Basic plane - expensive iron?

[Racers]

Jacob

Both my children learnt to ride a bike with stabilizers, one really struggled even with them on.
You can't make sweeping generalisations without proof, or its just your opinion.

Pete

 

[Jacob]

...
You can't make sweeping generalisations without proof,

Yes I can! Just did it! I do it all the time!

or its just your opinion.

Pete

Yes, it is. Based on my experience however.

 

[Alf]

Alf,

My counter view would be, that using a honing guide and Charlesworth methods, students get a wonderful edge on day one or possibly day two....

best wishes,

David

Well yes, that may be so, but not everyone has quite that love of the, um... precision engineering approach. And I've often wondered; aren't they rather going to be up the well-known watercourse without a means of propulsion if they ever want to sharpen, say, a gouge?

But I kinda wanted to avoid getting into the "how" of sharpening. Alas, it's like avoiding manure in a farmyard. :lol:

 

[Jacob]

...... aren't they rather going to be up the well-known watercourse without a means of propulsion if they ever want to sharpen, say, a gouge? ......

Or up that particular creek without a paddle if they ever have to sharpen away from the sharpening station!
Difficult to travel with all those sheets of glass, granite, reams of paper, jigs, strops, pots and jars of rouge, diamond paste, lipstick, eau de cologne etc. You'd need another porter in a canoe of his/her own. :roll:

 

[Gerard Scanlan]

I was truly astonished by the improvement a 2 piece Clifton Cap Iron made to my Bailey No.5. The blade holds the sharpened edge for a lot longer with this cap iron. I sent Matthew at Workshop Heaven an email to ask him which blade and I should purchase and he told me to buy a clifton cap iron and save my money on a blade. He was right about the jump in performance. He could have suggested that I buy both a blade and cap iron and I would never have known how much the cap iron was responsible for the improvement but he didn't. A cap iron is also a lot cheaper. I know there are some very experienced cabinet makers who claim you don't need anything but a Bailey with a sharpened blade...perhaps they don't but for the rest of us they are really marvellous, not just some hype, or a new broom. I have used my plane every day for the last 6 weeks and I am still impressed with the performance and I am reminded of the difference everytime I pick up a different plane. I must get a couple more clifton 2 piece cap irons

 

[David C]

Alf,

Many of my students, who are beginners or in some cases quite seasoned amateurs, have never experienced the joy of working with a razor sharp well tuned plane.

This is why my first week course deals with blade preparation, sharpening, plane tuning and plane use.

My sharpening and preparation methods can be taught in two days. The results are immaculate. Now for whatever reason, my students have not been getting these results consistently by the means they have been using previously.

It seems to me that the intelligent use of a simple honing guide guarantees consistency, repeatability and efficiency. I am full of admiration for those of you who operate freehand but will continue to sharpen my straight edge tools, as I have done for the last 40 years. Oh, forgot to mention, it is probably quicker too.......

best wishes,
David Charlesworth

 

[Digit]

Enter cat in search of Pigeons. Japanese planes don't have cap irons, just one very solid cutting iron that has no need for the cap iron's support.
Chip breakers aside, the Japs seem to manage without that as well, the cap iron simply appears to be a means of adding rigidity to a flimsy cutter.

Roy.

 

[Paul Chapman]

the cap iron simply appears to be a means of adding rigidity to a flimsy cutter.

I think you're probably right. The cap iron also serves as a means to adjust the blade - the Y lever in the Bailey-style adjuster engages in a slot in the cap iron. However, with a sufficiently thick blade, the adjustment mechanism could be provided by a small plate which has a slot in it, like the one they fit to the LN #9.

Cheers :wink:

Paul

 

[Jacob]

........... the cap iron simply appears to be a means of adding rigidity to a flimsy cutter.

Roy.

Correct.
In the same way a gillette safety razor makes viable a very flimsy throwaway blade, the resulting product being much better than what it replaced.
An added advantage of the flimsy Bailey blade is it's easier to sharpen. You have to look at the blade "unit" as one thing i.e. frog, blade, cap iron, lever cap, which together will out perform the earlier heavy blade types of plane.

 

[Digit]

IME as a development engineer refining a defective design simply results in an over engineered design. As for 'out performing' I'm not sure what that means.
Having used planes for over 50 yrs I exclusivly use wooden models now. It takes me no longer to hone the iron than a metal model, it's quicker to adjust, the iron is held more firmly and adjusting the 'mouth' is very much quicker.

Roy.

 

[matthewwh]

Before we get too far into cap irons or sharpening it is worth mentioning for the benefit of Phil and others in his position that achieving a supremely sharp and correctly shaped edge is the next logical thing to address.

David C's videos are a superb way to develop a comprehensive understanding of sharpening starting from basic principles. They give you a technique that works and from that stepping stone you can explore other techniques at your leisure. Unless you value your time in pence per hour (literally) and like being frustrated, they are a very wise investment.

There is little point tinkering with sole flatness until you can measure it, and the kit you need to measure it properly (let alone fix it) will cost more than the decent plane you were trying to avoid buying in the first place. Unless you encounter problems you would do better to first focus attention on your technique.

If you can get to the point where you can make a small board of mild timber flat, square, reasonably smooth and hit pre-ordained dimensions to within a mm you are probably on the limits of what can be achieved with a souped up economy tool. For a lot of people though that is good enough, if later on you do want to take things further you can always trade up to something with a little more panache.

 

[David C]

Matthew,

Thank you.

I would just like to suggest that with a little practice, (and a tuned up or good gauge), thicknessing to + or - 0.1 mm is eminently possible.

On other dimensions I would also be disappointed if errors exceeded 0.2 mm. There are obviously many cases where this sort of accuracy is not necessary.
The argument that accuracy is not needed because wood moves with humidity changes, breaks down if one considers the glue faces of a tennon, and their fit in a mortice.
Too tight and the glue may be scraped from the surfaces.
Too loose and we need a gap filling glue which we probably do not have.
A nice hand fit certainly requires a dimension which is within a few thou" of perfect. I like to plane a test stick to fit the mortice. This tells me exactly what size to make the tennon. A one thou" shaving makes a significant difference to the fit.

Best wishes,
David Charlesworth

 

[Jacob]

....
I would just like to suggest that with a little practice, (and a tuned up or good gauge), thicknessing to + or - 0.1 mm is eminently possible.
.....

Yes, but eminently pointless. This is woodwork, not engineering.
Promise of precision is seductive of course, and to argue against it might seem to be arguing in favour of lower standards and sloppy work. But that itself is another delusion.

 

[Jacob]

..... supremely sharp and correctly shaped edge......

"supreme" sharpness is not needed in woodwork - even if you could achieve it it wouldn't last for very long. It's all a compromise - "optimum" sharpness would be a better target i.e. a practical approach to getting the work done. There is no "correct" edge either, it's just that for some purposes one edge will be better than another, and some edges no use at all.

......
There is little point tinkering with sole flatness until you can measure it,

In which case don't measure it! If it wasn't a problem it doesn't need fixing.
Not true anyway - it's easy to check for flatness with a straightedge - no measuring involved.

......
If you can get to the point where you can make a small board of mild timber flat, square, reasonably smooth and hit pre-ordained dimensions to within a mm you are probably on the limits of what can be achieved with a souped up economy tool...

Say 0.5mm and you are also at the limit of accuracy needed for almost all woodwork, so just stick with that souped up economy tool!!

 

[Alf]

I am full of admiration for those of you who operate freehand...

Please don't be; it makes it sound like it's something difficult or remarkable. But I swore I wasn't going to talk sharpening. My apologies to all for cracking open the door for it earlier in the thread.

Regarding the cap iron and the thin iron combo. Is it not one of the "benefits" (depending on your view of what constitutes benefit) that it not only flexes the whole shebang into some rigidity, but also means there's just two points of contact you have to worry about between iron and frog? I only ask, because I've been diving into old books again, and the necessary tweaking of wooden bench planes in order to get the iron to bed correctly comes up again and again as likely problem with a plane misbehaving. (They don't tell you how best to achieve that though. Naturally.) You can see why avoiding, or at least reducing that problem might appeal. Further to Roy and his most reasonable point about the Japanese kanna, I'm digging deep into my unreliable memory, but isn't fitting the iron in the dai one of the trickiest aspects of setting up Japanese planes? But perhaps not the bedding? Dunno. Anyway, I just throw that out there for your consideration, deliberation, scorn, etc.

 

[Jacob]

I am full of admiration for those of you who operate freehand...

I'm sure you could manage it David - if you hadn't so convincingly talked yourself out of it!
It's not admirable at all - any fool can do it. I can do it!

Perhaps this would this help:


Somebody said that it couldn't be done,
But he with a chuckle replied
That "maybe it couldn't," but he would be one
Who wouldn't say so till he'd tried.
So he buckled right in with the trace of a grin
On his face. If he worried he hid it.
He started to sing as he tackled the thing
That couldn't be done, and he did it.

Somebody scoffed: "Oh, you'll never do that;
At least no one ever has done it";
But he took off his coat and he took off his hat,
And the first thing we knew he'd begun it.
With a lift of his chin and a bit of a grin,
Without any doubting or quiddit,
He started to sing as he tackled the thing
That couldn't be done, and he did it.

There are thousands to tell you it cannot be done,
There are thousands to prophesy failure;
There are thousands to point out to you, one by one,
The dangers that wait to assail you.
But just buckle in with a bit of a grin,
Just take off your coat and go to it;
Just start to sing as you tackle the thing
That "cannot be done," and you'll do it.”

 

[Paul Chapman]

Regarding the cap iron and the thin iron combo. Is it not one of the "benefits" (depending on your view of what constitutes benefit) that it not only flexes the whole shebang into some rigidity, but also means there's just two points of contact you have to worry about between iron and frog?

I think the two points of contact would only be a "benefit" if the frog was not flat. It would avoid the blade pivoting on high spots on the frog and causing excessive chatter. However, in my experience, having been through the thin blade/bent metal cap iron; thin blade/StaySet cap iron; thick blade/StaySet cap iron; thick blade/StaySet cap iron/Bedrock frog process, the only combination that really works is the thick blade/StaySet cap iron/Bedrock frog arrangement. Other arrangements can be made to work well but usually involve hours of filing, fettling and other fiddling about.

Cheers :wink:

Paul

 

[Digit]

On the subject of bedding Alf. I obtained a very old laminated iron some time ago that is 8mm thick and very hard indeed.
The welding of the hard cutting steel to the main stock had resulted in it curving, as I was making a new plane to house it I was deeply frusted in my efforts to bed it correctly. Eventually I sprayed it with silicone release agent and bedded it in motor car body filler!

Roy.

 

[woodbloke]

Enter cat in search of Pigeons. Japanese planes don't have cap irons, just one very solid cutting iron that has no need for the cap iron's support.
Chip breakers aside, the Japs seem to manage without that as well, the cap iron simply appears to be a means of adding rigidity to a flimsy cutter.

Roy.

I think here you're into a whole new can of worms. Yep, Jap planes (or the majority of such) don't have cb's, just a huge thick, lump of blacksmith forged steel (and in many cases, a very expensive lump of steel) which from my very limited experience, seems to be much superior to Western steels. Most of the time the blades are honed freehand and I have it on good authority that not only are they are able to hone freehand, but single handed :shock: so that they can use the other to natter on the mobile!
The advantage of the thick iron (around 6mm) is that the single bevel is then easy to find on the waterstone, but as far as I'm aware, all Jap blades are honed with a single bevel - Rob

 

[Digit]

Personally I'm not convinced that the bevel angle is at all important, so long as the back edge remains clear of the wood that's being cut.

Roy.