george wilson
03-28-2009, 12:03 PM
This is a batch of planes,similar to the picture some months ago of a batch of backsaws.For this picture,we laid 2 sheets of plywood on the 16' workbench. There are (were before the layoffs) about 80 craftsmen in town who used these tools,and there were 5 types of planes in a set.
Therefore,Jon,on your left,and I on the right ( though no one is as far right as Jon!),used every means to manufacture these expediently. However,our best efforts to manufacture was in cutting the escapements. The rest,except for sawing and planing the wood to basic size,was hand work.
We had a slotting attachment for the milling machine seen in the back of the room,to the left of Jon,with the motor on top. This device made reciprocating strokes whose length could be varied. It was really for cutting keyways in metal gears,etc.,but we adapted it for wood. We made powerful sharp wood cutting chisels out of D2 steel.
At first,we laid out the throats of the planes,and drilled away as much wood as possible with Forstner bits. Then,we turned the planes upside down,and with a special long router bit,we routed a groove where the mouth of the plane would be. Then,we clamped the planes at the angles required,and chiseled away the wood with long,powerful strokes of the slotter. This worked perfectly,because the slotter did leave chisel cuts,not router cuts which would not have looked acceptable.The router cuts at the mouths were eradicated by the chisel cuts. Thick saws we made sawed away where the wedges fit,and squared up the mouths of the planes.
The beveling of the plane bodies was done by hand. Handles were sawn out,but hand rasped to their rounded contours.
We got the blacksmith shop to make authentic laminated irons,which have not yet been delivered. They were very stingy with metal in the 18th.C.,it being hand refined,so the irons were not very thick,and did not have chipbreakers till late in the century. Therefore,these planes needed careful tuning to make them not chatter.
Therefore,Jon,on your left,and I on the right ( though no one is as far right as Jon!),used every means to manufacture these expediently. However,our best efforts to manufacture was in cutting the escapements. The rest,except for sawing and planing the wood to basic size,was hand work.
We had a slotting attachment for the milling machine seen in the back of the room,to the left of Jon,with the motor on top. This device made reciprocating strokes whose length could be varied. It was really for cutting keyways in metal gears,etc.,but we adapted it for wood. We made powerful sharp wood cutting chisels out of D2 steel.
At first,we laid out the throats of the planes,and drilled away as much wood as possible with Forstner bits. Then,we turned the planes upside down,and with a special long router bit,we routed a groove where the mouth of the plane would be. Then,we clamped the planes at the angles required,and chiseled away the wood with long,powerful strokes of the slotter. This worked perfectly,because the slotter did leave chisel cuts,not router cuts which would not have looked acceptable.The router cuts at the mouths were eradicated by the chisel cuts. Thick saws we made sawed away where the wedges fit,and squared up the mouths of the planes.
The beveling of the plane bodies was done by hand. Handles were sawn out,but hand rasped to their rounded contours.
We got the blacksmith shop to make authentic laminated irons,which have not yet been delivered. They were very stingy with metal in the 18th.C.,it being hand refined,so the irons were not very thick,and did not have chipbreakers till late in the century. Therefore,these planes needed careful tuning to make them not chatter.