Alternatives for molding plane blanks

[David Ryle]

Just wondering,

Beyond historical precedent,is there any reason why a hardwood other than Beech could not be used to make molding planes, I know in the past bench planes were built using other species,yellow birch in particular. So I was curious as to the possibility/practicality of using other species,the one I'm thinking about in particular is Hickory.

[Frederick Skelly]

I have used both mahogany and jatoba. The mahogany will last a few years with tuneups. The jatoba is very hard and durable. Im not sure whether it's harder or less hard than hickory. The way it's sawn makes a difference too. I think quartersawn is most desirable, IIRC.

[Patrick Chase]

Just wondering,

Beyond historical precedent,is there any reason why a hardwood other than Beech could not be used to make molding planes, I know in the past bench planes were built using other species,yellow birch in particular. So I was curious as to the possibility/practicality of using other species,the one I'm thinking about in particular is Hickory.

Larry Williams addresses the topic here: http://www.planemaker.com/articles_beech.html

The short answer is that Beech has a nice combination of properties, but it's by no means the only option. There are molding planes made from other woods, for example Matt Bickford started out using Cherry, though he later switched to Beech.

With that said Hickory wouldn't be among my top choices. The obvious concern is that it's ring-porous and therefore has uneven wear resistance. It also has higher radial shrinkage than Beech due to the relative lack of medullary rays. It likely takes a bit longer than Beech to equilibrate to its environment, again because of having less rays. Williams' article goes into both in some depth.

Horizon woods is a great source of plane blanks btw.

[Patrick Chase]

I have used both mahogany and jatoba. The mahogany will last a few years with tuneups. The jatoba is very hard and durable. Im not sure whether it's harder or less hard than hickory. The way it's sawn makes a difference too. I think quartersawn is most desirable, IIRC.

You ideally want the blank oriented so that the pith of the log it came from was directly above the top surface of the plane. For a molding plane that would indeed be "quatersawn", assuming that the face of the workpiece is the side of the plane.

[Frederick Skelly]

You ideally want the blank oriented so that the pith of the log it came from was directly above the top surface of the plane. For a molding plane that would indeed be "quatersawn", assuming that the face of the workpiece is the side of the plane.

Yup. You started making your own molding planes yet, Pat? Being an engineer by schooling, you should. I've found it fun to experiment with and have learned a great deal - even when I got too lazy to drive a ways to buy quartersawn, and used flatsawn instead. (It works but can distort too, as the books all say.)

[Patrick Chase]

Yup. You started making your own molding planes yet, Pat? Being an engineer by schooling, you should. I've found it fun to experiment with and have learned a great deal - even when I got too lazy to drive a ways to buy quartersawn, and used flatsawn instead. (It works but can distort too, as the books all say.)

Yes, I have. I recently got some beech blanks from Horizon and some iron blanks from LN. I would currently describe myself as "noodling around" while I figure out the required techniques for cutting and tuning the mouth/throat etc.