Did oldtime craftsman flatten their plane irons?

[Derek Cohen]

Just for reference, this weekend was another one building drawers in hard Jarrah. The difference in a chisel honed on a Ultra Fine Spyderco, and a chisel finished on green compound was night-and-day. One made sure, controlled, easy cuts. The other stuttered and required extra force.

I wonder what percentage of the Stanley and woodies found in the wild were owned by professional woodworkers who knew how to prepare a plane and sharpen the iron? Or were they owned by home DIY-ers, in the same manner as today one would have a cheap cordless drill-driver and a set of plastic screwdrivers at home? Just how much can you determine from these planes?

Regards from Perth

Derek

[Tom Bussey]

I regrind a lot of plane irons. First reason is a lot of them are pitted where the chip braker touched the iron. The pitting is usually to deep to stone out by hand. In doing so I find a lot of irons dating back to the 30s or newer can have the iron" back stoned. Since stoning the angle takes a little skill. I suspect the person tried to cheat on the process by just honing the top. And on a lot of the iron I find the corners to be rounded more that the top which leads me to think the stone was not flat but dished. I tend to think the rolled corners came from having the iron honed the long way the dished stone and not on purpose. So after doing maybe 50-75 blade I wound tend to think the backs were not flattened.

[david charlesworth]

Derek,

I thought UF Spyderco was supposed to be fine.

Any idea of grit size please?

David

[Mike Holbrook]

Something occurred to me regarding the fine end of a sharpening system. It seems to me that we frequently get caught up in how fine a medium may be appropriate to a sharpening system. The question gets complicated when one starts understanding that some media, as Kees mentions above, loose their sharp edges early on & become burnishing/polishing systems., some media may clog with refuse from the work....

It occurred to me that the solution I found for these issues on the coarse end of the spectrum was a powered "grinder" with a super abrasive. It occurs to me that on the opposite end of the spectrum, honing and polishing, we might also benefit from some sort of mechanism that moves the grit over the surface at a much faster rate. The two objections I often read to using buffing...wheels are: 1) They may over heat the delicate edge where the metal is very thin. I believe we are seeing new media that dramatically reduce any heat issue though. 2) Sharp edges tend to sink into a soft sharpening media rounding the edge vs making it more keen. I believe the second objection is raised regarding strapping on leather. Still we have reason to believe that leather straps have served people sharpening razors for many years. Again there are newer much harder composite & leather buffing wheels available now that may help.

[Mike Holbrook]

I have been a fan of Spyderco stones for some 35 years or more. I think they are a little hard to define in terms of grit. Mine seem to "load" with refuse steel fairly quickly, but the super hard ceramic with, I believe it is sapphires embedded, seems to still cut and polish at the same time without water or oil. I find them to be relatively unique in that regard. I believe part of the problem in rating these stones to other stones is Spyderco has never been eager to reveal the exact composition/grit of their stones.

[george wilson]

I don't think we can ever get to the truth about the issue of craftsmen flattening their irons' backs. The unused irons I have seen were ground pretty well on a large wheel by skilled cutlers. They were not as accurate as the irons made today on precision machinery. But,they were pretty decently flat,or more to the point,flat ACROSS THEIR WIDTH. What happened to them after they were sold,we have no idea. We could be looking at a dubbed over 18th. C. iron that was used by a hack less than 100 years ago,or even in the early 20th. C.,and left to rust in a humid shop for decades.

As for me,I did have,and still have, several new (never used) laminated irons that I used myself. In fact,I have a package of old 19th. C. irons,a dozen,still in their brown paper package. I haven't used any of them because they are too narrow(1 3/4",I think). They are very accurately ground. As for the unused 19th. C. irons I did use,I never attempted to further flatten their backs. I thought they were quite flat enough. I did my best work as posted here with those irons in my planes.

This post could use some word unscrambling,but I have to go somewhere right now.

[Jim Koepke]

My best answer on this is a question.

Was a flat back needed on a single iron plane?

If a cap iron (a.k.a. chip breaker) was involved, did anything other than a flat back prevent the shavings constantly clogging between the cap iron and the blade?

My thought is maybe they did whatever was required to get their work done in a timely manner.

jtk

[Phillip West]

The spyderco UF stones are about 3 micron..Thats according to Sal the companys founder..

[george wilson]

i'd add that if you are using a chip breaker set real close to the edge(like they need to be),the iron had better be flat. The slightest sliver of an opening between the chip breaker and the iron will cause chips to get wedged in there slightly less fast than the spaceship Enterprise can reach light speed.

[Lasse Hilbrandt]

Just for reference, this weekend was another one building drawers in hard Jarrah. The difference in a chisel honed on a Ultra Fine Spyderco, and a chisel finished on green compound was night-and-day. One made sure, controlled, easy cuts. The other stuttered and required extra force.

I wonder what percentage of the Stanley and woodies found in the wild were owned by professional woodworkers who knew how to prepare a plane and sharpen the iron? Or were they owned by home DIY-ers, in the same manner as today one would have a cheap cordless drill-driver and a set of plastic screwdrivers at home? Just how much can you determine from these planes?

Regards from Perth

Derek

Derek, just to be absolutely sure of what you mean.

Which one was the better one ?

[Kees Heiden]

Much of this I don't know, but I am absolutely sure they didn't have a Spyderco back in 1780.

[Ray Selinger]

In an antique store I came across a real carpenters' tool box, not the sea chest you see on the net, fresh from an estate sale. I remember these boxes from my apprenticeship. From the assortment of chisels, he likely bought them one at a time, and like me when I was an apprentice,, thinking hard before spending all that money. From the Canadian Stanley "Sweethart " on the cardboard boxes, I would date his purchases from the '30s. His sharpening stone was just one of the grey ones. And I know how effective they are, not. Why would someone sharpen the back when they came from the factory with a better finish ?

[Warren Mickley]

Derek, just to be absolutely sure of what you mean.

Which one was the better one ?

I wondered that too. I have no idea. I once repeated a chisel test that Derek performed with five steels. I used a 19th century chisel. The difference was like night and day.

[Derek Cohen]

Derek,

I thought UF Spyderco was supposed to be fine.

Any idea of grit size please?

David

Hi David

No figures have been published by Spyderco, consequently we can only estimate this.

The Medium is around 2000-3000. The Fine and Ultra Fine are reputed to be the same, but that the UF is flatter. That does not make sense to me. I would estimate the UF around 6000-8000, and then it seems logical that the Fine is between the two (i.e. 4000-5000).

Honing with green compound takes it to 30000. That is a big jump, and quite noticeable in terms of the greater ease with which a blade will cut Jarrah end grain.

Regards from Perth

Derek

[george wilson]

I bought a UF myself,but have not yet used it enough to determine if it is finer or not. It has a bit of "tooth" to the surface that only use will wear down.

Long ago I did flatten my fine Spyderco. The UF was more perfectly finished,and did not have any "fuzz" on it(ceramic fuzz which would NEVER have worn off without a scrubbing with the diamond stone).