set of shavings!

David Charlesworth

Me too, as well as...

Scott Burr in Ben Lomond CA

>Jim Kingshott recommends this method.

Re: Adjusting a plane *LINK*

Pam Niedermayer - Austin, TX

>I adopted Terry Gordon's method for all my planes, which is put the plane on a piece of flat hardwood, edge down, tap the blade, which gives me a sort of minimum depth that will plane. Be careful to choose a fresh area on the hardwood each time. Adjust downward from there if necessary.

It's easy, fast, and sure.

Pam


HNT Gordon's Blade setting instructions

Re: Adjusting a plane

thomd

>"It was Charlesworth who wrote about withdrawing the blade which clearly must work."

I always have this feeling that a heavier cut takes away from my edge at least for the finnest cut, so I work it out. Sometimes it's frustrating if I haven't placed it in the right starting position and I'm taping away like an idiot and nothing is happening. That rarely happens and I like working it out.

Sometimes after reviewing all the methods I wonder if we should just have a policy of listing the short list of methods that don't work...