Its been a while. Got caught up in my other obsession, fly fishing. Back to plane making. I wanted to document a start to finish of a plane. A simple plane that most woodworkers could make using tools they already likely have. I will follow a plan published in Furniture & Cabinetmaking issues 188-190. The article was written by Karl Holtey. Below is a sketch of the plan I will follow. Sides will be 1/8" brass and the sole 1/4" O1 ground tool steel.

Update on the Bent Back Mitres

I had 2 weeks off work for Christmas and plane making took a back seat for a while. A relative was married in the summer and my gift to them was to build for them a piece of furniture of their choice. They decided on a dining room table and the Christmas break was the first opportunity I had to get this done.

The material was lumber from a barn apparently cut many years ago (50+ yrs). The farmer wanted his space back in the barn and the material was had for a very good price aka nothing. There is a sad part to the material story, days later  we went back to get more lumber as we knew he wanted rid of it and we were too late. He had burned it, many many hundred board feet of it. For me this is a sickening thought.
 I will say no more about that.  Anyways after many hours of my Christmas holidays the table was delivered. Here are some poor quality Iphone pics. I will try to post better ones the next time i see it again.

My father-in-law scored the material for me, he believes its hickory. I am pretty sure after working it that it is elm. Does not matter, the new owners like it and that's all that counts. The through tenons were secured with African blackwood wedges. Making a project this size is not easy in my cramped 2 car garage but it was a very enjoyable project. Since i stared making planes last year this was my first major woodworking project.

With this off my plate and after a full day of shop clean up it was back to plane making.  Two of the three bent back mitres are complete.

The smallest has boxwood infills and the middle one madrone burl stabilised in acrylic. Both have 22 degree bed angles.

Here is the smallest set up to take the finest shaving.

My till is starting to get full. 

Wayne

Block plane sized smoother

Finished up this block plane sized infill today. It is 6" x 1-3/4" with a 1-3/8" wide 3/16" thick blade bedded at 47-1/2 degrees. Infill is east indian rosewood. With this plane you have all the advantages of an infill plane in a plane small enough to use where you would usually use a block plane.  I took a couple of pics next to my Veritas NX-60 to give a comparison of size. Although not a low angle plane it works great on end grain too. This is the first time taking the lever cap to such a high polish. I think I like it!

Smoother Available

Made this one a while back and its looking for a home. Infill is black and white ebony and the blade is bedded at 52-1/2 degrees. If you are interested give me a shout. Christmas is just around the corner.

Progress on the mitres....

All three of the mitres are now dovetailed, one has been peined together and infilled with madrone burl that I stabilized with acrylic.

This is how the pins are filed with the dovetail shape to provide the space for the peined metal to move into to form the locking double dovetails.

Tennons pass through the sole at the front and back of the plane.

The plane in the background is another block plane sized smoother that i am making for someone. It will be infilled soon with East Indian rosewood.

3 Bent Back Mitres

 

The tale of these 3 bent back mitre planes began before this blog. Its from the stage above I will begin. Earlier steps of bending the sides I will document in a future post.

This type of plane is fairly uncommon in North America, having its roots in Europe. I have for quite some time been following the blog of Bill Carter in the U.K. Who makes a lot of this type of plane.

All the other makers of this type of plane cut the pins in the sides of the plane and then bend to form the shape of the plane. This means you have to be very accurate when you bend so that the dovetails on both sides are perfectly adjacent to each other. I wanted to try bending first then cutting the dovetails (pins really). Here is the piece for the front of the plane. The dovetails will join this piece to the sides. once peined together the joints will almost disappear.

I tried a variety of methods to cut the pins on the bent sides. I tried milling but milling this alloy of brass is not easy as its quite "sticky". I eventually settled on roughing on the band saw then cleaning up on the milling machine. Did not take any pics of the process but this is what I ended up with. I angled the pins approx 10 degrees with a hand file. This is difficult to see here but you will see it when I mark out the dovetails on the sole.

Over the last couple of weeks i have been working on the soles. Although this is a simple looking plane when complete the construction is quite complex, especially the sole. The sole is made in 2 pieces that join together with a tongue and groove joint. I cut the tongue on the mill and the groove by hand with the hacksaw. I use a large sole plate to form a partial frog.  Here it is before the joint is refined with hand files for the perfect fit.

 The Groove is being fine tuned with files.

Here is the front escapement ramp.

 I start with a zero mouth opening that can be lapped open later after plane assembly. This will give me the smallest possible mouth opening.

The sole is clamped to ensure a tight joint and the dovetails marked directly from the pins.

My portaband clamped to my bench is used to rough out the dovetails.  A hacksaw could easily do this too.

One of my favourite tools. A Butterfly die filer.  I use this to refine the dovetails. This old machine does a great job. Its not fast but very controllable and accurate.

That's all for now.

Wayne