A plane question and a card scraper question

[Patrick Chase]

Well, I have never seen a broken yoke/fork in 20+ years of using handplanes. The reason I move the wheel forward is to take out the backlash and ensure that the blade/chipbreaker is held in the forward position with some mechanical assistance. If the wheel was not in the forward position, the blade/chipbreaker would only be held in position by friction (tightness of the levercap). It would then be vulnerable to being pushed back and losing its setting by the forward force in planing. Adding extra downforce via the levercap screw is not recommended as this will tighten the adjuster and increased force will be needed to move the blade projection. That is a recipe for damage.

Regards from Perth

Derek

I think that this is one of those pins-first vs tails-first things that can't possibly be resolved by forum debate, and that's where I'll leave it. I recognize that I (and Sellars and Leach) am in a very small minority on this one...

[Tom M King]

"Just right" is a fine balance of both levercap, and yoke. I'm sure I can't explain it in words. It's a feel thing. You do want to be able to adjust it on the fly, but you don't want the little yoke to take all the heat, and you don't want to strip the threads on the adjuster.

[Tom M King]

One thing that hobby woodworkers don't seem to understand when looking at all the expert videos is that there is a wide range of different touches doing the same work. Some are very heavy handed, and a few are light handed. For instance, when filing a saw, the same amount of metal can be removed with either a half inch stroke, or a full stroke. I'm not much for taking advice from the heavy handed ones, since that's not the way I work. It applies to many things in hand tool work. Watching any video, or taking any one person's advice, probably won't give you the absolute final answer for what works best for you.