Have you planed plywood?

[D_W]

I hadn't, at least that I can recall. I was out of town for a week, or I'd be done with this already, but I've been finishing up my kitchen cabinets and the last one, I decided to make by hand entirely. Grooves and all in plywood, etc. No sanding.

I finally sucked it up and planed the plywood to finish, and wish I'd have been doing it all along. $600 in sanders (I already had those) can't match a $35 plane (which is apparently now a $70 plane).

I did find a limitation later - very thin veneer birch ply where the veneer isn't level - took little time for that ply to turn pink as the lower layer telegraphed through, but all of the ply I've used (birch for drawer bottoms and cheery for sides) would've been far faster to plane. I am capping most of the cabinets with raised panels, so little of it will show, anyway.

https://youtu.be/ErVeJtTf_Fg?t=4m8s

I don't make entertaining videos, but I think the little details are important to the few who might want to do things like this, so the first few minutes are always talk. You can ignore them. In case I cut it out, sharpened with washita, and stropped on shop towel since my strop is in another room. No super sharpening or any mickey mouse, just use the cap iron, plane straight through.

 

[El Barto]

Nicely done. The finish looks good!

 

[DBT85]

I don't make entertaining videos, but I think the little details are important to the few who might want to do things like this, so the first few minutes are always talk. You can ignore them. In case I cut it out, sharpened with washita, and stropped on shop towel since my strop is in another room. No super sharpening or any mickey mouse, just use the cap iron, plane straight through.

Entertainment is relative so don't sell yourself short. I spend hours a week at work watching woodworking stuff so your channel is a nice new one to watch for me now. Millions of others would rather watch someone playing pranks on others or a dog that whistles or something!

As always with videos, get the sound and light as good as possible and it immediately feels better, on top of the content.

 

[Saer Llongau]

I use plywood panels a lot for boat interiors but I have to sand them anyway for varnish to properly adhere so I don't see the point in planing it.

 

[Beau]

On occasion but have often found ply less than perfectly flat and as you mention the outer ply can be a tad thin so easy to mess up. Surprised you find it quicker than a quick going over with random orbit sander though

 

[D_W]

I've never had trouble with finish adhering to planed surfaces, but it's not something I'd risk on a boat, either.

 

[D_W]

On occasion but have often found ply less than perfectly flat and as you mention the outer ply can be a tad thin so easy to mess up. Surprised you find it quicker than a quick going over with random orbit sander though

You can sand quickly on non show surfaces, but when I used to sand, care and time was needed to make sure no hooks appear after applying finish. It just took longer, but I have spent a lot of time learning the subtleties of finish planing without marks.

I also have minor asthma and hate wearing masks or running loud devices.

 

[deema]

Well, I’d never though if planing ply, looks great. Thanks for sharing.

 

[MikeG.]

On occasion but have often found ply less than perfectly flat........

And this afternoon I have had to plane the upper level of my new shooting board for this exact reason: the ply wasn't flat. There is no way of controlling sanding enough for that level of adjustment, but it planed beautifully, and I reckon that the board will be perfect tomorrow when the fence glue is dry.

 

[thetyreman]

a no80 cabinet scraper works well also, the plywood I've got hold of is nowhere near that quality in your video, the plywood I've used has an extremely thin top layer, so thin that I'm not sure a hand plane would work without destroying it.

 

[ColeyS1]

I've only just discovered your YouTube channel - wowsers! It's absolutely fantastic!!!! I've watched 4 of your videos so far. Nice work

Sent from my SM-G900F using Tapatalk

 

[PAC1]

The problem with planing Birch ply is the very occasional imperfection can completely ruin the piece, leading to a major re work and lost time. So the question is does the better finish outway the risk?
Also hand planed Birch ply edge can make a very striking detail banding on things like chess boards.

 

[ED65]

I've planed plywood and like you I found it to be about a zillion times more effective than sanding. Admittedly first time I did it was on some excellent old exterior ply and not something made more recently, so the veneers were ridiculously thick.

The only other ply that I can recall planing was the all-beech ply that forms the core of the finger plane in my avatar, surface plies on this were fully the same thickness as the interior ones.

This is surface planing, I plane plywood edges all the time.

 

[D_W]

Like you, I have always planed plywood edges before. re: the mention of birch above, I don't have any "good" birch ply, and generally will use cherry ply because cherry is more or less our local "decent" wood. I'm sure there is less expensive cherry ply, and probably more expensive (0.47" sheets are just north of $100 for something with two good faces) but the kind of the stuff in the video above is available here all the time and close enough that I can rent a truck on miles and not be out much.

Decent prices are only available here at commercial places, and most of those places have a "contractors only" sign on their doors, but I've learned which ones will entertain you if you have a reasonably large order (a dozen sheets or so).

The only thing I've ever used birch ply for is jigs and drawer bottoms, and up to this point, I've scraped the ply used for drawer bottoms. Out of curiosity, I scraped this cherry ply on a scrap, too, which was fine, but a light touch is needed at the edges to avoid severing the top veneer off at the ends. It proved no faster than planing in the end, though at first it seemed like it would be.

I did find a great use for my bosch killer ROS (1250 something or other) - glazing and polishing the car hood this weekend to remove some uglies. No dust!! Car hood looks great, and I'm pretty sure it wouldn't if I planed or scraped it.

 

[Derek Cohen (Perth Oz)]

David, I am envious of the quality of your plywood. The stuff we get in Oz is filled with voids. Cheap stuff made in China. The only relatively decent ply is extremely expensive - it costs more than furniture grade wood!

I would not use our stuff, never mind plane it.

Regards from Perth

Derek

 

[D_W]

I guess we don't make a lot of things in the US still (at least not compared to the economy here 50 years ago), but plywood choice here hasn't suffered because of that.

Do you have access to millwork shops, or commercial plywood supply places? It's not always particularly nice to make a 10+ sheet order to get in the doors at one of those places, but if you have a go-to that you might use over the years, it's kind of nice to have some on hand. Our retail options aren't great here (they do have A-face cherry ply, but it's overpriced), and, of course, the box store options stink, so that's out.

This type of ply (softwood with far more wood than glue) is nice to work with hand tools. It stays flat, it's not too heavy and it's not very hard on saws or planes. I made the early mistake assuming that it'd be too rough on hand tools, and I'd have finished the kitchen far sooner if I'd have just done everything with it by hand (not because it's faster, but because I'd have actually done it continuously).

 

[custard]

I made the early mistake assuming that it'd be too rough on hand tools

That's interesting, I've spoken to old school craftsmen, guys who were cabinet makers in the immediate post war period, who have suggested that the widespread adoption of sheet goods was the death knell for wooden planes because they couldn't stand up to edge planing ply like a Bailey style plane.

 

[D_W]

I made the early mistake assuming that it'd be too rough on hand tools

That's interesting, I've spoken to old school craftsmen, guys who were cabinet makers in the immediate post war period, who have suggested that the widespread adoption of sheet goods was the death knell for wooden planes because they couldn't stand up to edge planing ply like a Bailey style plane.

I use metal planes on them, too, but I use metal planes on all narrow stuff. Doing a bunch of narrow work on a wooden plane is a good way to put a rut in the middle of the sole or bang it up near the mouth.

 

[Graham Orm]

WOW! That plane is set sweetly. Great job, who knew?

 

[toolsntat]

I used to thickness good quality Birch ply back in my specialist jig and gauge building days for the rubber hose industry
. The Brazilian Mahogany would not stay stable enough so I took to laminating layers of the ply. Because of the quality I was able to easily achieve a tolerance of 1 tenth of mil.
These were industrial tools so filling after finding a stray pocket or getting rogue tearout was acceptable.
Cheers
Andy