Recently I've been experimenting with learning to restore and use old, wooden hollow and round planes to make moldings. The results of been decent, but I've had to spend a lot more time than I want to fettling the planes/irons the old irons don't seem to stay sharp very long. As a consequence, I'm considering trying to make some side escarpment molding planes spurred on by the "Roubo molding planes – easy to make traditional tools" in the April edition of Popular Woodworking.
I think I can manage the woodworking part; the dealbreaker for me as I have zero interest in buying raw 01 tool steel and then heat treating it myself as described in the article (owoo fire- very scary!).
Does anyone know where I might be able to buy modern, already treated plane irons that might be of use for this project? The article calls for 1/8" thick x 8" long x 1/4", 3/8" and 1/2" wide irons, to build # 4 ,6, 8 H&R planes. I'm happy to grind and sharpen the necessary profiles, I just don't want to make the whole iron shebang from scratch.
Any and all advice and suggestions are much appreciated!
I read with great interest LV's recent announcement of adding beading profile irons to their small plow plane and their plans for a combination plane sometime in the future. These are both something I'm definitely interested in but don't know very much about.
Thanks in advance for the help.
Cheers, Mike