REVIEW David Charlesworth DVD Part 2: Hand Planing

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after countless months of suffering craft shopping channels, cooking channels, medical blood-n-gore etc..... what can I say but Payback's a puppy :twisted: :twisted: :twisted:
 
Well, I finally succumbed to this DVD after reading the review and watched it this evening.

I agree with Alf's review entirely and was somewhat surprised by just how far DC goes in his search for planing perfection :shock:

I was also left feeling a little sorry for DC as his attempts at audience interaction were pretty much ignored as were his questions!

He even brushes all dust and shavings off the plane between cuts!!

Thicknessing by hand to 1 thou :shock: :shock: :?

Well worth the £20 if you already have a tuned plane and want to take it further - shooting board one comes out next

Cheers

Tony (who just bought a brush to......)
 
actually....er.....I bought a brush... :oops: :oops:


and followed DC's instructions to the letter....


and it all seems to work perfectly....


and I now have chronic tennis elbow from two days of planing to prove I could do it as well.....


and ...... life is so short I wonder if it's worth it :?: :!:


I think I'll put the micrometer back in it's box for a while now! :)



Cheers
Scott
 
I agree with Alf's review entirely and was somewhat surprised by just how far DC goes in his search for planing perfection

This seems ideal for an instructional video. It's still up to you how far you follow him down the road, but at least he's shown you the road, all the way to the end.

BugBear
 
I thought the review was a good one and I agree that a new hand planer should start somewhere else, but certainly not postpone DC too long. I'm certainly not "experienced" and I benefitted a lot from both his DVDs and eagerly await his third, which should be out before long. I would also note that the second DVD should be understood in light of his first. A key to his method is in his sharpening. It is unconventional. An advantage of his method is that it forces me to focus on where I need to plane, how much I need to plane, as well as on what my plane is actually doing and where my plane is doing it.

For the beginner, all of the choices mentioned above are good. Personally, I think Jim Kingshott's Bench Planes video is the best of the lot. He, as Cosman in Rough to Ready, goes from rough boards through final smoothing. His 90 min. video is longer and more detailed than Cosman's, which I found to be an advantage. In fact, all of his videos (6 that I know of) are excellent. I have his Bench Plans video as well as his Special Planes, Mortise and Tenon, Dovetails, Sharpening the Professional Way, and Sharpening Carving and Tuning Tools videos. His stuff is available at www.highlandhardware.com in the U.S. All of the videos sell for $24.95 each. I don't think they are available on DVD.
 
Welcome to the forum, glh.

glh":2qyuz2uq said:
eagerly await his third, which should be out before long.
You're not alone there.

glh":2qyuz2uq said:
I would also note that the second DVD should be understood in light of his first. A key to his method is in his sharpening.
Yep, a good point. Not sure I made enough of that. Although we're probably a bit more used to his sharpening method over here; practically blasé even... :wink:

glh":2qyuz2uq said:
Personally, I think Jim Kingshott's Bench Planes video is the best of the lot. <snip> I have his Bench Plans video as well as his Special Planes, Mortise and Tenon, Dovetails, Sharpening the Professional Way, and Sharpening Carving and Tuning Tools videos. His stuff is available at www.highlandhardware.com in the U.S. All of the videos sell for $24.95 each. I don't think they are available on DVD.
It's a terribly irony that Kingshott's videos are easier to get hold of in the States than they are here, in his own country. If anyone knows if, and where, the non-sharpening ones are available here in Blighty I'd love to have the details.

Cheers, Alf
 
The non sharpening vids are very difficult to obtain. Plenty of the others. Anybody try GMC? Think they actually published them, maybe not.

Noel
 
Noely":2npzl560 said:
Anybody try GMC? Think they actually published them, maybe not.
Don't think so; he was a Trad Woodworking regular and thus persona non grata as far as GMC are concerned. Stobart Davies, the obvious place, draws a blank. :(

Cheers, Alf
 
Thanks for the welcome.

It's amazing that those JK videos aren't available in the UK. Would seem some retailer is missing out on a profitable opportunity.

By the way, my daughter will be visiting in April or May (can't remember which). She is a pharmacy student and will be doing one of her rotations at a pharmacy in Cambridge. She'll be there for a month and is really looking forward to it.
 
Cambridge is a very beautiful city with amazing architecture and stunning book shops - I'm sure she'll love it :wink: Put your order in for some rare books :D
 
Hi there,
As a complete newbie in this field ( woodworking ) I want to make a few comments. Just to let you know first, I am french ( 31 years old ) and I have just started to build a solid body guitar a few months ago ( you can see a photo here :
)
I have bought 3 planes ( all veritas ): a block plane, a jack low angle, and more recently a scrub plane ( curved blade).
I must say that at first it was a disaster ( it was impossible for me to get the control that I needed for precision)...But with some practice, the help of the scrub plane and the David videos ( I own the vol II and III) I have started to understand. So this lead to a first comment. I think that the scrub plane ( with the curved blade) can show more easely ( and more directly on the wood ) some of the ideas exposed by David. Because I am a beginner I dont wanted to deal with too much precision at first. So I have taken the scrub plane ( more easy to setup too of course!) and I have followed David in his explanations. It was a lot more easy that way for me. Thats why I think that the scrub plane( or a rough setting in a bench plane with a curved blade) could help in the demonstration.
Another thing that David should really consider for the poor viewer that is not in the imperial realm. At least give us the the metric dimension as a subtitle, thats really important because the imperial measures dont talk too much for us and they are not easy to grasp. Sorry my english is not that good I hope you willl understand.
I have really liked the peaceful mood ( and the dog tail too!) of the videos and the clear explanations of David. It is a real pleasure to watch and I really like the smart and elegant way he works . I really want to see all his videos and books now! Tky David.

Just a few pics( click the images to get the full size) that I have taken during my process of learning. There's some french comments but I think that will be pretty clear for you to grasp. Of course its not perfect.


 
Labuzz,

Delighted you find them useful.

I would have liked to have more of Karl, the Bouvier des Flandres, who counts me as a friend. Bribery with treats gets you everywhere. He is a very fierce guard dog, and very doggy, which is reassuring in a dog.

If you like dogs please try Mawgan's diary on the news page of my site.

http://www.davidcharlesworth.co.uk

Sorry about the imperial / metric issue, the DVD was made in Maine USA where they still suffer from imperial.

I am muddled, prefering metric up to about 35 mm and then reverting to imperial which is more anthropo####### or some such word.

All you need to know is that 4 thou" (0.004") is equal to 0.1mm!

The planing system works and I rarely see other exponents using a straightedge......

best wishes,
David Charlesworth
 
David C":2y2cedwl said:
I would have liked to have more of Karl, the Bouvier des Flandres, who counts me as a friend. Bribery with treats gets you everywhere. He is a very fierce guard dog, and very doggy, which is reassuring in a dog.

If you like dogs please try Mawgan's diary on the news page of my site.

Nice to see all you heary friends :D Hopefully they will appear in one of your books or videos. I have had dogs and cats during all my life but now that I am living in Paris in a very small apartment it would be be not very reasonable to get one. My last one is living with my mother in the alpes.She is a blend between an epagneul (like Mawgan) and a cocker.
David C":2y2cedwl said:
The planing system works and I rarely see other exponents using a straightedge......

Yes it works beautifully. Strange that the straightedge is not used more often. In guitar building it is a crucial tool for the neck.
http://www.stewmac.com/shop/Fretting_su ... edges.html
But I will add some wind sticks soon :D .
David C":2y2cedwl said:
All you need to know is that 4 thou" (0.004") is equal to 0.1mm!
Tky for the info! I read thou everywhere on this forum without knowing what it means.

Cheers,
Borhan.
 
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