Dimensioning by hand (Rob Cosman)

[transatlantic]

I was watching this video by Rob Cosman. He spends quite a while getting that one board flat on one side. He goes from fixing high spots, to fixing twist, to fixing humps, which then caused high spots, which fixing caused twist etc etc.

It looked like a lot of work. At one point he is fixing issues that are a shaving high. Surely such small discrepancies are going to arise again over night?

Secondly, how an earth do you dimension to an exact thickness when the slightest change could cause twist, high points, low points, humps or any other of the issues he was getting when flattening the one side.

It seems like you could spend a long time getting it flat, but then introducing issues just as you're at your dimension line, and then you can't remove any more material. Add to that you might have multiple boards all needing to be the same dimension. What if one board needs more flattening than another, and you don't even have enough material to remove? would you have to account for that by having way more material than you actually need? seems like a massive headache, and so much skill required.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QwfHgtx3EHQ

 

[thetyreman]

it's ridiculous how long he takes here, painfully inefficient in his planing! I'd recommend reading robert wearing's 'the essential woodworker' his chapter about how to create face/edge marking is the best method I've come across.

 

[Honest John]

I’ve watched these with interest and have had similar doubts. I would have thought that clamping this piece in the vice rather than trying to reference from the bench surface and underside of the workpiece would be a better route to making 5he first reference surface. I must lookup Tyremans reference. I generally like Rob Colman’s productions but this seems extraordinarily long winded.

 

[basssound]

I watched it thinking jeez that's way too much work to fix the twist ect...
His problem was he was taking shavings of the same thickness across the board instead of shaving a little more from the center and feathering to the edges.

 

[Trevanion]

Seems to be losing his touch! Too much time spent being a glorified salesman I think. (I don't think I've ever seen anyone wear safety glasses with a hand plane either)

 

[MikeG.]

Is there a more patronising "I know better than you" presenter out there in the world of internet woodworking? Telling his audience how to do things seems such a menial task for him that he can barely trouble himself to do it, and I reckon he would suck the enthusiasm out of students in a few seconds. Thus, I haven't bothered watching how he would flatten a board. It's not a difficult task.

 

[Jacob]

Is there a more patronising "I know better than you" presenter out there in the world of internet woodworking? Telling his audience how to do things seems such a menial task for him that he can barely trouble himself to do it, and I reckon he would suck the enthusiasm out of students in a few seconds. Thus, I haven't bothered watching how he would flatten a board. It's not a difficult task.

Agree. Take no notice of Cosman. He's all showman - same act could sell snake oil or used cars!

 

[transatlantic]

Is there a more patronising "I know better than you" presenter out there in the world of internet woodworking? Telling his audience how to do things seems such a menial task for him that he can barely trouble himself to do it, and I reckon he would suck the enthusiasm out of students in a few seconds. Thus, I haven't bothered watching how he would flatten a board. It's not a difficult task.

Very helpful ...

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[MikeG.]

........Agree. Take no notice of Cosman. He's all showman - same act could sell snake oil or used cars!

To be fair, he does cut some tidy dovetails.

 

[Jacob]

I’ve watched these with interest and have had similar doubts. I would have thought that clamping this piece in the vice rather than trying to reference from the bench surface .......

Clamping can build in a bit of distortion and defeat the object. Usually best loose on the bench top, against a stop.
Bench surface has nothing to do with it - you plane the best side flat and assess flatness by looking at it and perhaps using winding sticks. "Reference surface" gets mentioned often but I think it's from engineering and nothing to do with woodworking. A bench surface needs to be just reasonably flat like any other worktop - "reference" doesn't come into it.
PS had a quick look at his vid - he's talking tosh from the off. 29 minutes too long for me!

 

[Tasky]

To be fair, he does cut some tidy dovetails.

That's about all he ever seems to do on the whole, though. He's got about twenty slight-variant methods of cutting them.
Intersperse that with overlabouring the word 'plumb', and occasionally remembering to cite how Alan Peters showed him how to do something, and that's the sales pitch.

 

[woodbloke66]

Is there a more patronising "I know better than you" presenter out there in the world of internet woodworking? Telling his audience how to do things seems such a menial task for him that he can barely trouble himself to do it, and I reckon he would suck the enthusiasm out of students in a few seconds. Thus, I haven't bothered watching how he would flatten a board. It's not a difficult task.

Agree. Take no notice of Cosman. He's all showman - same act could sell snake oil or used cars!

Yep, seen him a few times at various shows; muchly over-rated IMHO - Rob

 

[John Brown]

I watched part of one video. I wasn't keen... I think he has to sell those planes though.

 

[Steliz]

Whenever I watch his videos I always end up feeling sympathetic towards his camera person.

 

[Stanleymonkey]

Comment below the video:

This is one of the best adverts ever for.....




... a planer and jointer setup!

 

[Trevanion]

After having a nose around on his website I noticed the IBC chisels he's been selling for a while now. The 1/4" IBC chisel is about $70 on his website, but he also does another version of the exact same chisel which has been ground at 17 degrees rather than 25 degrees for ease of use in softwoods and he's asking $100 for it!

25 degree chisel
17 degree chisel

$30 mark-up for less than 1 minute of grinding!

I'd also be making marking gauges all day if I could get £300 each for them.

 

[Jacob]

Comment below the video:

This is one of the best adverts ever for.....




... a planer and jointer setup!

Cosman's trick is to make things look difficult, which he does, and then to pretend that he can show you how to make it easier, which he doesn't. :lol:

 

[Bodgers]

What a grumpy bunch.


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[MikeG.]

What a grumpy bunch.......

Grumpy? You want grumpy? That's not grumpy. Ooooooooh boy, we really can do grumpy if you want it, but be careful what you wish for...

 

[Jacob]

What a grumpy bunch

Makes a change - in the bad old days you couldn't be rude about these self selected gurus and gadget sellers they had almost cult following.
Could be grumpy about quite a few of them if I put my mind to it! :lol:
This one always makes me laugh; man demonstrating that he doesn't know how to sharpen a scrub plane and does a funny little dance https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PyE7-GBCrGA
n.b. scrub plane is about the easiest thing in the world to sharpen once you've got it!