I have the book “Making Traditional Wooden Planes” by John M. Whelan. I am planning to build a jointer plane, plow plane, and possibly some molding(hollow/round, etc). What type of blade would be good to use for the jointer, hock, Lie Nielsen, Lee Valley? Also, Where would be a good source for a set of traditional, tapered plow blades, new or used. I live in NW Pennsylvania, so if anyone knows of a place near here at all, that would be great, or online retailers as well. Also, where would be a good source for suitable beech, local or online.
Thanks,
Nick
Replies
Pennsylvania, What do the OLD Quakers use?
West Penn Hardwoods in Olean, NY stocks European steamed beech.
Go to the WoodNet forum [sorry I don't have the exact address] and go to the handtool section and tell Rarebear what you are wanting. He custom makes blades. Peter
Edited 4/22/2005 5:03 pm ET by Peter36
Hock makes good blades for wooden planes. A wooden plane needs a much thicker blade than what you see in the metal planes. I might get in trouble for saying this, but with such a thick blade, you may want to avoid the A2 steel, it might take a bit longer to sharpen than regular tool steel.
For the molding planes, I guess you can buy O1 steel from starrett, cut it to size, then harden and temper it (i.e., heat it really hot, cool it really fast, heat it not so hot, cool it not so fast).
n1K86,
Too many syllables in your name..lol.
There is an big antique tool auction next weekend up in Nassau, NH. ..and you can see the stuff and bid on-line. Many dealers don't like the bidding on-line option, but that is another story,
Google on Martin J. Donnelly Antique Tools..all the info is on his webisite.
maybe this is it http://www.mjdtools.com
Edited 4/22/2005 5:53 pm ET by BG
a good source for steel for plane irons is a machine shop. Ask them if they toss out old industrial hacksaw blades. I got two from a machine shop about 20 years ago. The blades are 2" wide 5/32" thick and 24" long. Made a number of plane irons from these old blades.They are harder than a regular iron but not too much harder. Grinding and honing are not a problem. They stay sharp longer than the irons I had bought .You have to grind the teeth off of course.The blades must have been wider than two inches, After grinding the teeth off I have two inches of steel.
By the way ,I have that book.Great information on the history and building of wooden planes. I have made several planes, one tip, make each plane out of scrap wood first.Each plane I made was from a 4x4 cutoff.It's best to work out the kinks on a hunk of fence post first. I made a jointer plane from a hunk of fence post, then made the keeper out of quartersawn white oak. A neighbor gave me $50.00 for the experimental plane. I only wanted $5.00 for the approximate cost of the iron.
mike
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