Me toooooooOriginally Posted by John A langley
Member
Me tooooooo
I got cash in my pocket. I got desire in my heart....
Member
To Reinis/George. We're only a very small distance from the UK, and there has historically been a lot of intercountry trade.
Despite that it's only in the last year or two with the advent of a couple of new carriers that shipping rates have started to come down from the stratosphere.
I avoid buying high end woodworking stuff in the UK if at all possible, because even with the above most sellers charge huge prices too. Then there's the currency issue. Axminster Tools are not so bad, but still tend to be quite expensive.
Most of my stuff comes from Germany - from Dieter Schmid, Dick Gmbh and the like. Their prices are typically less in Euro to UK in pounds. UPS is cheaper to me from Germany than the UK.
I'm not 100% sure why, but my impression is that it may be to do with local sellers taking advantage of a very deep seated reluctance of the average UK punter to buy overseas. Maybe somebody who knows better will come in...
Last edited by ian maybury; 05-12-2015 at 2:38 PM.
Member
For me it mostly stops me from using eBay for some cool stuff from UK. Lot of nice old tools from there, but shipping is crazy so I do not even look.
Contributor
Same here, many an item has been passed over due to shipping being more than the cost of an item. When selling my boiler plate includes notice of international bidding needs to ask first. In the past my ebay auctions have always included shipping in the starting price.
Having both bought and sold on ebay it seems ridiculous how much it costs to ship to some countries and how simple it is to ship to others. Then there is the added problem of paperwork needing to go along with exports.
jtk
"A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty."
- Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965)
Thanks to those who offered to help! I have family in the US, but I think I might try to make blades... maybe re-configure the plane.. my mind is running.
Member
Too bad it costs so much to ship a small item to Israel. I am in sympathy with Matthew about the cost to get a new blade,and the 3/8" of usable length it offers. However,I must say that I don't think I've used that much blade length since the 60's on my planes. And many years ago,when I only built instruments,my ONLY plane was a standard,contemporary Stanley block plane. I did everything with it. Still have it,too,but now have added a number of other block planes. LN,LV NX60,others I have made,etc.. Not that I needed more tools!
Member
Place to begin is to find a local tool steel distributor, and then ask for the heat treat brochures for their brand. Each brand may have their own names for their steels, but most also provide cross referencing to the generic terms. If you (or for that matter anyone) need help, post it on SMC and there are more than a few of us that can assist.
If the thunder don't get you, the lightning will.
Member
The best thing to do about getting into making your own tools is this:
Select a single type of tool steel. I recommend 01,or OIL hardening steel. It is easy to work with. You can get good results by heating it to an orange color and quenching it in any one of several oils. Vegetable oil,linseed oil(yes,even linseed),CLEAN motor oil(a light weight grade like 10 weight is best), or automatic transmission fluid. I have used automatic transmission fluid for many years.
After you quench the steel,sand the blackening off so you can see the naked steel. Wipe the oil off so it doesn't burn black while you are re heating the steel to temper it. You need to heat the steel slowly and carefully so as not to go over the color you want too easily. It is easy to overheat the steel and ruin its temper. Heat the steel till it turns a medium or dark brown color,and quench it again. If you are heating the steel and it starts to turn purple,quench it as quickly as possible. Sand it off and begin carefully heating the steel to the brown color again. Purple is past brown,and blue is next,which will give you a softer cutting edge at a spring temper in the low 50 rockwell hardness. It is still usable,but will not have the edge retention of a steel heated to brown.
If you heat the steel till it goes past blue and turns gray,you will have fully softened the steel and will have to re harden it,then re temper it. You can do this a FEW times,but the steel will start acting crazy after you do it 4 or 5 times. You would need a hardness tester to see what I mean,but I demonstrated this to students in my shop.
I will not elaborate further as viewers tend to not read long posts.
Contributor
For all of the small planes compared in this thread there is a tradeoff between usable blade length, 'real estate' under the lever cap, and comfort of grip. No one is arguing for a blade that is so long it sticks out 1/2 inch beyond the lever cap.
I have noticed the limitations most with the LN model maker's plane. It looks like a version of an older squirrel tail plane, but it isn't. It is a low angle plane, and because of that the blade can't be any longer than it is. it is also another example of a small plane that is a terrific performer at the disadvantage of not being able to accommodate a longer blade. This is one of my favorite little planes. When the blade needs to be replaced I'll pay the premium price. By then I ll have gotten a lot of use out of it.
Alfred
Member
I've got BOTH a Veritas Apron Plane and a Bronze Lie Nielsen 102 sitting in front of me.
Here's what I notice:
1.
The OP is right. With a never-used Apron plane, there is 10mm of motion in the Norris adjuster before it bottoms out against the groove in the casting and no more sharpening is possible. Even with a second 'hole' in the blade, the 'slot' would crash into the frog screw. It appears that the blade slot could have been lengthened by about 5mm before it would encroach on the 'seat' of the Norris mechanism. By contrast, the Lie-Nielsen 102 has 15mm on the thumbscrew before it 'bottoms out'. 50% more usable blade. In theory, one could get about 20mm out of the blade by removing the blade from the plane, backing the screw out, and putting it back with the thumbscrew pressing against the END of the blade (to advance it). In this configuration, the thumbscrew couldn't retract the blade, but it would keep the plane working until a replacement blade arrived.
IMG_20160417_233239 (Large).jpgIMG_20160417_233446 (Large).jpg
2.
The Norris adjuster is a nice feature, but this plane is difficult to adjust the blade with hammer taps because the blade is tightly tucked in to the body of the plane. This means you ONLY get the Norris adjuster. An unnecessary exclusion. I found that I get much more precise adjustments by tapping the blade of the 102 versus using the Norris adjuster on the Apron plane.
IMG_20160418_000926 (Large).jpg
3.
The blade itself is tapered, making it incompatible with side-clamp honing guides, possibly throwing off someone's sharpening foo.
4.
The mouth of the Apron plane is wide open. The 102 has a much finer mouth than the Apron plane which is very large by comparison. Note that both planes as pictured are adjusted to take a .0015 " shaving, yet the mouth openings differ greatly.
IMG_20160418_000645 (Large).jpg
5.
The body of the Apron plane is considerably wider for the same size cutter, especially near the front. You can see that there is a lot of extra material on either side of the blade. Initially this seemed unnecessary, but I'm thinking it was done to allow the plane to be used for shooting. The front must be as wide as the widest part of the plane to create a flat reference for shooting.
IMG_20160418_001106 (Large).jpg
6.
The LN-102 has curved sides. This means you can't lay the 102 on its side to shoot with it. You could call that a negative compared to the Apron plane's but consider that it's a design trade-off. Making the plane suitable for shooting excludes the more compact, sleek design and hand-feel. In this sense, someone could could 'prefer' the 'feature' of not being able to shoot with a small block plane.
7.
The LN-102 is a bit heavier despite being smaller. I measured 15.8 oz for the Apron plane, and 16.8 oz for the LN-102.
Last edited by Karl Fife; 04-18-2016 at 11:57 AM.
Member
Very good observations there. On item 4. It is actually better to have a smaller mouth on these planes. It is for trimming. If a bigger mouth is needed a block plane should be used.
Contributor
The mouth of my LN #103 was also very wide. This made it harder to set it up for fine shavings. A while ago I shimmed the bed with 4 layers of 0.002" brass sheet (one piece folded 4 times and epoxied on). This closed the mouth up (and dropped the cutting angle from 20- to 19 degrees) ...The mouth of the Apron plane is wide open. The 102 has a much finer mouth than the Apron plane which is very large by comparison. Note that both planes as pictured are adjusted to take a .0015 " shaving, yet the mouth openings differ greatly.
No knowledge of the LN#102 or Veritas Apron plane.
Regards from Perth
Derek
Member
I have to ask.
Why did this string become active after a year since a previous post.
I have the apron plane. Other than occaisionally clogging on a fine shaving, I have no issues with it. I'm sure the bronze plane is delightful to hold and use, but I have had an apron plane in my apron for years. I'm totally happy with it. It is an honest tool that does what it is supposed to do.
Contributor
I'm late to this thread but if the OP wore out 3/8" of A2 steel - and was using regular conservative sharping methods - he did a LOT of planning with that iron. I'd figure I got my money's worth out of it and buy a new iron.
If the OP sharpened in some manner that took a lot of material off with each sharpening, well, that's a choice he made.
Mike
Last edited by Mike Henderson; 04-18-2016 at 4:07 PM.
Go into the world and do well. But more importantly, go into the world and do good.
Member
Good question. But the worst are those bumps, second bumps and third (?) bumps.I have to ask.
Why did this string become active after a year since a previous post.
Simon
Last edited by Simon MacGowen; 04-18-2016 at 11:03 AM.
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