Thread: Advise needed - Low angle jack plane vs others

What do you want to use it for? I bought the exact same plane a couple of years ago primarily for use with a shooting board but also bought a high angle blade to go with it for smoothing cranky grained timber. Both purposes are now performed with other planes at home but it is part of my portable toolbox. It turned into one of those niche items that I don’t use often but does come in very handy when I do; it really shines on end grain.

In my experience (others mileage may vary) I find my type 11 jack is a better all rounder than than the LA jack until it hits badly reversing grain, then the high angle blade gets fitted. But for normal or mildly cranky-grained timber the Bailey breezes through it whereas the LA can tear out. In my case it’s probably down to poor technique but if one had to go it would be the LA.

If you're set on getting a bevel up jack plane then the Luban is priced too close to the LN and Veritas, stretch the budget and get one of those, you won't remember the extra $100 down the line and if you want to move it on one of those 2 brands will retain much more value.
I find I don't really use my bevel ups (I have a smoother, jack and jointer) except block plane anymore, preferring bevel downs.

I want to use it on the shooting board and also for reverse/end grain planing. I use my #5 for jointing and flattening boards so I want to use the Luban for that as well, at least until I get a proper jointing plane.

barramonday's comment about stretching for a LN/Veritas makes sense... but plonking down almost $500 is a bit too much for me right now. I'll probably live with what I've got for now and scour the marketplace for a cheapish LA jack.

Thanks guys!

Azahan

You'll be better off not buying a bu Jack in the long run, especially if the later payoff is to get a jointer.

I bought a (Luban or un-branded clone) LA jack expressly for shooting board use. It does a good job, but it's not at all comfortable to use, there is little to grasp & a lot of sharp edges that really chafe my hands after a bit. If you do more than the occasional end of a board, your hands will let you know they aren't happy!

I rarely use my shooting board nowadays, a good cutoff blade & decent tablesaw have eliminated so many of the situations where it was once necessary to shoot sawn ends. Recently, I had occasion to shoot a whole lot of small pieces, and the plane I found did the job best (& most comfortably) was my little English thumb plane - the handle/wedge was easy to hold & very comfy. Of course it would not be appropriate for regular furniture-scale work.

I think that the LA business is something we all need to experience to find out what it's all about, but I suspect most will not end up as enthusiasts for the style. I got myself a LV LA smoother way back when they were first becoming popular. I'm afraid we never got on all that well, but I did use it for preparing wide end-grain pieces when making dovetailed cabinet carcases. The Luban actually does that job better so the LV sits untouched in my tool cupboard for months on end, in fact it's probably a year since I last used it seriously. It needs re-homing, I think.

I'm with Chief Tiff - I reckon LA planes have very limited use. The only way you can get a LA into the same ball-park as a plane with a well-set chipbreaker is to put a silly bevel on the blade, but it will be much more work & still may not perform as well. The only place a low-angle blade really shines in my experience is planing end-grain, the low angle blade just handles the vector forces better than a 'regular' BD blade. So if it's a (relatively) inexpensive shooting plane you want, the Luban could do that, and I'm sure you could fit one with some sort of "hot dog" handle or similar modification to make it comfy if you plan on doing a lot of shooting-board work.

As to which plane(s) to part with, well, not many of us are likely to be of much help there, I'm afraid. I don't know of any serious woodworker who doesn't have at least a couple of superfluous tools they could probably get along without, but can't make the decision to part with them....

I found the Low Angle Jack very light in comparison with a 5-/12, it seemed to take more effort to use in that you have to use more weight to keep it going.
With the heavier weight of the 5-1/2 and 6 they have the mass to sit on the wood easier.
As mentioned they are a bitch on the shooting board which made me buy a shooting plane and get rid of the low angle.
I was conned by the sales spiel that it would replace a bunch of planes, it did not.

Originally Posted by IanW

As to which plane(s) to part with, well, not many of us are likely to be of much help there, I'm afraid. I don't know of any serious woodworker who doesn't have at least a couple of superfluous tools they could probably get along without, but can't make the decision to part with them....

Never part with any of your tools. I made the mistake a few years ago when I thought I just wanted get to some work done instead using hand planes. Getting them back has been a bear but I'm getting there. The only tool I won't get back is my LV skew rabbet plane. I think I can get by without it. Someday though ) On the bright side, I have better planes now.

Originally Posted by Jim Carroll

I found the Low Angle Jack very light in comparison with a 5-/12, it seemed to take more effort to use in that you have to use more weight to keep it going.
With the heavier weight of the 5-1/2 and 6 they have the mass to sit on the wood easier.
As mentioned they are a bitch on the shooting board which made me buy a shooting plane and get rid of the low angle.
I was conned by the sales spiel that it would replace a bunch of planes, it did not.

You're not alone. I had three. The whole concept seemed great until I worked for a few hours (long ago now) with a friend trimming a maple countertop with a low angle jack (the back of it had to have a gradual curve). It left both of us with sore wrists.

I had a BUS and several blades - same thing - logical seeming concept, but they're beginner's planes. The orientation of them isn't right to get rotation (downward and forward pressure at the same time) and later learning the cap iron quickly eliminated any perceived advantage that they have other than being a plane with one iron that beginners can figure out easily. And they're available new and relatively cheap to make.

They need to be sharpened more often than a double iron plane in long grain work and even when the handle is oriented more properly (I also had a LA62 from lie nielsen), they're an inferior plane for woodworking. There is one instructor here who requires an LN 62 as a condition of taking his class. I get what he's doing - he's trying to weed out beginners coming in with old planes that don't work, and signaling that the hand planing done in his furniture making course (he does have some students doing very fine work) is going to be minimal.

The whole setup (and at least at one point, I think paul sellers was also on board with the whole high bench thing) ignores the mechanics of planing, just like the idea that you shouldn't impart any downforce or rotation as part of the forward stroke is misguided.

At least a few of the people at lee valley seem to think using a cap iron is too difficult - the technical advisory group there is inept. Forgivable before there was much widespread discussion of using a cap iron, but in the last decade, why they stick to that gimmick - who knows.

It did take LN quite a while to actually make a plane of that type, but I guess they probably got a lot of requests for it, and they still sell a fair number of them (but they also sell high frogs, too, which is a dippy solution for a bench plane).

I hesitate to give advice to beginners at this point because instant success isn't something that runs through my mind - and it's probably also true that most people who do a lot of planing will eventually figure out that their stanley planes are better than anything bevel up, at least the ones in good shape - more productive and with better ergonomics. There will always be a constant wave of new users floating through forums who proclaim the virtues of a plane with switchable irons and one set at a very high angle. A fine concept when planing for 30 seconds at a time. dealing with it in a project (and the accelerated sharpening schedule of high angle, and limited ability to remove much material, and on and on....) either leads to finding something easiser on the user or cutting back on hand work (either is OK, but if someone really wants to do a lot of hand work, the latter is a shame).

Originally Posted by mdrose

Hi all

I'm planning to get a Luban low angle jack plane from Timbecon when they're in stock, and I already have these planes:

- Stanley #5
- 2 x Stanley #4 smoothers type 11 & 12. I use the type 11 with the shooting board since the side is exactly 90° to the sole, but the type 12 gives finer shavings.
- 1 x Stanley #4 converted to scrub
- Rebate & router planes

Question is, what can I offload to make way for the Luban? Can it totally replace the #5? I can also sell one of the antique smoothers. Would be sad to see it go because I restored them from 100% rust but I'm trying to keep a lean collection of users.

By the way the Luban was $299 until last week where it went up to $349 I'm kicking myself for missing one for $140 on Facebook!!!

Azahan

Hi Azahan

To provide a not-too-different perspective, the BU planes- including the LA Jack - are excellent planes which can produce wonderful results ... when set up correctly (specifically, using the ideal cutting angles). They were my first choice for well over a decade, especially as they could be set up with high cutting angles, which was needed for West Australian timbers. While excellent planes, they top-out ... reach their potential ... before a good double iron bevel down plane will do.

Around 2013, many of us moved to using double iron planes with the chipbreaker set close as the main weapon against tearout. The potential of these planes is greater. Using the chipbreaker, an old Stanley can be made to perform at a higher level, such as when planing the intersection of a book-matched panel.

The low cutting angle of a LA Jack still proves to be a winner on a shooting board, but now I am referring to the Veritas version, which I have. This is easy to grip and use on its side. I cannot speak for other brands.

Regards from Perth

Derek

Originally Posted by IanW

... I bought a (Luban or un-branded clone) LA jack expressly for shooting board use. It does a good job, but it's not at all comfortable to use, there is little to grasp & a lot of sharp edges that really chafe my hands after a bit. If you do more than the occasional end of a board, your hands will let you know they aren't happy! ...

I increasingly use a Lie-Nielsen LA jack plane as my "go to" plane; I use it as a smoother and as a jointer. But, like Ian, I find it uncomfortable to use on its side on the shooting board - there is nothing to hang onto!

Originally Posted by derekcohen

... The low cutting angle of a LA Jack still proves to be a winner on a shooting board, but now I am referring to the Veritas version, which I have. This is easy to grip and use on its side. I cannot speak for other brands. ...

Derek posted a really interesting project on his website where he was inspired by the Lie-Nielsen "hotdog" grip and made one in jarrah (of course) to fit his Lee Valley LAJ.

Hotdog on LN LAJ.jpg "Hotdog" Handle on LN LAJ
(Photo: Derek Cohen)


Oops! Just realised that I have never considered buying or making a hotdog for my LN LAJ!


EDIT: Typos; spelt Lie-Nielsen wrong!

Originally Posted by GraemeCook

......Oops! Just realised that I have never considered buying or making a hotdog for my LN LAJ! ......

Well, Graeme, I consider doing something every time I use my LAJ on the shooting board. However, I don't use it often enough or for long enough in that role to cause me to extract the digit & do something constructive. One day, I'll end up with a whole bunch of pieces to shoot and it will be the stimulus to finally get cracking.

Funny thing, today I was doing the sort of job I reckon my LAJ normally excels at - I was tidying up two hand-sawn cuts on a pine shelf. The shelf is for a corner, and the boards are glued up so they run diagonally across the corner to reduce deflection when heavy weights are placed on it. The two long sides to trim were 850mm & all end-grain at 45* to the long-grain direction. I started off with the LAJ, but it was a little dull, & rather than stop & sharpen I just picked up my #7, (which had been freshly sharpened to joint the boards for glueing). Well, the #7 did the job easily, peeling off full-length shavings once the saw-cut was smoothed, & what's more I ended up with perfectly straight sides. I did eventually sharpen the LAJ because I had two short sides (250mm) to smooth, which would've been a bit awkward with the #7 and it certainly did a nice job, but I did start to wonder if I really need the LAJ too!

Cheers,

your experience matches mine, ian. I made a fingerboard yesterday out of castelo box. it involved a bunch of shooting, but it was diagonal grain.

The first part of the shooting was jointer plane upside down in the vise to get close to the mark and then the last part was putting the roughed blank in a shooting jig for fingerboards and I used the jointer plane. it was at the bench and sharp. it also has a long front and back and for long shooting like that, the plane works well as you can approach finished size in the jig evenly to ensure the centerline of the fingerboard doesn't get lost in the process.

the 8 jointer has more cheek side, more length and all of the fluff about planes not having good edge retention is secondary to every single other thing in the operation.

LV's skew shooter is nice, but I doubt most people will use a shooting plane enough to ever make it worth having. Many will buy, anyway. I had one for a short period, but too much shooting of wood (aside from model making or jigged shooting, which is rarely straight cross grain, or with little pieces of wood) usually indicates something unnecessary is going on.

I made a skew infill shooter that works wonderfully (better than LV's plane, which itself works better than the other planes I've had - the LV BU jack is a for shooting - it's a nothingburger compared to a bigger bevel down plane, let alone their skew shooting plane) - it is completely covered in black metal dust because even having made that, i rarely find a good reason to use it. It works wonderfully. There's still almost never a reason to walk over to it, brush the dust off, adjust it and use it.

Could you please clarify this for me. "the LV BU jack is a for shooting - it's a nothingburger compared to a bigger bevel down plane, let alone their skew shooting plane) "

There are things you'll shoot a lot when you first start out (long grain, often things like drawer sides). These are better marked and planed to the mark in a vise.

And other things perhaps as you move on, like striking edges. If you do a bunch of really small work, you may shoot end grain often just for fit and because it's hard to work on anything like that in a vise. i doubt many people do that.

Long grain is often designed out of things in terms of shooting ends- for example, something like a guitar fingerboard is cleaned up after the fingerboard is on the guitar. Probably with chisels, and in some cases, both ends. Someone doing a lot of work by hand would mark something like drawer sides with a knife and square and dovetail the drawers after hand sawing the ends. The knife lines for the dovetail base lines are made by a cheap double bevel knife against a good square and everything is planed off after the drawer is made. The idea that one has to shoot drawer ends to be able to mark the base with a marking gauge is kind of reverse engineering tablesaw operations.

So, back to actual shooting. Your objective unless you're doing something very odd (like trying to fit an exact length piece between two fixed points) is to cut accurately and spend as little time as possible shooting until you get to something like shooting edges (back to the mark comment - I have to shoot the edges of a fingerboard. i can make them freehand, but the stock is a trapezoid - stuff like that is easier to do shooting edges at least for the last little bit.)

For that and almost all shooting minimizing the time you're actually shooting dominates, and then after that, a plane with stability and more cheek side dominates. Sharpening comes last unless someone is bad at it. The cure in that case is to get better at sharpening.

All of the bevel up planes have relatively little side area. If they're going to be used for a lot of shooting, it becomes dippy because it ignores that limiting shooting has to do with accuracy, not shaving off 5 degrees.

For the fingerboard example, to limit the amount of shooting done on long grain, I want the strokes approaching the final size to be accurate, robust and even. otherwise, I'm going to end up taking little bits off here and there all over the place so as not to lose the center line, grain orientation and frets. Just the fact that a #7 or #8 can easily be used with a thicker shaving than a BU jack, which isn't comfortable to grip and apply forward and side pressure, plus the smaller sides - the BUJ has already lost.

If the iron on a BD plane doesn't seem to tolerate shooting well, get a harder iron. shooting end grain is highly dependent on iron hardness, more so than abrasion resistance. Long grain shooting, it doesn't matter as much.

...

so, what about the LV skew shooter? it just works better than the BU plane - it's got a bigger base and the handle is oriented on it so that you're applying forward and "downforce" (which is actually sideways/lateral) as part of the stroke. I no longer have the one I bought - I used it as a bar to see if I could make a blockish skewed infill plane that outperforms it - I was able to. I sold the one I had to a friend, who also has it and doesn't use it, but it seemed useful so it looks pretty in his shop while he makes drawers and box sides and stick ends with a crosscut sled and a stop.


I didn't think about much yesterday other than the fact that I already had the jointer under my bench and even if I didn't, it's the plane I'd have chosen for the operation. it took me about 80 hours to make a skew infill shooter. I probably shouldn't have made it, but thinking back to the time when I'd have thought a BU jack was a good plane to shoot with (i went through that phase), I just can only conclude that all of this whatabout-ish stuff is due to too much reading and too little woodworking. I can describe here why I prefer the jointer for this (the iron in my jointer is of my own make - relatively hard XHP, but only because I haven't made a harder iron out of anything else. XHP is or is very much like V11). It caused me to pause a little bit and wonder - at no point did I have a desire for "premium" tools yesterday despite having had some of just about everything. And because I didn't imagine that the plane would need to be sharpened too soon because an internet article says it would, I made a fingerboard out of castelo boxwood and the plane is still cutting fine - after having used it to make a couple of others already. I cut the fret slots with a specially sized stanley gents saw - mostly because I didn't want to alter the set on any of my nicer saws. And I realize while doing all of this and making the fingerboard, the real issues that I have to solve to come up with an easy way to make the fingerboard have nothing to do with tool buying.

and tool buying is the biggest thrill for most people on hand tool forums. it's relatable, buy, try, get the slight buzz, then fail to put considerable wear on the tool - move on to buy and try something else. I can only guess why this is is based on the fact that manufacturers have in interest in putting things in peoples hands so they'll write about them. I think we've seen plenty of that. But the whole thing is well divorced from getting some experience and solving actual problems in the shop.

There's a parallel to this with guitar making, too - stew mac is kind of the bridge city / LN / LV / woodpeckers of guitar making rolled into one. you need precious little of anything they make, and precious little of the copies of the things they make, but you could easily get sucked into asking about something they do make and have someone else who bought the same thing give glowing results.