Plane Confused

[Jim Koepke]

3) High quality sharpening equipment. I really like my Norton water stones. The combo 1000/8000 stone, a leather strop, a granite plate (for flattening the stone) and a decent honing guide will sharpen practically every plane and chisel in your shop. Don't even try to use a plane or chisel unless you can get it surgically sharp. It will just frustrate you and completely defeat the purpose of quality tools.

Point #3 can't be stated enough. Much of the perceived uselessness of hand tools is the use of crappy, dull hand tools. Once you use a high quality saw, plane or chisel, and see how fast and easy it can be, you'll find yourself starting to use them for all sorts of things because often times it's quicker.

Just my opinion.

The three most important items with hand planes... Sharpness, sharpness and sharpness! Of course, that is for a properly tuned plane.

The most amazing moment of woodworking just might be when taking as thin a shaving as your plane can while you are exhaling and the shaving just slowly rises aloft and floats away.

That will hook you on hand planes.

jim

[Brad Lehman]

I'm far from an expert, but I'll share my experience none the less.

I was in much the same situation a few years ago: 'just not getting it'. I was rapidly acquiring power tools, each with an ever increasing 'gizmo-ness' for lack of a better word.

What inititally got my started into hand tool work was making edge glued panels. No matter how hard I tried, I simply couldn't get a glue up that didn't have slight steps at each joint line, which I then had to sand out. I don't know about you, but I really, really don't like sanding.

I thought there had to be a better way, and I was eventually pointed to hand planes. At first I was incredulous. "Handplanes??!?!... you mean those torturous things we had to use in Junior High Woodshop?!??!" After doing some more reading, and more panel glue ups, I was willing to give it a try. After a lot of reading, and a few modest purchases (a decent old stanley, and a lot of sandpaper, and a piece of flat glass), I did try it and was blown away.

Now for me, there were three events that really made me a believer:

1. Getting ahold of an already fettled old Stanley smoother from Walt @ Brass City: This showed me how a plane *should* work...

2. Learning how to really sharpen a blade. Much has been written about this already, but it makes all the difference regardless of how much you spend on a plane...

3. Experiencing a really great plane (and this one was just last night)... I picked up the Lie-Nielsen Low Angle Jack and just got a chance to play with it last night. Now I can see where the value is in what they ask for their tools.

As they say, the slope is slippery. I can't remember the last power tool I purchased.

-- brad