Hi Creekers,
I'd like this thread to be about all the lessons learned in building a traditional wooden plane. (not a Krenov style plane) I am soliciting all the knowledge and experience that anyone will offer.
Here is my first meager attempt at building just the body of a plane. I did'nt have any nice scraps of wood, so i took this small piece of qtr swn wt oak, marked it up and had a few hours of fun. I don't plan on doing anything else with this piece. I'll probably just do a few more practice pieces in the near future for now.
Things I learned:
-Start waste removal 1/16" in from the scribed lines
-Leave the top and bottom of the stock 1/16" (1/8" total) larger than final size (i plan on cheating by doing this. I use my mortice chisels and pry and leave marks. then i plane off the 1/16" on top and bottom. Also, It gives nice clean lines to the mouth
-Cut well inside your angles (I exceeded mine and the mouth is huge)
-My skewed combo Float is awesome!
-Skew chisels are invaluable
-Using my shoulder to run my chisel down the bed wasnt that hard. (this is a small plane though)
-Floats are better for getting a flat surface than paring chisels. However, I had to use both constantly because floats will cause the wood to lift up as with miter planing.
-Clean the corners out extra sharp with the skew and paring chisels.
-Touch up chisels at least once or twice with a strop, if not a few more times.
Let me know your experiences as well.
Thanks,
Dan