Square edges on boards but how?

[Tony Caro]

I marvel at people that can put a square edge on a board by hand planing without jigs or any aids. I have practised this skill for many months and sometimes i get it, most of the time i don't. It seems to me that you must start off at 90 degrees to the face side and rigorously maintain this position to ensure that you finish up with a square edge throughout the entire length of the board. For those that can do this, how do you know you've got the plane sitting at 90 degrees to the face side when you start? How do you keep the plane at this constant angle throughout? By feel, by sight, what cues do you use? I am right-handed and i tend to lean the plane to the left slightly even though it looks perpendicular to the face side to me as i plane. I should also say that i curl 3 fingers on my left hand against the face side as a guide.

[David Weaver]

Joint until the board looks straight and square, then take a square and check the board for square and put a pencil tick at the high spots.

Make a through pass by biasing the plane on the sides of the board that have your tick marks. By biasing, I mean literally moving the plane left or right so that you're only cutting with one side.

Make sure your plane is cutting evenly on the left and the right. On planing the other side to a width mark, make your ticks a couple of passes before you hit your width mark so that you don't overshoot.

Study what your natural error is. Mine was to plane the near edge low on the left and the far side low on the right.

[Tony Caro]

Thanks David, i will try this, only problem is that i'm not always consistent with my out-of-square planing.

[Pat Barry]

If you really want to get the board edge square and that's your biggest concern then what you need to do is use a shooting technique for the long edge. Thats pretty simple and eliminates the variability of the freehand method. I'm sure there are examples of this method posted somewhere - maybe even on this website - I just don't have a chance to dig one up for you. How long are these edges you are trying to true up?

[David Weaver]

Thanks David, i will try this, only problem is that i'm not always consistent with my out-of-square planing.

I think it's a matter of doing it some more, then, and getting a feel for vertical. If you have to for a while, walk with the plane along a board instead of retracting and extending your arms. You'll find that you can get an error left or right that way but not both. That worked for me until I got a better feel of making a stroke and staying vertical the whole time. I still think about keeping the plane vertical on the near side of the stroke, too, or i'll lean it toward me.

I expect now when I feel a board that's vertical, that I could work with it without any additional correction (like for m&T joints) and that's usually the case. I don't always check everything with a square, if the error is big enough to cause a problem, the more you joint edges, the better you'll be able to see it with the exception of sometime grain running a certain direction can make a board that feels square (and is square) look a little out.

Pencil marks and biasing the plane are a good way to start, though. I check with a square in three places now and just remember where the board is off, but I still put tick marks on a board sometimes if I'm tired (tired makes it hard to remember things on the fly).

[Kees Heiden]

If the boards aren't too thick you can try match planing. It was a surprise for me how well that works. Being off a few degrees to the left or right doesn't matter in this case. Of course, when you are of to the right at the start and to the left at the end, this isn't going to help.

[Sean Hughto]

If you are jointing to glue up a panel, consider match planing - i.e., planing two board at once so that any deviation from 90 is cancelled when the two are brought together.

As Pat said, shooting - such as on your bench top - works well.

There are planes, like the LN edge plane for example.

There are fences for jointers, and home made ones are not hard to fashion as well.

Keep in mind that perfectly square is not necessary in many applications - no will care if a table edge is 88 degrees and not 90.

[Tony Caro]

The boards can vary from a few inches to several feet. I know i can use a shooting board but i've spent a considerable amount of time trying to develop this skill, just like to know how others do it.

[Zach Dillinger]

David Weaver has an excellent description of the process. To use his phrase, my natural error is / was to allow my body to turn towards the board just a hair too much, which takes some of the supposedly forward force of the plane and causes the plane to roll away from me slightly. This leads to an edge that slopes away from me. I had to really focus on keeping my shoulders as perpendicular to the board as possible, using my hands in the proper way, and learning to trust my plane until I developed the instinct to do it properly.

[Sean Hughto]

I think we are telling you.

[David Weaver]

e. I had to really focus on keeping my shoulders as perpendicular to the board as possible ......until I developed the instinct to do it properly.

I think this is something (Square shoulders) that is worth mentioning a second time. When I make a through shaving after getting the edge square (to get to a width mark or to finish off getting an edge or slightly sprung), I do exactly the same thing, and turning the shoulders square is part of "walking the plane". It allows you to stand straight up and feel vertical better than if you're oriented more toward the board.

This is all details to talk about, but once the instinct is there, it's trivial and habitual, and you can ramp up the shaving thickness and get to where you need to be (either to remove rough wood or to work to a mark) very quickly.

[Brian Holcombe]

I find that being perfectly square helps along the way as your completing your project.

the most important aspect of edge jointing when you are matching is flatness. Make certain that you are making the edge flat and not embellishing the curve. 88 and 92 degrees still come together at 180 but two curves do not make a straight line.

I have a handful of precision ground straight edges of various lengths and feeler gauges that I use for this, you can also use your bench for a quick-check if it is actually flat.

[Shawn Pixley]

It just takes practice and repetition. I don't bias the plane as much as others, but will slightly "rock the plane" to get a square junction. Don't over reach on longer boards. If you get your body out of position / balance, you'll create a twist in the planed surface. I test with straight edge and square every few strokes when I am close to completion of the square planed edge.

[Andrew Pitonyak]

Disclaimer: I struggle with this sometimes.

While jointing an edge, I expect that you want to end with two things.

1. Edge that is square to the face
2. straight / flat edge along the length; no curves.

For generating an edge that is perpendicular to the face, something like this can help; a jointing fence.

http://www.leevalley.com/US/wood/pag...16&cat=1,41182

Sometimes I find that it helps if I reference one hand against the board (the front of the plane). It certainly helps to check often to see how I am doing, since I can easily and quickly destroy a square edge.

The second skill is generating a flat edge. Recently, I managed to generate a curve. I think that I started with the center too low, and then suddenly (it seemed), the center was too high. Create or purchase a straight edge that you can use to test as you work. I own one that is probably five feet long.

[Warren Mickley]

I marvel at people that can put a square edge on a board by hand planing without jigs or any aids.

I think that I could have you planing an edge this afternoon with my plane. What you need is a very careful camber on the iron. You want the camber so that when you take maybe a .002 cut with the plane the edges don't cut at all. When you take a .001 cut, it cuts only in the center. I am not talking about just a rounding of the corners, I am talking about a very gentle curve all the way across. That way you can adjust where you remove material from the edge by a slight movement side to side. If you need to remove wood from the far side you just move the plane a little to that side, center on that edge. If you need to remove wood from the near side at the back end and from the far side at the front end, you plane diagonally with the center of the plane going form one edged to the other over the course of the cut. Body position has more to do with fatigue; it is not so important for a trivial operation like shooting an edge.

The easiest way to put the appropriate curve on the iron is to put your jigs and your flattening contraptions in a drawer and learn to manage the stone while sharpening. So that the stone gives the curve. This takes a lot more skill than just using the plane. It is easier to buy a disk than to learn to play the piano.