Aftermarket plane blades

[daniel leslie]

Potentially dumb question here but...

If you're going to be putting a back bevel on the iron...why spend any time at all polishing the back flat first?

[Johnny Kleso]

I'd like to add you can NOT use a back bevel with a new style cap iron..

Both are flat if you bevel the end of one it dosen't make contact with the other..

[Don Dorn]

Possibly my expecations are not what they should be, but the two Hock blades I bought were quickly flattened using 220 on a granite plate, then 400, then 600 which is all the higher I've gone. As all the scratches dissapeared, I moved to the next grit and found that 600 wet/dry gave a good polish. Then, it only gets batter with time. So far, I love my Hocks as they tend to stay sharp longer and are quick to sharpen now.

[jamie shard]

There's two things being talked about here. The back which seats on the frog and the back which hits the wood.

It's fiddly, but I like knowing the back is flat and seating completely on the frog without distortion. That's the flatness of the big area of the back.

I also use the ruler trick to flatten the 3/1000 of a inch which might contact the wood. That's the flatness of the tiny edge of the blade.

(probably obvious)

[Trevor Walsh]

With a back bevel you wouldn't need to polish the whole back. just flatten to the point where the chip breaker makes uniform contact. The other important face is the one that engages the bed, that has to be flat or else you get chatter. Those surfaces must be flat, but not polished. I would think a grippy 320 grit flattened surface will hold a setting against the bed better than a mirror finished one anyways.

[Bob Warfield]

I have a Hock blade/chip breaker combo in a #4 and a Hock blade in my 60 1/2. The #4 took forever to flatten and the first blade I bought for the 60 1/2 had 1 corner that appeared to be bent over a few thousanths. Ron replaced that one but the shipping was on me. I won't buy anymore of his blades. I have the IBC/Cossman blade/chipbreaker in my #7. That blade was very flat out of the box. I'm very pleased with it. I'm about to order a set for my #8 from LV. I'll have to get back to you on those.
Good Luck,
Bob Warfield

[Tony Shea]

I won't buy anymore of his blades.

That's too bad you are so dissapointed with Ron that you'll not buy anymore of his product. In my experience Ron's blades once flattened and sharp, seem to outperform most blades that I have used. Even his A2 blades seem to get a sharpness about them that resembles the sharpness of regular O1. My other LN and LV blades don't seem to get quite as sharp, but really this is splitting hairs.

But I completely agree in that Ron's blades are certainly not always that flat. I;ve had to send a couple back myself but seem to always get a nice flat one in return, or one that doesn't require too much work on my part to flatten. I find it odd that Bob that you had to pay return shipping. I've never in any of my dealings with LV, LN, Highland, TFFW, etc had to pay return shipping or least not get reimbursed for it. Almost hard to believe Bob. But stranger things have happened.

On to LV blades. Damn these things are just incredibly flat!!! Just seems to awe me everytime I get a new blade of theirs how incredibly easy they are to get sharp. This fact really does out weigh the performance of Ron's replacement blades for Stanleys and I will now always grab a LV blade instead of Rons for this purpose. I truely just think LV does an incredible service to us in their blades being perfect.

[David Weaver]

I still have been buying hocks just because they're cheapest and they're the thickness I want for an old plane.

Build yourself an iron holder and you can do in 10 minutes what would've taken 45 with just bare hands and stones.

All you need is an 8/4 offcut or 2x4 end and some bolts, nuts and washers.

[Josh Rudolph]

I still have been buying hocks just because they're cheapest and they're the thickness I want for an old plane.

Build yourself an iron holder and you can do in 10 minutes what would've taken 45 with just bare hands and stones.

All you need is an 8/4 offcut or 2x4 end and some bolts, nuts and washers.

David,

I also like the thickness of the Hock's. Substantial yet do not require opening the mouth. Paired with free shipping and the prices at Craftsman's Studio...I keep going back. However I keep forgetting about the back flattening.
When I was flattening the last 2 blades...about an hour into them, I remembered this guy on here who had made a jig to do it in a fraction of the time! I will be building your little jig for the next time. However I am very intrigued by the LV's...so my money may be heading their next time.

Josh

[Tony Zaffuto]

They don't get mentioned on forums as much, but also try the Ray Iles irons.

I've got a lot of aftermarket blades, and one of them is the Ray Iles, purchased for a Stanley #18 block plane. I believe I got it from Tools for Working Wood, and one of the reasons was that blurb about these being basically a hand process, including a look-see at the blades after heat treat & draw, to determine if a side is concave. If concavity is found, the bevel is put on the other side, to give the flat side a hollow, to aid in flattening. I also believe the irons are O1.

The iron I got did have slight concavity and was a breeze to flatten, maybe ten minutes or so. The iron honed up very nicely and keeps a decent edge on the wood I work-mainly cherry, white oak & walnut. I would definitely buy another should I need another blade.

Another iron I like a lot are the Clifton hand forged irons. Thick and take & hold an edge!

[Eddie Darby]

I recently bought an extra balde for my #4 to have for smoothing some curly maple for my upcoming project. I am going to try a 10* back bevel on it.

If you are going to run a back bevel on the blade, then flattening the flat-side of the blade is not needed. The back bevel needs to be only just slightly wider than the thickness of the shaving being taken, and since it is curly maple, then a very thin shaving is called for, so a back bevel around 5 thousands of an inch is all that is needed, if the shaving is in the 1 thou area. Also a tight mouth on the plane is very helpful.

As I started on the 4000 stone, I noticed the polishing pattern was not even, indicative to a non-flat back. It was like this on both blades. So I went through my entire sharpening regime to get them setup as I expect them.

A 4,000 x stone has a particle size of 3 microns, so though your Hock blade was not 'flat' it was probably close to within a few microns. I've had way worse.

I really like Hock blades, but I hate how long they take to get setup.

How long did it take you?

My question is, how could the blades have come to me appearing to have a nice uniformed polished flat back, and in reality they were not. Is it possible they are buffing the backs on a buffer? Or am I just being to anal-retentive about the backs? My goal with sharpening is to keep everything as consistent and repeatable as possible. If everything has been through the same process, quick touchups and re-honing works out to be very fast.

If the scratches on the blade are smaller than the amount that the blade deviated from being perfectly flat, then someone 'may' have gotten a blade that was made on a Monday or a Friday! It is also possible that the surface of the abrasive used to flatten the blades got out of flat itself.

I have reached the point that I will likely be ordering the LV setup next time as I don't like spending that much time setting the Hock's up.

http://www.popularwoodworking.com/wo...keeps-dropping

The above link shows the lapping machines that Lee Valley are incorporating into their blades.

Any ideas about the Hock backs or suggestions for me with getting them setup?
Thanks,
Josh

Yes, try the David Charlesworth ruler trick, then you never have to flatten plane blades on flat-side ever again.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sFOz9n8dHqU

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rvop_JCfZGI

The above 2 links show Rob Cosman sharpening a new blade in no time flat.

Now as for myself, I don't worry about the lapping of the flat-side of the blades so much, and focus instead on getting the right type of blade material that I want for the application at hand.
So I like to use A2 Cyro for tough abrasive woods, and rough 'hogging it off' work, and then I use O1 for finishing cuts, smoothing and jointing where I 'think' the fine sharpness helps.

I hope this helps.

[Eddie Darby]

I think I saw on here a while back where someone built a back flattening jig, essentially a block of wood with magnets that allowed the user to put a lot of pressure (significantly more than you could get with just fingers)on the blade as the back was being polished. Is this a good approach or amintroducing problems by applying that much pressure?

Any ideas about the Hock backs or suggestions for me with getting them setup?

Thanks,
Josh

Just ran into this while surfing.

http://www.popularwoodworking.com/wo...rpening-easier

"Three Magnets Make Sharpening Easier" - - Christopher Schwarz

Hope this helps.

[David Keller NC]

Tom,

You make a good point. It makes perfect sense as to why we need flat backs on a chisel, but why do we need them on a plane blade if you are putting a back bevel or "ruler tricking" it? I guess I have never thought about it it's relevance since I started back beveling. It could be the same OCD that makes guys worry about their tablesaw being .002" out of flat.

Is there any real reason to flatten the back's like we do if we use a back bevel/ruler trick?

Nope, there's no reason to flatten the back of a plane blade at all except as an aid to future honings - specifically so that a few swipes on the bevel is pretty much guaranteed to produce a burr all the way across the cutting edge.

I'm in possession of a large number of antique planes, many with their "historic" sharpenings still intact, the way the last craftsman honed them a generation or two ago. And I've never seen a flat back - ever. The most I've seen is a very narrow honed stripe across the very tip of the back of the iron, as you'd expect from the "ruler trick". My guess is that the former owners were using these tools to make a living, time was (is) money, and flattening an inch or two of the back of an iron was a waste.

[Josh Rudolph]

How long did it take you?

It probably took about 30-40minutes per blade. I dropped back to my 1000 stone to get the bevel uniform. Then switched to my 4000 and 8000 for polishing. I put a micro bevel which takes about 30 seconds or so. The bulk of the time was spent on the back. I always end up with trouble spots that make the back flattening process take longer.
I have problems with my hands doing this type of work. So it amplifies the time spent sharpening.

Yes, try the David Charlesworth ruler trick, then you never have to flatten plane blades on flat-side ever again.

I do use the "ruler trick".

I will say I have learned quite a bit on sharpening throughout this thread.
I now do not see the need to flatten the back of my plane blades since I put a back bevel on the blades.
I won't be investing so much time into the back flattening in the future.