Hello all,
I am an 18 year old avid woodworker from australia and have been taking classes at school and recently at tertiary level for the last 10 years. During that time I have used machinary to prepare my stock and to save time. However, as I have developed a passion for timber, I am now going to invest in some tools of my own.
I know what to buy and what to look out for (poor products, bargains etc) and am buying those tools as quickly as my budget can support. However, I have ran into a snag. I have never really prepared any stock with hand planes and the thought of preparing rough saw timber to make some projects is rather daunting after using a planer/jointer all my life.
could someone please explain the purposes of shooting boards, which planes to use for specfic areas of stock preperation and what brands are good and whats not (I’ve heard lie nielsen takes the cake)
im sure I will have many questions to come
Replies
Well, that's a fairly tall order......
Normally, I would suggest a "search", there has been considerable discussions on this subject. However, since The Move, the search function here is a frustrating experience, at best.....
In a nutshell, four squaring stock totally by bench planes really is not that daunting a task. While a #5 jack, with a radiused bezel on the iron certainly will work, a #40 or #40 1/2 scrub plane will make the task go much quicker. Then you would follow up with the #5 or #6, smooth with a smoothing plane, checking for flatness all along the process using winding sticks, and joint the edges with a #7 or #8.
Normally, one begins four squaring by flattening a face, then joint the edges insuring that they are 90° the face, then take your marking gauge set for the final thickness and scribe around the edges of the board with the block of the gauge registered on the flattened face. Flip the board over and flatten that face to the scribed line.
Shooting boards are basically jigs that can be made for any number of tasks. One would be for "shooting" the end square, another would be for "shooting" the end at a mitre. Shooting boards can also be made for edge jointing.
I would highly recommend that you get a copy of Garrett Hack's The HANDPLANE Book. It is available here or most any book store in hard bound or soft bound. Mr. Hack goes into considerable detail on the types, uses, fettling, etc, etc, etc, in this book.
As to what brand to buy; I've also consumed considerable bandwidth here on that subject. While there is no question in my mind the Lie-Nielsen planes are finely crafted tools, they are entirely patterned after Stanley. In other words, with few exceptions, their cutting geometries are identical to the Stanley equivelant. Given that, there is not a person alive or dead that could tell the difference if a board was planed with a Lie-Nielsen, Clifton, Stanley, Keen Kutter, etc.
My personal preference are Pre WWII Stanley's, with the exception of a Clifton #4 and a Stanley (UK) #6, ca. 1980) all my planes are Pre War Stanleys. FWIW.
Dano
Edited 6/4/2002 2:15:05 AM ET by Danford C. Jennings
I'm sure folks will pick up on this thread and give you lots of good advice and suggest a number of books to read. I have some suggestions for the latter.
Aldren A. Watson has written and illustrated several books on woodworking and two that I strongly recommend: "Hand Tools: Their Ways and Workings" and "Country Furniture." Watson does an excellent job of showing through wonderfully drawn illustrations how various tools are used and there is a section on shooting boards, cutting miters, etc. I highly recommend these two books as a great starting point in gaining an understanding in properly using hand tools. "Country Furniture" then takes you through the process of making some pieces and how hand tools are used to do the job.
Good Luck!
Coincidentally, I just finished a new shooting board and some jigs to go with it, vastly improving my ability to shoot square ends (as in fitting drawer fronts to carcasses) mitered frame joints (as in picture frames, etc...) and mitered corners of boxes. All these tasks involve shooting endgrain with a handplane set on its side. This is what is most frequently called, "shooting", although shooting along an edge (for example, when book matching veneers) also falls under what I think of when speaking in terms of "shooting". Using a shooting board connotes this area of handplane use to me.
While there are many books which show line drawings of shooting boards and "donkey's ears" (a jig fashioned to shoot across the width of a workpiece, just like a shooting board, but at an angle, as in 45 degrees for making the aforementioned mitered cornered boxes) Few books discuss their actual making, including specific materials, thicknesses, etc... It is also difficult to find specific instruction on which planes are best suited to this task and how to actually perform it.
Watson's is a good book. Hack's is extremely useful, as well as being breathtaking to behold. I also would add Graham Blackburn's Traditional Woodworking Handtools and Making Woodworking Aids and Devices, by Robert Wearing. The very best book I've read, which contains two specific chapters on the use of shooting boards and planes to use in such applications is volume 2 of Furniture Making Techniques by David Charlesworth. In this book you will find the specifics in terms of construction, materials, planes, and techniques, fully illustrated and with photographs as well. It also contains a chapter concerning your fellow Aussie and plane maker HNT Gordon!
Note: the spectrum of hand planes and their uses is pretty broad. Shooting is a pretty specific task. To me, it is the method of choice for the above-mentioned tasks, even in a shop fully stocked with every power tool one could desire. It is quick, accurate, easy to control and yields very satisfying results. I agree with Dano about the blind woodworker, but that concept leads to plane irons and sharpening them properly, a whole other kettle of fish. I will continue to use my L-N #5 (would have gotten a 5 1/2 if offered at the time of my purchase...) for some things, but will now reach with child-like delight for the new L-N iron miter plane for most shooting operations.
I still use my jointer and thicknesser all the time, and wouldn't much like it if I had to give them up entirely in favor of hand tools alone. Shooting endgrain on a shooting board is the exception to this.
Cheers,
Greg
Edited 6/4/2002 6:30:37 PM ET by GregB
Sorry, I did it too. Here is how to make a pretty good shooting board.
It is constructed in a way very similar to a bench hook. The base should be of mdf, at least 5/8 inch thick. The mdf's advantage is stability. The plane also slides along it pretty well too. Don't worry that the timber you intend to shoot doesn't have its centerline right on your plane's centerline when the timber is resting on the mdf. Even if you slightly crown your iron, the plane's lateral adjustment can be used to position the iron in the right spot relative to the timber.
I used a maple fence screwed to the mdf. It is approx. 1 1/2 thick by 2 inches wide. It is exactly the same width as the mdf base. It was scribed around with a sharp knife and carefully block planed right to the knife line. It is very important that the fence is at 90 degrees to the edge of the mdf, as well as being straight and with ends square to the edge against which the workpiece is held. So mine can be used either left or right handed, I made sure the mdf base was perfectly square, with clean, straight edges, and that the fence was straight and square to both the left and right edges.
Perhaps it was overkill, but I screwed the base to another subbase of 3/4 inch mdf, which has the bench hook cleat screwed to it. A small groove was sawn about 1/8 inch deep into the sub base on the table saw right at the edges of the upper mdf sheet, to be a catch trough for dust created while shooting. The plane actually glides back and forth on this sub base. My dimensions were something like 18 inches for the sub base and 13 or so for the upper sheet. The upper is centered on the sub base, so an equal amount of 3/4 inch mdf projects out each side. This gives equal space for either left or right handed planing.
If the fence is accidentally fixed at other than a perfect 90 degrees, the board can still function. You can use a paper shim or a bit of masking tape on either the shooting board's base or fence to correct for errors. You can also use shims and wedges between the workpiece and fence in order to purposely shoot at angles other than 90 degrees. (for example, if you got crazy and wanted to fit a drawer to a carcass space very snuggly and wanted 89.5 degrees, so the outside face of the drawer front could snug up just a bit on closing)
With this shooting board, you can use jigs, or carriages, set at other angles, such as 45 degrees. For example, you can construct a sled-like jig, similar to what Ian Kirby advocates in his Accurate Tablesaw book, to hold a workpiece up on the shooting board at a 45 degree angle. This presents the endgrain to be shot right at 90 degrees to the shooting board on which it rests. Shoot as normal. You don't need a donkey's ear if you do it this way. Other angled carriages can be made as needed, just as you might for use on a table saw (if you prefer leaving your tablesaw at 90 degrees and using sleds to saw mitered edges).
The plane must have a well sharpened iron. I also like a very tight mouth. The old bedrock design after which the Lie-Nielsen's are made have a nice, stable surface on which to rest while lieing on their sides. Lie-Nielsen also takes care to see their sides are 90 degrees to the sole. Some other designes can wobble a little, which would be bad. This could conceiveably be addressed using Robert Wearing's "improved" shooting board design, but I haven't tried it. While I do now have a L-N iron miter plane (after the sort of rare Stanley #9) and it performs even better than I imagined, this special plane is not strictly necessary. You can do great with a 5 or 5 1/2. The 5 1/2 now offered by L-N being a bit wider and more massive, which helps. In any event, set the plane for a very shallow cut and work smoothly. It's kind of fun.
I hope this is clear enough and helpful. Pictures are worth more than the thousand words I just used, so you might like to check the books out as well, especially Charlesworth's. In the end, it is very easy and satisfying work.
Cheers,
Greg
wow greg, thanks for all that.
however, when you press the stock against the fence and start moving the plane back and forth, doesnt it start cutting into the mdf itself? you have cleared up alot of problems I have had, thanks alot.
ITSUNFAIR,
You're very welcome; it would be nice if you gave it a try and were very pleased with your result! As to cutting into the mdf, it isn't a problem. Notice that the plane has 1/8-3/16 of iron on the sole between the mouth and the edge of the plane. You will also notice that the cutting iron's edge is a bit inboard of that. The portion of the sole running against the bottom portion of the mdf is solid. No blade there to cut into anything. Still, set your cutting depth very shallow, and nothing will get chewed up. Imagine using a rabbit/rebate plane on its side on a shooting board. You most certainly would get the tearing up of things that I think you're asking about. Does this make any sense?
Norm,
I don't have a digital camera. To be quite honest, the best pictures and descriptions are in David Charlesworth's book, volume 2. My verbiage is poor by comparison. He also has both drawings and photos to help illustrate both the making and the technique. It isn't expensive, and you get a lot more than just the chapteres devoted to shooting boards and the planes for use on them. For example, there are superb chapters on drawer fitting and edge jointing with handplanes. The book is really a collection of articles he wrote as a regular contributing editor of England's Furniture and Cabinetmaking magazine. No, I'm not a sales guy or anything like that. But, without any formal training, his two books have really let me turn a corner.
Cheers,
Greg
Okay, thanks. I'll take a look for the Charlesworth book.
Greg, any chance of getting some of those pictures of your shooting boards?
Hi,
A couple of answers that I couldn't see in the body of the replies.
1) As Danford Jennings states, Lee-Nielsen are great planes, but just as good for everyday users are the old (pre-1950) Stanley planes or Records, which were made when tradesmen had to rely primarily upon good quality hand tools. They also cost about 90% less.
2) Skewed blade planes work best on end grain, I use an old wooden skewed blade plane (badger plane) with my shooting board, mainly to clean up mitres
3) Here's a photo of a metal shooting board to give you ideas for construction of your own. Don't have a heart attack at the price. Collectors pay these prices. Not me either! http://cgi.ebay.com.au/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=2113081363
4) Some Australian suppliers of old tools are:
Hans Brunner http://www.hansbrunnertools.gil.com.au (one of the world's true gentlemen also!) and http://www.workingtools.com.au
5) Reiterating earlier comments, blade has to be razor sharp +
Cheers,
Eddie
Edited 6/15/2002 3:04:27 AM ET by eddie
Edited 6/15/2002 3:19:02 AM ET by eddie
Edited 6/15/2002 3:20:59 AM ET by eddie
Edited 6/15/2002 3:41:04 AM ET by eddie
I have probably 250 planes. The ones I constantly
use are a bull-nose rabbet (Stanley 93?), a low-angle
lever-cap block plane, a number 10 cabinet-maker's
rabbet plane, and #7 jointer. I also have a set of
Bailey transitional planes. Metal tops and beech bottoms.
I find they handle better than the all-metal variety.
If my house were on fire, I'd rescue the planes, my
cats, and then worry about everything else. Maybe the
cats first, but it would be a close call.
A number 5 is the old standby. I find it a bit tall
and ungainly. I much prefer the #10. A bit longer,
a bit lower, much more expensive and difficult to find.
Lie-nielson planes are nice. I've never been able to
justify the cost. Used Stanleys are easy to find and
reasonably easy to recondition. A good replacement blade
makes a big difference. You can recondition one and get
a good blade for the cost of a new Record plane. I don't
find the Records very well made or comfortable to use.
If you frequent the antique dealers and flea markets, you'll
soon see enough planes to be able to judge and buy yourself
a few good ones. Buy the oldest you can find in good
mechanical condition. The irons seem to improve with age.
I suspect that some precipitation hardening or other
chemistry is at work. New blades do not seem to hold an
edge as well. Could be my imagination, but it seems like
that to me. Old planes have character and a feel that you
do not get with a new plane.
For timber, a hand plane will never compete with a powered
jointer. But, your work will look like it came out of ####jointer. Get a good #4 or #5 jack and sharpen it with an
agressive curve to the blade. Maybe 1/8 inch curve. That
will be the roughing plane. Get a #6 or #7 jointer and
sharpen it dead flat and razor sharp. You will get ####smooth and shiny cut that need never suffer the abuse
of sandpaper. Also get a few good scrapers.
A half dozen good planes and 30 years experience will do
the trick. Unfortunately, you'll have to buy about 250
planes in those 30 years before you get the experience and
figure out which 6 you really like.
Correcting wording in my earlier post, ITSUNFAIR, I was referring to old Record planes also, not the new variety - steer clear of modern planes wherever possible.
Agree woth Bob's comments.
Eddie
Bob I am pushing 200 planes now and there are only a select few that hang on my shop wall and are ready for work at a monents notice. But do you use your #10 for. I don't find them as good as a smoother and are harder to control than a shoulder plane. I seem to just keep the #10 on display. But then then again I am only pushing 200 and have only 15 good years but in yet.
ScottScott C. Frankland
Newfoundland Wood Worker
Scott,
I use a No10 to field panels - can be run in either direction, unlike panel raiser. Imagine this would also be more versatile than a standard smoother - but the blade profiles are different (smoother is flat grind with rounded corners, rebate plane has flat grind, square corners)
Workshop attached to house, noise and dust issues - cannot/do not use router at home.
Cheers,
Eddie
I can relate to the shop being in the house. I have been building a shaker workbench with all hand tools because my little guy cannot seen to sleep through the noise my power tools make. It has its rewards though when it is all done by hand.
I usually use my scrub plane to start out a panel. I use my 5, 5 1/2 and 6 to work the panels flat before my smoother. The smoothers I have two #4 1/2's one with a small radius on the corner and the other with a straight edge.
As more a shooting I use a very tight mouth wooden plane with a 45 deg or up to a 55 deg angle depending on the wood I am working. Scott C. Frankland
Newfoundland Wood Worker
Hi Scott,
Trade school here (Aust) use a No6 as the only bench plane. We are taught to do all with the one plane, maybe using 4 or 4 1/2 smoother for finishing. That's at school.
At home, my preference is to use six planes:
1) An old Record 311 shoulder plane that I picked up second hand for detail work/trimming shoulders & rebates.
2) A 16" wooden Moseley badger plane (skewed blade) as the general purpose bench plane & shooting plane, bigger than a No 5 and smaller than a No6. Use this plane to work panels flat, unless they're huge
3) A 1950-60 vintage wooden smoother with a lignum vitae sole and adjustable throat. Far more pleasant & comfortable to use than the Stanley 4
4) A Stanley No8 for flattening big panels or jointing long edges.
5) HNT Gordon make high angle wooden planes that are v. good and sell them in kit form - approx USD20 ex works NSW. Blade pitch is 60 degrees, or 92 degrees with blade reversed & plane used as a scraper plane. Highly recommend these - very good plane and use this plane and its tryplane cousin on figured panels.
6) Stanley 80 scraper
Also use a plough to groove/rebate with when necessary, the old Record No10 (heavier casting than Stanley) as discussed and a Stanley 40 scrub plane to thickness with, but thicknessing is generally unnecessary - I design to standard thicknesses so all that's necessary is to remove machine marks
Am just about to get rid of the rest of my stock of planes, just gathering dust. Might keep the No5 as it is the 'general purpose' plane that might have a use eventually
Have seen new Stanley rebate planes on the shelf out here, but with "replaceable blades" (Tungsten carbide inserts). I wouldn't touch them with a bargepole. Cost of these was USD60, vs USD35-40 for a 1920's vintage Stanley 10. Not a hard decision if you were looking to buy one.
Currently building a small cabinet out of Sureni (Malaysian red cedar) at home - hard to work - glad I have the high angle planes and the skewed planes.
Anyway, enough of typing, better get back to work.
Cheers,
Eddie
Edited 6/16/2002 4:30:22 AM ET by eddie
Eddie,
I've heard wonderful things about the HNT Gordon planes too. I have a local supplier and have an ebony shoulder plane on my purchase list.
I'm curious about some terminology in your post. I know what you mean when you say, "jointing". If you use the term, "shooting", do you mean on a shooting board, as was the original query in this thread? For our young Aussie who originated this discussion, what would you recommend for use on Australian timbers being shot on a shooting board? Sides square to the sole and substantial enough to avoid rocking, a low angle and thick/well supported iron are relevant criteria for shooting end grain. I've already made the commitment on a L-N iron miter plane, which performs superbly. It was expensive. Any other suggestions for our young Aussie friend?
Cheers,
Greg
Hi Greg/ITSUNFAIR,
Yes Greg, the last post was half off-topic - thanks for picking this up.
By jointing, I mean getting edges absolutely true (straight and square to the face), shooting means using a plane on its side to true up end grain. Criteria are sharp, square ground blade, side at 90 degrees to sole and plane stable on base of shooting board (see earlier post for a picture). Any plane mentioned in this discussion should do this, but a bedrock or higher priced plane usually is more accurate.
Low angle planes work well on end grain, but tend to break out as the blade goes across unsupported edges - use a scrap piece of wood behind your job to avoid this.
Regards,
Eddie
Edited 6/17/2002 2:08:49 AM ET by eddie
hi eddie,
what part of australia you in? where did you pick up your second hand planes from? thanks for all your help
Hi ITSUNFAIR,
Have emailed you the details you requested.
Leave a message if they didn't get through.
Cheers,
Eddie
eddie,
try [email protected]
im sorry the other one doesnt work. thanks again
Eddie,
I thought that's what you meant. You also mentioned a reference to an earlier post with picture. Can you indicate where? I don't have a digital camera to photo my shooting board and 45 degree angled carriage for shooting miters across their width, but thought ITSUNFAIR might benefit from a photo or illustration. The books I mentioned previously in this thread have them, but he may not have made book purchases yet. Not with all those planes to acquire.
Cheers,
Greg
Hi Greg,
Pictures mentioned are in 6485.10 in this discussion
"all those planes" -You're right Greg, looks daunting. ITSUNFAIR, just buy one at a time and figure out for yourself what you need. I was just letting you know where I ended up.
Eddie
Edited 6/17/2002 11:18:52 PM ET by eddie
Here is a few pictures of different shooting boards that are out there. I cannot remember where I found this two on the net.Scott C. Frankland
Newfoundland Wood Worker
Scott,
I think they may be from Ernest Joyce's Encyclopoedia of Furniture Making. I'll have to check. Figure 1 is a simple shooting board which holds the work piece while the plane is moved back and forth resting directly on the bench top. 2 shows a set up I don't like much for shooting 45's, as with picture frames. I prefer to place the triangular piece with its pointy end towards me and its flat end (nice geometry terms, right?) up against the fence, running the plane on the bench top as in 1. 3 is the Donkey's ear, mentioned in a post, above. I prefer to use a 45 degree carriage resting on my simple shooting board and run the plane in exactly the same way as if shooting the ends of a drawer front. Just finished a miter cornered box in Koa with moderately interlocked grain and it worked great. The box sides are approx 9 inches wide (tall) and will have ebony keys to help hold the corners together. These 9 inch wide corners were shot to accurate 45 degree miters with a very sharp Lie-Nielsen iron miter plane. 4 is a miter jack and 5 is something like a sticker, which can be used to hold such things as muntins steady while planing them to shape with molding planes. The muntin is held steady by a small point of a nail, I think, protruding from the far left end. 6, I don't know or don't remember.
I think it's best to make only the fence and edge-of-bench cleat in hardwood (mine are in maple). The rest (I call it the field, but am sure that is not right) in mdf. More stable. I also like to make an mdf sub base on which the plane slides, instead of using the bench top. Alternatively, you can just rest the whole shooting board on 1/8 inch mdf to protect the bench top. Wedges can be used to present the work piece at different angles to the plane. Shims of paper can be used to correct for shooting boards not made exactly at 90 degrees, for example. This is an extremely useful tool. You just need a stable (via substantial sided) plane with care taken on sharpening the iron.
As mentioned above, all this stuff is covered very clearly, with both illustrations and photos in David Charlesworth's new volume 2 of Furniture Making Techniques. It has worked superbly for me.
Cheers,
Greg
I like the number 10 because it does most everything
I want without switching to 4 different planes. Does
rabets, smooths, long enough to joint small stock,
raises simple panels. If it only had a skew blade...
Might not like any other number 10 as well, but I like mine.
They're all slightly different. Doesn't matter to me
that it leaves a couple fine marks at the edges since it
has no relief at the edges. I usually take a pass with ####scraper anyway.
I don't think anybody currently makes anything comparable.
Unfortunate, because they're not common and hence expensive.
Some day it would be nice to design something good and sell
it, but it would probably be too expensive for anyone to buy.
The variety of new planes available is pitiful. HArd to
compete with a router and jointer. But, I hate the noise
and don't run miles of molding. I frequently find it faster
to use a hand plane than to use the jointer. Particularly on
small pieces. Yet, I know woodworkers who do not own a single
plane. They make pieces that have no regard for the grain.
I read every piece and work with it. They make more money.
I can't work that way. They use a mortiser and can chop
50 before I can do 5. But, I can do one before they have the
chisel and the fence and the hold down all adjusted.
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