There's very little written about this. Lots about how to camber a blade (which isn't a problem), but big differences between writers in terms of what they (admittedly tentatively, and emphasising that personal preferences count for a lot) regard as a typical amount of camber for each plane type. Very little to say about why.
I'm relatively new to the structured use of planes, and have some initial/starting point choices to make.
Pondering the issue suggests that it's perhaps those planning to horse off large amounts of material using hand planes that go for the heavy cambers. Seems to me that as a mixed hand and power tool guy (having put a lot of time into accurately setting up a 16in jointer/thicknessser) that there's going to be far fewer situations where this is appropriate for me. David Charlesworth while not really being all that specific about camber amounts seems by his technique suggestions to use far less than many.
I'm for example thinking of keeping one block plane straight for trimming joints, and the other (wider) one set with a small camber for small area smoothing. Ditto the smoother where removing power planing marks (as an alternative to heavy sanding) is the main task. Also the jointer where board edges are likely to come off the machine pretty straight and require mostly fine tuning. The 1/64th mentioned in some places seems like an awful lot of camber for both these jobs though?
There's a choice to be made between a low angle jack or a bevel down to be kept straight for shooting. Then how much to camber the general use jack given that there's also a scrub plane for straightening wide surfaces. Some of the camber numbers quoted for jacks (1/32 in plus?) seem almost likely to take them into scrub plane territory - but that maybe makes sense in absence of a scrub plane. I'd likewise expect glued up boards to come out of the clamps relatively flat, and feel that a full 1/16in plus may be a lot for the scrub...
What strategies are people using, and what are the rationales?
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