Paul Sellers Router Plane

[scooby]

I occasionally read Paul Sellers blog and found this pretty interesting.
https://paulsellers.com/2021/10/the-best-router-plane-is-born/
Curiosity got the better of me, so I signed up to the woodworking masterclass to read the full instructions and see some videos. Theres nothing radically new about the design, but the instructions are very good (imo).
https://woodworkingmasterclasses.com/videos/how-to-make-the-worlds-best-router-plane/

 

[Argus]

I agree.

A soundly-made, relatively inexpensive piece of kit, clearly explained - plus it's free to watch with a set of free drawings.

No doubt he gets some stick for the 2nd hand prices of some tools, and despite some of the hyperbole in his jottings, the quality of photography of his masterclass series has improved and there are some very sound woodworking ideas explained.

He can be 'marmitic' to some folk, but you can't please 'em all.

 

[Jacob]

Sellers is very practical and thinks things out very sensibly.
He's not popular with the tool fetishists obviously - his sharpening must give them nightmares!
He also can get things wrong in his enthusiasm but that's OK in the bigger scheme of things - he's only human and not a self-important guru.
I'm going to have to sell my Stanley 71 while the prices are still high- I've hardly ever used it anyway.

 

[D_W]

The funny part about it is that the comments are loaded with folks complaining about the cost of second-hand router planes....

.....on the blog of the person who caused it.

I bought three router planes long ago before there was ever a sellers masterclass (misnomer) marketing, and they averaged about $50. I didn't get them at yardsales or flea markets, I got two off of ebay and one from Walt Quadrato (a tool hunter and reseller at the time).

 

[Argus]

Those were the days!

You could get ten fags, a bag of scratchings, a couple of pints and still get change from five bob!

 

[mikej460]

I got an excellent quality 71 for £45 recently off a chap advertising it on Facebook Marketplace, so you can still get a bargain, just not on eBay.

 

[scooby]

I'm going to have to sell my Stanley 71 while the prices are still high- I've hardly ever used it anyway.

Without bragging, earlier this year I had one of those 'lucky deals'. A friend had notified of a neighbour selling some tools for a friend's wife. I went with the intention of just getting some turning tools (I already knew there was an almost new 32mm Sorby Roughing gouge there. which are about £60 new).
I saw an excellent condition no.71 with 3 good blades and just missing the shoe. "How much for this?'...got a reply of "£5?" I played it cool (with difficulty) and said "go on then". I ended up coming out with a lot of decent stuff for £85. I ended up selling it as I ready had a 71, likewise it doesn't get used much.
There was a tinge of disappointment. Whilst rummaging, the bloke informed me there had been a "lot" of metal body planes (including no.7 and no.8s) that had been sold a few days earlier. Cant complain though.

 

[jcassidy]

To be fair, Paul's blog post mentions the unintentional and unpleasant 'Sellers Effect' as being a driver for him wanting to come* up with a DIY plane.

I have to say I like him, he's a bit pompeous at times but he is English after all.

*Not that he invented it, just that he's worked to develop one that's good, functional, and can be made at home.

 

[D_W]

Cant complain though...

one of my first plane purchases was from a coworker whose grandfather was a collector of planes and never a woodworker (so he had some real pearls and he had some planes with amounts of wear that you would never think were possible - maybe they were rigged in machine fixtures, I don't know).

Her grandfather passed away and an auctioneer attempted to sell all but a couple of his 1600 planes at one time at a public sale (the couple held back were things like #1s, which are common on the internet, but not on the ground).

She mentioned they didn't sell everything and by the end of the sale, they were selling planes for $0.25 each and still couldn't get rid of them. I was new to woodworking and this sounded interesting. She brought a tray to me and left them behind. Her uncle decided to have another go and with what was mostly absolute junk, priced everything (broken transitionals, etc) at $50-$100. This included a couple of planes with the soles worn to half thickness on one side but not the other (one could only guess how that can be accomplished) and 7s with half a foot cut off of their tail ends).

I managed to get a T11 4 1/2 out of that tray for $40 (had no clue that it was valuable in the US, just that it wasn't total junk) and a #5 for $40. It was too much volume for the group at the public sale apparently - I'd guess the "uncle" still has most of the remaining planes looking for buyers who aren't trying to "rip him off".

I'd bet some router planes probably sold for a quarter the day of the sale (public sales of tools here are often during the week, leaving more valuable stuff with wider appeal for weekends and evenings - things like farm sales and sales of estates of vintage gun collectors).

 

[xraymtb]

Nobody can blame him for tool prices - everything on eBay at the moment is going for silly money. I've seen tents sell for more than RRP - whilst the shops still have them in stock at sale price.

There may be a rush on items when Sellers mentions them but that would happen with any prominent woodworking 'celebrity' - he just promotes second hand, affordable, solutions rather than the latest Domino machine or £350 block plane

 

[gmercer_48083]

Paul Sellers has been gracious enough to include the pdf plans to his router plane along to a very detailed video. Can't wait for part 2 video. He has included the depth adjustment that makes his router plane compete with the best of the manufactured hand router planes. He has also prototyped altered versions and cutting angles in his version, prior to making this video. I believe he has presented a great alternative to spending an absorbent amount on either used or new hand router planes. I am gathering the parts necessary to make two of his designed hand routers... not because I need them...but because I think other woodworker friends need to be introduced to the value of a hand router. And can be made in it's entirety for less than a cutting iron for a veritas router plane.

 

[scooby]

I have to say I like him, he's a bit pompeous at times but he is English after all.

How very dare you!

 

[D_W]

Nobody can blame him for tool prices - everything on eBay at the moment is going for silly money. I've seen tents sell for more than RRP - whilst the shops still have them in stock at sale price.

I think he gushed about the router plane and the effect was immediate. Compared to the supply of stanley 4 planes, router planes are relatively uncommon (not uncommon, but on relative terms). If there are 10 on ebay at any given time, he can blow up the market and then it's a self propagating thing as the sold history establishes a higher price.

not sure what 71s go for there, but the average sale price here appears to be about $130 with a cutter (more for one with several cutters and a box, but those were always expensive because of collectors). Maybe having a local celebrity there makes them more expensive.

The formula on ebay is pretty simple - set up a saved search and if it takes two or three weeks to find one at $125 or whatever, then that's what it takes. In the meantime relax and wait for the system to bring the results to you instead of having a case of the galloping gimmies.

 

[DBT85]

I'm not sure what you're supposed to do then. Not talk about something that you think is good just in case the prices go up and others choose to pay more for it. becase at the end of the day people are choosing to pay more for these tools. They don't have to.

 

[D_W]

I'm not sure what you're supposed to do then. Not talk about something that you think is good just in case the prices go up and others choose to pay more for it. becase at the end of the day people are choosing to pay more for these tools. They don't have to.

no, you talk about them and say "prices may have gone up due to my publicity"..."so here's plans to make a different type".

At $150, if that's a reflection of reality over there, I'd just buy the metal one instead (had one of the premium ones the last 4 years or so and it got lost due to the preference for the stanley - the latter was less hassle to use and most of us don't expose joinery in a way that the slackness in the stanley would matter (it's not more than a glue line in anything that i've made aside from that). Thanks to paul, the LV large router plane sold well on ebay.

 

[IWW]

Years (& years) ago I bought a 71 at a flea market for what was a bargain price even then - not much more than 50p in your terms. But for some reason(s) we just never got along as a happy couple (& I'm prepared to accept full responsibility for that!).

Then about 8 or 10 years ago Derek Cohen posted his home-made version on the Ubeaut forum (expanded on here) which intrigued me, so I made one for myself. As sometimes happens (rarely, in my case!), I fluked everything just right, it worked first go, & worked well - it was love at first swipe!

I readily parted with the 71 at an equally bargain price to a young fella starting out (they seem to get along just fine), and my home-made version did yeoman service for a while. The only improvement I made was to add the depth-stop collar sometime later.

But a friend goaded me into developing the idea & adding a screw adjuster, & between the two of us we came up with a workable prototype:


In retrospect, the screw adjuster is barely worth the effort to make it. The basic model worked very well and was dead-easy to set with a light tap or two. The very dense wood (Forest she-oak- Alllocasuarina torulosa) gave it just the right amount of 'heft' without feeling too bulky, and being wood, there was almost no friction. It was a very sweet little tool to use. However, the screw-adjuster version feels slightly 'top heavy' compared with vers1.0. It's still ok, but I wouldn't bother with adjusters again, I think these tools are best left as plain as can be - the most useful refinement was the depth-collar!

Cheers,
Ian

 

[Derek Cohen (Perth Oz)]

You did a great job, Ian. But then you are a better toolmaker than I.

Here is my original router plane - I made this one for a raffle to go to WoodCentral woodworking forum ...

Plans are here: http://www.inthewoodshop.com/ShopMadeTools/BuildingaWoodenRouterPlane.html

The design that Paul Sellers has largely copied is based on a Old Woman's Tooth, where the blade is from a plough plane ...

The reason that I went for the design I used is that it could be built around an established set of router plane blades, in this case Veritas.

What I like about the design Sellers uses is that the blades can be sharpened more easily - although the Veritas blades are easy enough with my method (see later). Where the Sellers' plane struggles a little is in using blades of different widths and ensuring that they remain square.

Sharpening a traditional router plane blade:



Regards from Perth

Derek

 

[thetyreman]

I think this tool looks good, but the wood will have to be very well seasoned or it'll move, laminating on some rosewood or ebony to the sole wouldn't be a bad idea

 

[Linus]

To be fair, Paul's blog post mentions the unintentional and unpleasant 'Sellers Effect' as being a driver for him wanting to come* up with a DIY plane.

I have to say I like him, he's a bit pompeous at times but he is English after all.

*Not that he invented it, just that he's worked to develop one that's good, functional, and can be made at home.

Having read this comment it reminded me of a snippet I read many years back re the definition of the races within these sceptered isles:

A Scotsman keeps the Sabbath - and anything else he can get his hands on.
A Welshman prays on Sundays - and his neighbours (poetic license)
An Irishman doesn't know what he wants - but he is willing to fight for it.
But an Englishman believes himself to be of a self-made race - thereby relieving God of one hell of a responsibility.

I rest my case.

Oh! and I'm English and I like Paul Sellers.

 

[Cozzer]

How very dare you!

Indeed!
And I'm Irish!
(And he can't spell "pompous" either!)