I am trying to flatten the face of a piece of wood by hand. It is a piece of pine about 8 inches wide. The face has a slight cup in the middle. Initially I was planing parallel to the grains, and this technique didn’t seem to work. In fact it seemed to get worse. Then I remembered reading about planing across the grain. This, even though it seems counter-intuitive seems to work. I don’t have enough confidence to know if this is a proper technique or if I am just making the board more uneven.
If I am able to get the board flat by planing across the grains, will cleaning up the marks with a lighter plane setting and going parallel to the grains, damage the flatness?
Thanks for your patience.
Replies
Check youtube university. Bunch of vids there. Here's one https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UTPvcXVzb9A
Planing cross grain to flatten a board is the best and fastest way to do it. Go on a bit of a diagonal, rather than 90 degrees across. Clean it up with a finely set smooth plan with the grain at the end.
Some types of pine are flexible. Make sure downward pressure isn't taking the cup out as you work. You may have to shim the two sides to keep it from flexing.
Either way, scribe a tight ‘S’ in pencil or chalk down the length of the board to get a good visual of where stock is being removed.
There are a couple ways to do it:
1. Check the board for wobble and starting with the best side, plane off the high spots until the board does not rock when flipped and placed on workbench. Then work on the convex side, until you got it flat, using winding stick to check for twist.
Then mark a line around the edges, flip over and plane to the lines. Cosman has a very anal (ahem) thorough video worth checking :-D
2. Start with the concave side up, cupped edges equally spaced off top with wedges. As above, then address the convex side.
If you're a FWW subscriber, the Kitchen hutch project video also has a section on flattening, albeit with Japanese planes, the principle is the same.
Something else to consider. I had issues with planing soft woods with my #4 1/2 due to my bench top not being flat. My bench top became concave over time. Once I flatten the top with a #6 diagonally all was fine. A friend had issues on long pieces as he was applying too much pressure with his tail vise which caused the board to bow up in the middle slightly. Food for thought depending on your setup.
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