Anyone Used a Wedged Infill Plane?

[D_W]

I'm about to go on an infill-making binge, and have gone on a short one in the past (3 1/2 planes), but have never made a good lever cap. I have a drill press, no machinist tools, and no interest in buying machinist tools, so the ability to make a lever cap accurately - at least something like you'd find on a norris 2 (where the collar around the cap screw is taller than the rest of the cap) - will rely on my filing caps out of stock, or trying to cast them (I don't really want to do that where I live).

I have suitably raided your infill supply over there thanks to the ebay GSP, so at least I can have some nice examples in front of me:
https://s11.postimg.org/mks0nkqlf/20170521_191641.jpg

I'm thinking that perhaps, it may be a better idea for me to cut a wedge and retain it with flat brass stock (see attached picture). I've seen this on a lot of older infills, and slater made a bunch of planes where the retaining brass rotates:

Anyone used planes like this? Are they as solid in use as one with a lever cap? There is another hidden benefit to one of these retaining caps, and that is that when you make infills with a home store drill press (actually, I used an optical punch and a cordless drill on the last ones), the lever cap often needs to be worked out of perfection so that it accounts for drilling inaccuracy. If this retaining piece was close to spec, the wedge is easier to tune by a mile.

 

[bugbear]

I'm about to go on an infill-making binge, and have gone on a short one in the past (3 1/2 planes), but have never made a good lever cap. I have a drill press, no machinist tools, and no interest in buying machinist tools...

Out of curiosity, If I said I was having trouble with tear-out, and said I had no interest in adjusting cap-irons, what would your reaction be?

BugBear

 

[D_W]

I'm about to go on an infill-making binge, and have gone on a short one in the past (3 1/2 planes), but have never made a good lever cap. I have a drill press, no machinist tools, and no interest in buying machinist tools...

Out of curiosity, If I said I was having trouble with tear-out, and said I had no interest in adjusting cap-irons, what would your reaction be?

BugBear

Well, I wouldn't suggest large powered machinist tools!

I just don't want to buy a mill at this point, because one long enough to do longer infills would cost quite a bit and take up a lot of space. It's the physical aspect of making planes that I like, and making infills entirely by hand is very physical. Time isn't an object - 100 hours on a plane isn't a big deal.

I have a pile of files of just about every type, as well as metal cutting specialty files (like nicholson shear cuts, etc).

The wedge type infill with a cross piece appeals to me for aesthetic, though. The infills I've made before probably have almost an inch of iron and cap iron exposed below the bottom of the lever cap, so I can't see why a wedged plane won't work well - I can get support down that close pretty easily. I just haven't seen a nice wedged plane like the picture I showed for any reasonable price (that one is about $1500), and I try to buy reasonable when I buy subjects to harvest ideas from because most will end up being sold off later.

 

[D_W]

I'll take the lack of responses to suggest that I might be taking a little bit of risk making a plane with a wedge (probably not much, just risk that it might not be quite as good).

In the 10 or so infills that I've gotten, I also bought a Lie Nielsen bronze 4, as I'd sold off all of my premium bench planes a while ago, except for a newer Veritas plane (and never had a bronze 4 to begin with). I figured that from what I recall, the solid feeling of an LN is hard to beat (but the weight will wear you out if you using them for the entire dimensioning process). It doesn't make any difference in wood, and sometimes it can mask small tearout that you can feel on a stanley, but it's a decent bar to aim for when making an infill (that solid feel). Two of the infills have a similar feel, the rest feel a little bit looser - the result on the wood is the same, of course, it's just how they feel.

I'm curious as to whether or not a wedged infill has that locked down feeling, but it will be easy enough to find out in making one. I'll post it here when finished - though I'm sure it'll be a while.

 

[memzey]

Watching with interest Dave. WIP thread and pics please!

 

[essexalan]

Never used one but I reckon the wedge would exert more consistent pressure all along the contact area with the CB. You can buy Norris style lever caps on US ebay. Will also watch your progress with interest.

 

[AndyT]

I've got this one, which might be of interest to you. I bought it out of curiosity, to see how well it would perform. I'm too tight to buy the sort of plane shown in your picture, so this was a compromise. It was relatively cheap, because the back of the casting has been broken. I bought it at a Stanley auction. I think it was about £40 including auction fees and tax, maybe a bit less.

I guess that's a potential problem with any wedged infill - you can't just gently slacken off a screw. On little bullnose or shoulder planes it's common to see a screwed-in strike button as a way round it.

Here are some more detailed shots. The plane is 12 1/2" long, 2 3/4" wide with a 2 3/8" iron. Iron and cap iron are by Moulson Brothers but the plane itself is anonymous. There are three visible rivets through the sides to hold the infills but nothing through the sole. The front of the place for the wedge is integral to the casting and is thick enough not to have broken in use. The wedge holds the iron well and is a good fit, as can be seen by the shininess on the top of it.

It's possibly significant that the bed for the iron is not just the front of the infill - there's an extra slice of wood there, so the bed is side grain. If it wasn't there, the iron would be very difficult to adjust as it would be too close to the handle, which is quite small. Was this original by design, or to correct a mistake, or was it a modification? We could speculate but I don't think we will ever know for sure.

As for how well it performs, well, once it's set up, it works perfectly well, but it doesn't have any magic powers, at least, not that I have discovered. I find the rear handle a little awkward - it's small and rather vertical - though the curved square shape at the front is surprisingly comfortable.

Do say if you want any more details.

 

[bugbear]

There are multiple types of blade-holding wedge system.

* Woodie style, with abutments, only holding the side
* full width wedge under wide, full width fixed bar (Spiers style)
* full width wedge under full width dowel (Krenovian)
* full width wedge under wide pivoting bar (Ulmia, IIRC)

BugBear

 

[D_W]

There are multiple types of blade-holding wedge system.

* Woodie style, with abutments, only holding the side
* full width wedge under wide, full width fixed bar (Spiers style)
* full width wedge under full width dowel (Krenovian)
* full width wedge under wide pivoting bar (Ulmia, IIRC)

BugBear

Yeah, the dowel is out. It's somewhat inferior with a wedge, as opposed to the other designs which can apply pressure further down the wedge.

The rotating bar (but over a large span) is also something that was on a few Slater infills. I'd rather that bar was fixed, though, so that pressure is certainly applied.

 

[D_W]

I've got this one, which might be of interest to you. I bought it out of curiosity, to see how well it would perform. I'm too tight to buy the sort of plane shown in your picture, so this was a compromise. It was relatively cheap, because the back of the casting has been broken. I bought it at a Stanley auction. I think it was about £40 including auction fees and tax, maybe a bit less.

I guess that's a potential problem with any wedged infill - you can't just gently slacken off a screw. On little bullnose or shoulder planes it's common to see a screwed-in strike button as a way round it.

Here are some more detailed shots. The plane is 12 1/2" long, 2 3/4" wide with a 2 3/8" iron. Iron and cap iron are by Moulson Brothers but the plane itself is anonymous. There are three visible rivets through the sides to hold the infills but nothing through the sole. The front of the place for the wedge is integral to the casting and is thick enough not to have broken in use. The wedge holds the iron well and is a good fit, as can be seen by the shininess on the top of it.

It's possibly significant that the bed for the iron is not just the front of the infill - there's an extra slice of wood there, so the bed is side grain. If it wasn't there, the iron would be very difficult to adjust as it would be too close to the handle, which is quite small. Was this original by design, or to correct a mistake, or was it a modification? We could speculate but I don't think we will ever know for sure.

As for how well it performs, well, once it's set up, it works perfectly well, but it doesn't have any magic powers, at least, not that I have discovered. I find the rear handle a little awkward - it's small and rather vertical - though the curved square shape at the front is surprisingly comfortable.

Do say if you want any more details.

Thanks for that excellent post. My best working infill out of the box is also an unmarked casted plane. It is every bit the equal of any Lie Nielsen plane that I've used, but with a nicer more nimble feel. Most of the rest of the infills that I've gotten recently will need a bit of assistance to match Tom Lie-Nielsen's efforts in a solid plane (or for that matter, the performance of a properly tuned stanley plane, which is more or less the same as a car with less weight and stiffer suspension when compared to the LN).

At any rate, I much appreciate the trouble there.

One other thing strikes me as being a potential problem with a parallel iron. I have a tapered iron in my try plane that is barely tapered (later sheffield all steel type), and if the wedge is set tight, it can actually move the cap iron set, which is unwanted to say in the least when you're depending on the cap iron to do its job. Wax on the cap iron and some grip added to the underside of the iron where the cap iron screw fits to it is a way to mitigate some of it, but it's not as trouble free as the irons that are tapered much better.

I'll ultimately make some of both, I'm sure. I just wouldn't mind not making a cap iron on the first one or two, especially not the flat slab type that was on later norris planes, which means effectively locating 3/4th inch bar stock and then going to the trouble of removing 1/4 inch worth on the top of a cap. Labor intensive by hand to say in the least.

The bun on my favorite panel plane is hidden in the picture above (panel plane with the lightest colored handle and hidden bun)...it's lower like the one you showed. I prefer it, too, compared to the original norris style that's a bit tall and sharp.

 

[Biliphuster]

I made a wedge infill a few months ago

infill-mitre-plane-build-amateur-hour-help-t100729.html

In use it feels completely solid, which might be partially due to weight (it is absurdly heavy), but I do not notice the blade move when planing. I made the wedge with a very, very slight hollow in the back so it exerts more pressure near the tip of the blade, which I think has worked well, I never notice any chatter.

Where it does not feel solid is in the adjustment, tapping the wedge home seems to be a gradual process; unlike a woody where you notice the sound change at a certain point, the wedge here just seems to keep on going in until everything has firmed up. My guess is that something is flexing a little as I tap the wedge in. It's a little disconcerting, but I don't reset the plane often (it's always set for a very thin cut) so I don't mind.

 

[D_W]

I made a wedge infill a few months ago

infill-mitre-plane-build-amateur-hour-help-t100729.html

In use it feels completely solid, which might be partially due to weight (it is absurdly heavy), but I do not notice the blade move when planing. I made the wedge with a very, very slight hollow in the back so it exerts more pressure near the tip of the blade, which I think has worked well, I never notice any chatter.

Where it does not feel solid is in the adjustment, tapping the wedge home seems to be a gradual process; unlike a woody where you notice the sound change at a certain point, the wedge here just seems to keep on going in until everything has firmed up. My guess is that something is flexing a little as I tap the wedge in. It's a little disconcerting, but I don't reset the plane often (it's always set for a very thin cut) so I don't mind.

Thanks for that assessment, BH. Looks like your miter plane turned out to be very nice.

 

[Biliphuster]

Thanks for that assessment, BH. Looks like your miter plane turned out to be very nice.

Make sure to post some WIP pictures so I can see how it's done, I am thinking of making another one next year.

 

[D_W]

Thanks for that assessment, BH. Looks like your miter plane turned out to be very nice.

Make sure to post some WIP pictures so I can see how it's done, I am thinking of making another one next year.

Will do. It'll be a few months before I start, probably, because I've got a couple of wooden planes to build yet, and a couple of other projects to finish. I'll return to this thread when I do the plane, though.

 

[AndyT]

There are some pictures of a similar wedged plane in a new item on Wiktor Kuc's site here which might be useful to you:

http://contrib2.wkfinetools.com/priceJ/ ... eCh-01.htm

 

[custard]

Duplicate post

 

[custard]

Anyone used planes like this? Are they as solid in use as one with a lever cap?

Yes, I've spent many, many hours at the bench with planes just like that and they're every bit as solid as a lever cap...providing that is that the fit of the wedge is really snug. If the wedge is wrong then it's a exercise in frustration, but if the wedge is right then they're a delight. Not least because depth and lateral adjustment are just so much more precise with hammer taps than with screw adjustments. I'll often do lateral adjustments with a hammer even with a bailey style plane.

For infill planes IMO the wedged versions are a far better buy than infills with a Norris style adjuster, they're much cheaper and it's a far simpler to correct a poorly fitting wedge than correct the all too common abused Norris adjustment mechanism.

Good luck!

 

[D_W]

There are some pictures of a similar wedged plane in a new item on Wiktor Kuc's site here which might be useful to you:

http://contrib2.wkfinetools.com/priceJ/ ... eCh-01.htm

Thanks, Andy. Interesting looking plane, probably because it was made before the more modern designs were widely disseminated. I see a lot of older ones like that with iron abutments, but I can't make those, at least not the same way - since I can't cast. It does appear that they all (or almost all) have their original wedges. My concern with that type would be only that the iron would beat up the wedges and cause them to be replaced.

The cross strap type is something I can make, though.

 

[D_W]

Anyone used planes like this? Are they as solid in use as one with a lever cap?

Yes, I've spent many, many hours at the bench with planes just like that and they're every bit as solid as a lever cap...providing that is that the fit of the wedge is really snug. If the wedge is wrong then it's a exercise in frustration, but if the wedge is right then they're a delight. Not least because depth and lateral adjustment are just so much more precise with hammer taps than with screw adjustments. I'll often do lateral adjustments with a hammer even with a bailey style plane.

For infill planes IMO the wedged versions are a far better buy than infills with a Norris style adjuster, they're much cheaper and it's a far simpler to correct a poorly fitting wedge than correct the all too common abused Norris adjustment mechanism.

Good luck!

Thanks, Custard.

 

[Derek Cohen (Perth Oz)]

.... Anyone used planes like this? Are they as solid in use as one with a lever cap? ....

Dave, this is not quite what you asked for (I have not used a wedged infill, only ones with a lever cap), however I was cleaning out old magazines and came across a picture of a wedged infill made by a mate, Vic, when we entered a tool making competition a few years ago (2009), run by the Australian Wood Review Magazine. Vic received second place ...

Vic builds spectacular infills, and has done so over some years. I have not used this plane, but all the tools went before judges that included Terry Gordon (HNT Gordon planes) and Colen Clenton (who builds spectacular marking tools). This is a critical audience!

In that competition I received fourth place for a brace ...

Regards from Perth

Derek