Page 1 of 6 123456 LastLast
Results 1 to 15 of 86
  1. #1
    Join Date
    Oct 2018
    Location
    Dandenong Ranges
    Posts
    1,866

    Default Making my own moulding planes

    Hi all. Recently I was given a link to M S Bickford's website (thanks Rob) and after spending some time clicking through it, I realised I had had a "moment". Hollows and rounds and the possibilities they offer when making (and reproducing) mouldings was simply amazing. Combined with Matt's instructions regarding the pivotal role rebate planes have gave me a real "A HA" moment. I felt like I had found one of the 7 wonders of the carpentry world. And I was re inspired to carry on assembling my own set of H and R. My plan is to slowly collect what becomes available and is at the right price (ie. cheap, so no matching pairs but one or the other) and then use the original to make its partner. I have already done this for a #6 and finished my #8 yesterday. Please see below

    20200628_105312.jpg

    20200628_105338.jpg

    20200628_105402.jpg

    I also have made a couple of plane floats and these certainly help with the mortise. My first moulding made by them worked out okay except for the proportions (I blame the tablesaw for ripping in the wrong spot). I am quickly running out of old blade stock and I have 2 now with short tangs. Does anyone have a good source for tapered metal? I am probably also going to have to build a little forge. Slippery slope indeed.

  2. # ADS
    Google Adsense Advertisement
    Join Date
    Always
    Location
    Advertising world
    Posts
    Many





     
  3. #2
    Join Date
    Mar 2018
    Location
    Sydney
    Posts
    469

    Default

    Hi MA,

    I've been very tempted to make some H&R but haven't got past the idea phase as yet.
    I plan to make a set of a no2, 6 and 8 as from what I've seen this would cover a large set of variations.

    Can i ask:

    What timber are you using?

    How did you find the process of forging the blade?

    Regards

    Adam

  4. #3
    Join Date
    Oct 2018
    Location
    Dandenong Ranges
    Posts
    1,866

    Default

    Hi Adam. I'm using European Beech for the planes but I'm not forging my own blades....yet. I have some old blades that came from wooden planes and for the last 2 I cut blades out of them. These are nice and thick but, because I'm only using old ones, they can be too short - see my photos to compare the original to mine.

  5. #4
    Join Date
    Feb 2015
    Location
    Hobart
    Age
    77
    Posts
    647

    Default

    Hi MountainAsh

    Where do you source European Beech?

    Cheers Yvan

  6. #5
    Join Date
    Nov 2004
    Location
    Millmerran,QLD
    Age
    73
    Posts
    11,099

    Default

    MA

    This is probably not a direct answer to your question, but as you mentioned that you may build a forge, have you considered car leaf springs as a ready source of cheap high carbon steel? Of course not all leaf springs are created equal in that some are considerable thicker than others.

    These are some blades I made up a while back, but have never made the planes so they are in their rough state before refining. However I am sure you can see the principle. In this instance even these thin blades are significantly thicker (nominally 6mm) than the typical blade in this type of tool:

    P1060154 (Medium).JPG

    The wide blade is from a thicker spring again. I have others, from trucks, that are 12mm thick but these are not for plane blades!

    P1060155 (Medium).JPG

    This is the original in the shoulder plane.

    P1060156 (Medium).JPG

    The mouth on this shoulder plane is much too wide, but a little of the problem can be redressed with the thicker blade: The leaf spring blade is twice as thick as the original and does take up some of the gap (but not all). Still not quite right.

    P1060157 (Medium).JPGP1060160 (Medium).JPGP1060159 (Medium).JPG

    I have only inserted the blade to demonstrate the issue. It requires an inch wide blade for this tool and this one is narrower.

    This is good weather for annealing high carbon steel (if you have a wood fire). If you are interested in going down this path I can give you a few pointers. It is relatively easy with not too much needed in the way of specialised equipment.

    Regards
    Paul
    Bushmiller;

    "Power tends to corrupt. Absolute power corrupts, absolutely!"

  7. #6
    Join Date
    Oct 2018
    Location
    Dandenong Ranges
    Posts
    1,866

    Default

    Hi Yvan and Paul. I get my Beech from Matthews Timbers in Knoxfield Vic (about 20 minutes from home but a long way from Hobart). They have some great stuff. Definitely interested Paul, and we have 2 open fires in the house which get lit fairly regularly. Thickness can be accommodated because the planes are custom and this may also allow me to grind a taper? I think I read a thread from you about chisels from leaf springs and from memory they turned out great. Happy for any advice. And thanks for the blade off cuts, I have already made a cutter for a japanese style marking gauge that turned out great.

  8. #7
    Join Date
    Nov 2004
    Location
    Redlands area, Brisbane
    Posts
    1,489

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by Bushmiller View Post
    This is probably not a direct answer to your question, but as you mentioned that you may build a forge, have you considered car leaf springs as a ready source of cheap high carbon steel?
    Honestly for the effort involved, it might be simpler to buy crappy moulding planes just for the irons and burning the bodies! The rubbish ones are so cheap and it's not like there is a shortage of rubbish moulding planes.

  9. #8
    Join Date
    May 2010
    Location
    Not far enough away from Melbourne
    Posts
    4,200

    Default

    Watching this with interest MountainAsh.

    This is something I see in my future too. I already have the forge and anvil and have made a couple of things but I am by no means a Master Smith, and probably never will be. So far I have made some knives and trinkets.

    I have Todd Hurrli's video - "Making Hollows and Rounds" and his followup video on moulding planes. I also had a good look around Bickford's website a while ago and have found a few other references as well.

    I have never seen any tapered steel barstock for sale but I have forged a taper into steel with "passable" results. Let's just say that I did no damage that I could not later fix with the grinder.

    Once I have finished my workbench build I hope to get into some toolmaking and a few planes are high on the list.

    Looking forward to seeing how you go.
    I got sick of sitting around doing nothing - so I took up meditation.

  10. #9
    Join Date
    Nov 2004
    Location
    Millmerran,QLD
    Age
    73
    Posts
    11,099

    Default

    MA

    Firstly you have to source the leaf springs. You may know somebody who has an old suitable vehicle as a wreck or alternatively go to a car wreckers. Nowadays it is probably only ute type vehicles that have leaf springs and these are most likely only on the rear. I am not sure why you need a tapered blade but some of the springs in a "cluster may be tapered so you could possibly use that to your advantage. I don't know what a wrecker would charge, but I would guess at scrap metal price for any old spring which is probably around $100/tonne.

    The springs are in a hardened state and need to be annealed (softened). This is where your wood fires come into their own. Get those fires blazing and put the pieces of spring in. The temperature needs to be such that the steel gets to a cherry red colour. leave them in the fire for the evening and let it burn out overnight. In the morning when the steels has slowly cooled down it will be annealed. Now you can work it. Use tongs to extract it. It will still have some heat in it. The first step is to flatten the blade which is done by pounding with a club hammer. Ideally it is done on an anvil of some description. I have a large section of universal beam about 300mm square and also some railway iron which I use as improvised anvils, but if you don't have a suitably large lump of metal, improvise again. A section of log such as unsplit firewood will suffice. Once straightened you can cut the blades to length and shape using a thin cutting disc in an angle grinder. I use a 125mm grinder. A piece of flat bar clamped on with small G clamps can be used as a guide when cutting. The bevel is put on the blades at this time too.

    Next are the hardening and tempering stages. To harden you need to bring the now shaped blade up to cherry red again and quench rapidly in either oil or water. I use old oil. Quench the blade by dunking it up and down in the oil in different parts of the medium. Really with your moulding plane blades you only need to get the fat part of the blade hot. The tang section can be left in it's soft state. I use an oxy set at work for this but a forge would be even better. Small blades are quite easy to harden, but for larger blades a heating head is required for the oxy so you can get enough heat. You could use the fire again but the problem is that you are going to extract a red hot (literally) blade from the fire, dash though the hose with it held in some tongs or large pliers and dunk it in some oil outside. Much will depend here on the relationship you have with your partner. Some will revel in the sheer thrill: Others will let you know their sentiments through their lawyer!

    Be aware that there is the potential for the oil to catch fire if the blade heats it beyond the flash point of the oil. Keep an old blanket or other cloth handy to smother the fire if it becomes too alarming. I tend to have a twenty litre bucket of oil nearly full so a small blade won't be a problem.

    The blade is now super hard, but too brittle and has to be tempered. The blade must be cleaned or polished so that it is bright and you can see the colour in the next step. I use a fire buffing wheels for this, but equally you could use wet and dry paper. For your plane blade it is gently reheated to the colour of straw. Be aware that this colouring comes quite suddenly. This would be tricky if you were still using the fire, but easy with oxy or a forge. A soon as that colour is seen it is quenched again in the oil. If it goes blue you have overheated it and you will have to go back to the hardening stage and then re-attempt to temper. This will try your patience of course and maybe that is why it is called "tempering." I have to say that I have never had to do that. Yet.

    When tempering start back at the fat part of the blade as the bevel (you should have left that no less than 1mm thick at tip. Any thinner and it could just break off) will heat up quicker. Again, oxxy is easy for this, but LPG could also be used. LPG struggles to get anything of size to cherry red ( annealing and hardening) but can easily reach the straw colour. Now you can polish up the blade and sharpen it.

    The alternative to this fun process is to go along with markharrison's suggestion . It is a bit of effort for a single blade, but I tend to do a bunch at one hit and then it becomes more appealing. There is also some satisfaction in doing the whole process yourself. You really have made the whole tool yourself.

    Regards
    Paul
    Bushmiller;

    "Power tends to corrupt. Absolute power corrupts, absolutely!"

  11. #10
    Join Date
    Oct 2018
    Location
    Dandenong Ranges
    Posts
    1,866

    Default

    Good morning Mark, Doug and Paul. I did have the same thoughts Mark but I do see a potential user in every plane. Maybe when i stumble across a whole bunch going cheap I would feel better sacraficing some. The taper is in part keeping with tradition but practically works better with a wooden wedge, so I'm led to believe. Thank you Paul for all the good info, especially the vision of me running through the house. My dog would love it! Have you ever used an oven to temper? I have seen this on YouTube a bit. Where did you get the video from Doug?

  12. #11
    Join Date
    Nov 2004
    Location
    Millmerran,QLD
    Age
    73
    Posts
    11,099

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by Mountain Ash View Post
    Have you ever used an oven to temper? I have seen this on YouTube a bit.
    MA

    Short answer is no, but for tempering it is a distinct possibility. In that case, if you have an oven thermometer to double check temp, you could dial in a number instead of relying on colour.

    Temperature hardening colour chart.png

    From the above you are looking at 229 degs C. This is getting towards the upper limit of the domestic oven but doable. Not so of course with the initial hardening process where you are chasing 816 degs C. If you use the oven, you could also treat your hound to another lap of the house holding a "branding iron."



    Regards
    Paul
    Bushmiller;

    "Power tends to corrupt. Absolute power corrupts, absolutely!"

  13. #12
    Join Date
    May 2010
    Location
    Not far enough away from Melbourne
    Posts
    4,200

    Default

    Good morning Mountainash and Bushmiller,

    Remembering that I am no expert when reading this, just a couple of things I have learned along the way to throw into the mix:

    I use a little toaster oven to temper small blades. It works well and it is in the shed and was bought for this purpose. that means that using it for shed stuff has no detrimental impact on domestic bliss. I think it cost me $30 or so. A small price to pay for the resultant benefits.

    The tapered tang: Yes you could argue that the tapered tang does indeed hold the blade against the wedge with less risk of slipping up under the pressure of planing, and nobody could deny that it is true. But it is a matter of scale as to how much benefit there really is.

    Back in the day, when hardenable steel was a rare and expensive commodity and skilled blacksmiths were plentiful, the blades were made from mild steel or even wrought Iron. A skilled smith would take a rectangular piece of iron and draw out the tang from it and even hammer it over to the side as you see on traditional blades. There would have been no cutting off of the waste as we do today. This is what blacksmiths did all day. once the blade was shaped and the tang drawn out they would forge-weld a small piece of hardenable steel on where the cutting edge would be.

    Now in the process of drawing out the tang, it would not have really mattered if the tang was the same thickness all along its length or if it tapered smaller as it got further away from the blade. What you did not want was for the tang to get thicker as it went out or it would increase the tendency to slip out of the wedge. At my humble level of smithing, it is far easier to allow the tang to get thinner as you go since you don't need to move as much metal along the length to get an acceptable result. I guess that for the same reason even an experienced smith would be able to create a tapered tang with a bit less time and effort than an untapered tang. At some stage some enterprising smith probably made a feature of it.

    Now when I get around to doing mine, after the workbench build (and the tailvise is nearly finished and then there's only simple stuff to fabricate and it will all go together soon) I will not be forging the blade from iron and forge-welding on a piece of tool steel. It's 2020 now. I will be making the blade from o1 tool steel which is ground to be completely flat. I will try that out for the first build and if I need to taper the tang I can do that on the grinder or milling machine and remake the wedge.

    MA, here's a link to the video Classic Planemaking Volume 1: Hollows and Rounds DVD | Hollow & Rounds DVDs
    When I got mine they were actually out of production. I got it by hunting down Tod Hurrli's facebook page, he put me in touch with his agent who posted me one of the last copies in stock for about the same price as the one in the link. Good to see that it is back in production.
    I got sick of sitting around doing nothing - so I took up meditation.

  14. #13
    Join Date
    Oct 2018
    Location
    Dandenong Ranges
    Posts
    1,866

    Default

    Thanks again Paul and Doug. I like the explanation regarding taper. Makes sense and removes potentially unnecessary work. You know what they say about assumption. I wonder if my ute would mind donating some leaf spring material

  15. #14
    Join Date
    May 2010
    Location
    Not far enough away from Melbourne
    Posts
    4,200

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by Mountain Ash View Post
    I wonder if my ute would mind donating some leaf spring material
    A lot of bladesmiths that I know recommend against using recycled steel particularly leaf springs simply because you have no guarantee that there will not me tiny stress fractures in them from their previous use, which can cause weak spots leading to critical failure. Having said that, these are guys who command $500+ per blade and cannot afford to dent their reputation. However for personal use on a relatively simple molding plane blade where the worst thing that can happen is you might occasionally need to remake a blade.

    I have made blades out of plow harrows and old slasher blades and they work alright so far. If you want to go down that road that's great but beware of the consequences - not much of a problem really. I intend to go with o1 tool steel because it will hold an edge better and is more wear resistant than 5160 spring steel. The price is not too bad either.
    I got sick of sitting around doing nothing - so I took up meditation.

  16. #15
    Join Date
    Nov 2004
    Location
    Millmerran,QLD
    Age
    73
    Posts
    11,099

    Default

    Doug

    I think you are alluding to the fact there is a big difference between something that is sold commercially as a high end product and something that you are making for yourself. In many ways it all depends on the materials you have to hand and how much folding money you wish to spend on the project.

    I would add that there is a big difference in forging a relatively thin knife blade (old circular saw blades are a good source of steel for knives) and a blade for a plane which in this case is 5/6mm thick. I can't imagine the level of abuse to which you would have to subject it to cause a failure. As we have mentioned knives I should add that when quenching it is essential that the quenching action is by vertical plunging into the quenching medium as otherwise distortion of the blade will result.

    Something I should have mentioned in my heat treating process before is that it refers to high carbon steel only. Other steels will have different requirements and may need to be held at temperature for longer periods. I am confident that the technique I have described works well for the steel composition found in leaf springs. The biggest problem I have found in recycling leaf springs is finding them free of rusting or pitting. However only the back of the blade needs to be free of defects as on the other side the faults will be ground out in the bevel.

    Regards
    Paul
    Bushmiller;

    "Power tends to corrupt. Absolute power corrupts, absolutely!"

Page 1 of 6 123456 LastLast

Similar Threads

  1. Moulding planes
    By Nads in forum HAND TOOLS - UNPOWERED
    Replies: 2
    Last Post: 6th March 2017, 08:32 PM
  2. Appreciate your moulding planes
    By pmcgee in forum HAND TOOLS - UNPOWERED
    Replies: 1
    Last Post: 10th July 2015, 12:08 AM
  3. Making your own wooden moulding planes
    By kmahony1 in forum HAND TOOLS - UNPOWERED
    Replies: 8
    Last Post: 12th August 2014, 06:30 PM
  4. Moulding planes
    By pmcgee in forum HAND TOOLS - UNPOWERED
    Replies: 1
    Last Post: 22nd February 2014, 12:34 PM
  5. Moulding Planes
    By pmcgee in forum HAND TOOLS - UNPOWERED
    Replies: 4
    Last Post: 7th May 2012, 08:50 PM

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •