Replies

1. 
   CedarGroves | Jul 26, 2011 02:28am | #1

   Do you scrub?

   Johnathan,

   I resaw and plane totally by hand, so my methods will be a little different, but generally speaking after I have established a good, flat reference surface without tearout I will give myself a strong 1/16th over my final thickness. If my saw arm is having a good day and I'm on my game I can go right to the jointer plane and then my smoother - if not, I'll treat the board with my scrub plane or jack, then jointer and smoother.

   Remember to use the right tool and adjust the depth of cut for speed first, get close to where you need to be, then switch over to your smoothing planes for the final finish. Just because you use hand planes does not mean it needs to take forever and a day. 

   Now you're using a thickness planer so make sure you have good infeed and outfeed support to help with snipe and good sharp blades to prevent tearout - both of which will bring your thickness down further than expected. in the end, practice will tell you what you need to know.

   -Ian  

2. 
   bones | Jul 26, 2011 09:31am | #2

   as long as they are the same

   Well I take mine dang close, some times so close only a scraper is required.  I don't know what you save by using the hand plane unless you have some nasty grains that like to chip i.e.  birds eye maple etc.  Or if you just like using planes.  I never get to concerned that the pieces hit an exact thickness just that they are all consistent and flat.   For example.  The piece I'm doing now a Pie safe. My plans call for 3/4" stock, but with the cherry I have looks like they will finsh out at around 7/8" or 13/16. Since I love to have a thicker piece when possible, I've decided to go with 7/8" and just adjust.  Again that's just me, I go with the flow and adjust. dimensions to accomodate.  I was fortunate on a hutch project that I was sold 5/4 for the price of 4/4 and all my pieces ended up coming out 1".  Made one heck of a solid, but heavy piece.    As to my planer, I had a lunchbox makita for over 20 years till I recently upgraded and bought an old Northfield # 2 18" planer, what a nice addition.   Good luck. 

3. 
   [email protected] | Jul 26, 2011 03:25pm | #3

   Depends on how good of job the planer is doing.

   This would depend completely on how good of surface the machine is leaving. 

   A good planer with sharp blades, will get a pretty clean surface, and you would only need to knock off the tops of the little scallops left by the arc of the blades.  The depth of the scallops is dependant on the head diameter, and the cuts per inch. 

   A small diameter cutting head with fewer cuts per inch leaves taller ridges, than the same head diameter making twice as many cuts per inch.   A larger head diameter leaves shallower scallops, than a smaller head at the same cuts per inch. 

   So, I'd say that when you can make long thin shavings with the hand plane you are done cleaning up the surface. 

   I agree with Bones, that you don't really need to get things to a "given thickness", they just need to be true and consistent.  I have measured some of the things made by my grandfather, and great grandfather in order to make replicas of them.  The thickness varies by the piece.  Which, I think was typical of work done before the commercial availability of surfaced woods. 

4. 
   joinerswork | Jul 26, 2011 08:23pm | #4

   Jonathan,

   In most cases, you can machine plane to nominal thickness, and just remove the machine marks with your smoothing plane.  For something like a glued-up table top, you might want to machine to 1/32" or so over your final desired thickness, then use a try plane to level the joints, followed by a pass over all with the smoother.  As has been noted, in many cases, final thickness variations + or - a bit don't really matter.

   Ray

5. 
   SgianDubh | Jul 27, 2011 07:26am | #5

   Jonathan, set the final cut of your thicknesser to the exact dimension you require, eg, if you want the wood to finish at 20 mm then set the machine to cut 20 mm for all the parts you need at that dimension and, further, run all those parts through as a batch. Follow up the final dimensioning all your parts to the requisite size by undertaking all the joinery.

   Restrict hand plane use to final clean up, although you have to bear in mind where you can and where you can't use the hand planes after doing the joinery. For example, if you have made a morticed and tenoned frame then plane the inside edges of the framing material after you'e executed the joinery, but before you finally glue the frame together. You can always get at the front and back face, and the outside edge of the frame after assembly. This is normal practice of course because there may be slight misalignment of the various members on the front and back face of the frame.

   Assuming your power planing machines are working correctly, and you're not getting a lot of tearout using this stock preparation method, then handplaning afterwards should take no more than a few strokes to remove all evidence of the scalloping left behind by the circular rotation of the planer irons. Slainte.