Replies

1. 
   joinerswork | Mar 04, 2010 08:47am | #1

   jim,

   Maybe you would benefit from a higher angle, either by putting a back-bevel on the smoother blade, or a steeper grind on thebevel up smoother.  Pushing the plane askew, holding it diagonally to the length of the board, while pushing it along the board's length can help too.

   It can be a challenge to get a good surface overall on a panel with that many boards, as the grain direction frequently will be alternating either side of the glue line. Being mindful of this, and being aware of the grain patterns that alert you of changing grain direction, and the tearout already there that shows the inclination of the fibers-reading the grain- means you must be prepared to switch direction in pushing a smoothing plane as often as needed- that's why smoothers are so short.  As a last resort, planing crosswise, (side to side rather than lengthwise) in problem areas will often prevent the plane tearing out great chunks of wood, but will leave the area somewhat less smooth than elsewhere, so that you might need to finish up by scraping.

   Ray

1. 
   Eef | Mar 04, 2010 04:34pm | #3

   ray,

   good answer to the op about grain reading and plane technique.  however,  when i first learned to carve, it was discovered through bitter experience, that a work which had previously been sanded, ought not to be carved further as the tiniest little grain of "sand"  would cause serious mischief to the keen edge of my carving chisels.  is this not also the case with smoothing with a hand plane on a sanded surface?  dulling my chisels this way was quite traumitizing  as it took me a while to figure out  what was going on and in a matter of minutes the daunting task of  all that sharpening to do over again left me speechless.

   eef

1. 
   joinerswork | Mar 04, 2010 05:03pm | #4

   Eef,

   Poster wanted better results than he got with sanding.  I guess, if sharpening (frequently, I'll grant you) is daunting, then leaving dips in the top,  might not look too bad.  YMMV, as they say.

   I'm reminded of the story of the old boy who went to a blacksmith to have a new axehead forged.  When he came back to pick up his axe, the new owner was so taken with the bright shiney bevels on the freshly ground edge, that he asked if it would not be possible to have the whole ugly black, hammer-marked surface of the axe polished too.  "Certainly,"  said the smith," I'll grind the head bright, you just turn the grindstone."

   After a few minutes of grinding, with the smith bearing pretty heavily on the wheel, the now sweaty buyer says, "You know, I believe I like that black finish better , after all."

   Ray

2. 
   AZMO | Mar 19, 2010 11:00pm | #13

   Skew cut

   Ray,

   I was working with some not quite sapwood QS oak this past week. When I planed it skewed it really wanted to shred the fibers. I attributed this issue to the angle of attack. Skewed the blade angle is relatively lower and the gap betweent the blade and the bed it more open since it is at an angle. Hard to describe that, but I have seen older posts about it.

   My solution was to get the steepest bevel out for my LA Jack. Worked much better but a workout indeed.  Still there is sharp and then there is the next level that really works.

   AZMO

2. 
   flairwoodworks | Mar 04, 2010 01:14pm | #2

   You've got two good responses so far.  Personally, I'd try them in the order they were presented - higher angle of attack (steeper micro bevel), then cross-grain followed by scraping, then (reluctantly) sanding.

3. 
   joinerswork | Mar 04, 2010 05:07pm | #5

   dusty,

   Would make a good Olympic event.  Two man scraping,... hold it on the curling court after each match.  Team members could offer encouragement, like in curling, "HARD!!! HARD!!!"

   Ray

4. 
   flairwoodworks | Mar 05, 2010 12:55am | #6

   Dusty,

   I'm not convinced it will work! <Grin>

   Edit:  Typo!

1. 
   jimbell | Mar 05, 2010 08:30pm | #7

   Thanks Ray, Dusty, et al. I appreciated the pointer on smoother planes--I'd thought they were simply to get a smoother finish but can see why they are so short--manoeverability to go with the grain. Also, the comment about 7 board being a lot is a nice touch--the worst tear out is right where two boards with different grain patterns meet. And Dusty, I appreciate the opinion about ash--its wild grain could be why it is relatively cheap.

   I"ve purchased the 4-foot cabinet scraper but now need another guy to hold the other side of it.

   Cheers,

   Jim

   "We must guard our enthusiasm as we would our life" --James Krenov

5. 
   JohnWW | Mar 05, 2010 10:04pm | #8

   I take an entirely different approach to making table tops, planing a top after it is glued up from several boards is way too difficult, near impossible in woods with irregular grain.

   Start out by getting each board flat, squared up, and smoothly planed with the top surface planed to as perfect a surface as you want the finished table to be. 

   Now when you do the glue up, glue the boards together just a pair at a time and take the time as you clamp to bring the top surfaces of each pair to as close to flush as possible.  By only having to worry about one seam this really isn't hard to do.  A can easily edge glue two 6 foot long boards together with only a barely perceptible step anywhere along the length of the joint.

   Once you have the paired boards glued up, glue the pairs together, again only one new joint at a time.  In this case, with an odd number of boards, I would make three pairs to start and then join the odd board to one pair to make a three board wide panel which I would then join to a pair to make a five board wide panel.  The last step would be to join the last glued up pair to the five board panel to make up the full seven board wide top.  Using yellow glue and leaving each glue up in the clamps for half an hour to 45 minutes you would be able to do the glue up of the full top in less than four hours working at a leisurely pace.

   If you prepped the boards properly, and got each joint flush as you went along, you will now have a top that has only very slight height differences at each of the seams.  At this point, fifteen minutes with a sharp cabinet scraper will clean up the top to perfectly flat with no chance of tearing out anywhere.

1. 
   jimbell | Mar 06, 2010 12:22am | #9

   Next time!

   jimbell

2. 
   user-64052 | Mar 13, 2010 07:10pm | #10

   you seem to get a change to an exterior edge to convex when you glue 2 up at a  time. so when you glue up the pairs, you have 2 convex edges facing one another. it is a lot more efficient to glue them all up at once. one just has to work a little faster. use biscuits. for alignmemt

   ron

1. 
   JohnWW | Mar 14, 2010 08:09pm | #11

   Why convex edges?

   Perhaps I'm not following you, but I don't see why the outside edges of the glued up pairs of boards should be convex.  In any case I check the fit of the joint between two of the pairs before I glue them together, If the joint isn't perfect, it just takes a pass or two with a handplane to get it right. 

   It may seem more time efficient to make up the top in a single glue up, but if you add in the time and hassle it takes to level out even a few badly stepped joints the time advantage disappears quickly.  In my experience biscuits are more trouble than they are worth.

6. 
   pictakinman | Mar 18, 2010 11:33pm | #12

   Ash is generally easy to plane if the grain is straight.  My thoughts are that the grain is changing direction in the glued up configuration.    Use the joiner plane with the bevel sharpened to a higher angle, set for a light cut, and skew the plane while making your diagonals.  If you still get tearout in a few areas, try planing from another direction.  Also note that since you sanded, vacuum the surface 2 or 3 times before planing as ash is opened grain.