Thread: Rabbet planing issues

A few ideas ...

- what depth of cut are you taking?
- is the blade level to the inside (right) side of the plane body (plus a smidge)?
- photos?


Cheers,
Paul

Originally Posted by section1

The tongue is never square and I can't figure out why,

are you making tongue and groove? or like a ship-lap?
Paul

A vertical ship lap, I've taken light shavings and heavy ones as much as 15 thou. I've had the side of the blade protruding about a thou as described in the manual and I've had it flush with the body as recommended in the FWW mag nothing seems to be working . Not sure how pictures will help though. I will have another crack at it later in the week.

Apparently you're not alone - see the comments - Accidental Woodworker: Veritas skew rabbet ......

I've used a #78 that wasn't lined up to the edge so I ended up making little steps in the corner of the rebate out further and further.

What wood are you trying? and with or across the grain (or against)?
I was surprised and excited the first time a #78 did a good job for me ... but I don't get out much.

Cheers,
Paul

I read his blog and like him mine is also slanted at the end but I think I may have found where the problem is, some how the rods were loose. This is entirely my doing, these rods are normally glued in I needed to use them on my plow plane as they are longer so I wrote to LV and they said just break the glue also in doing so I will void the warranty I know its a lame excuse but anyhow. So obviously I didn't re tighten them properly still I'm not entirely convinced that could be the solution as it was still threaded and not dangling but never the less when I get back from work I want to give it a whirl and see if that fixed it.

Couple of thoughts, the first being that the blade isn't quite square to the sole. It only has to be a smidgin out and each pass will add another small increment of error. I haven't used a skewed rebate, but in my limited experience with skewed blades, I find it hard to judge the blade protrusion is exactly even by sighting along the sole, due to the parallax distortion. I find the best way to confirm that the blade is set evenly is to back off to a very fine cut, and carefully take a shaving or two from a nice, flat piece of scrap. Watch the shaving as it comes off the wood, and you can easily see if it's full-width & even. I do this with any plane when setting up after sharpening....

However, I'd venture that it's more likely you are simply leaning on the outside of the plane a bit on each pass. Any hand-tool is only as good as the guiding hands, & accurate results depend on the driver at least as much as any other factor. With your rebate plane, the fence is there to set the width of the rebate, it won't guarantee the rebate comes out square (as you've amply demonstrated to yourself). You have to learn to hold & use the plane so that you get your desired result. This takes a bit of practice, but after a while, 'muscle memory' takes over & it becomes second nature - like planing perfect edges on long boards...

I always work to the old carvers' maxim "rough out, then refine". If planing a rebate (which I admit I don't often do, these days!), I would hog out most of the waste on a coarse setting, then back off & work more carefully to the lay-out lines, allowing me to correct for any out-of-squareness that has occurred to that point. Most places I would use shiplap joins are essentially out of sight, such as for backs on a reproduction piece of case furniture (where appropriate), which means they don't have to be perfect. If you examine a few oldies, you'll see that this sort of work was usually done with an eye to speed rather than finesse.

Cheers,

Yes I agree with you but I like to aim for perfection, precision, accuracy I don't like to be lazy or sloppy just to get it done. You may be right maybe I am slanted to one side or the blade isn't set properly, the shavings looks consistent though and I made a simple jig with an angle of 35deg to aid me. I spent the entire day yesterday practicing these cuts you would think I would get it right by now Anyhow I will keep at it though something's bound to come up but keep your suggestions flowing.

You may already be doing this but I like to have my board at the edge of my bench to give the plane fench the extra material to run against. I also have an auxillary fence on my rabbet plane. Like Ian I'll hog out most of the job quickly & then take extra care as I approach the layout lines.

I'm kind of new to woodworking so I'm probably suggesting things you have been doing for years !

Have you seen the video of CS using the VSR plane?
I was reminded watching him of 2 things ...
- he hunched down on the nicker drawing backwards to start across the grain and
- he started from the front of the cut and progressing backwards (once at least, with the grain) - like using a moulding plane.

Cheers,
Paul

I don't think Just Free handing it from the top down and getting it all perfect is something any body has ever done without Carefully checking all the way .

I think the biggest aid to keeping it on track is clamping a wooden fence to the work if you can. And then the side of your plane rests on that and that halves the errors. Depth stops can be taken off and put back on for when your close

After reading your thread, I wondered about this as I was coming to the workshop today and I was thinking
" I wonder if the old guys did this with their moving fillisters " surely they did ?

And if they did there should be marks on the side of the plane left from the plane sliding along the guide.

I got out a plane and photographed it , there are grooves up the side of the plane up to 48mm high.
So the original owner and user of this plane was either in a 48 mm rebate with his depth stop off or he was , say 10mm down, with his depth stop off and had a 38mm guide helping him.
I'm betting it is the later .

I'm working on laying in some cross banding ATM , just the sort of rebate { sorry, you wont hear me calling it a rabbit } this type of plane would be at home doing. I didn't use it for the job though.

I hogged it out with a Makita Router and cleaned it up where needed with a Spiers Shoulder plane.

Ive got to rebate the drawer fronts now and add in the rest of the cross banding and the Ebony stringing , I might give the moving fillister a go with a guide.

Rob

Originally Posted by section1

Yes I agree with you but I like to aim for perfection, precision, accuracy I don't like to be lazy or sloppy just to get it done.....

Hmm, I don't often get accused of being lazy or sloppy...

However, I do try work to sensible, necessary tolerances, dictated by the job in hand. For ship-lapped boards at the back of a chest, I certainly don't need to work to the nearest thousandth of a millimetre. If cutting shallow rebates for edge-banding as Rob (auscab) is showing, I would try to be very accurate & neat, both on the bottom & sides of the rebate. Must admit, though, that's a job where I'd reach for the screaming electron-burner, too - the workmanship of certainty vs. the workmanship of risk & all that..

I also agree with Rob that a board clamped against the scribe line is a good idea - it's extremely difficult to cut a dead-straight line along the grain, because the plane wants to follow the grain pattern, so unless it's dead straight & all going in the one direction, there's bound to be a little undulation. In fact, on the rare occasions I do plane rebates, I don't bother with the plane's fence, but use a guide - the single-rod fence on my old 78 is not easy to use, it's too short, for a start, and I have never gotten round to making the wooden shoe for it that I plan, sumday...

Originally Posted by section1

..... I spent the entire day yesterday practicing these cuts you would think I would get it right by now ....

Patience, my lad, some things don't come in a day or even a week. I've been bothering wood for more than 50 years, and there are still plenty of things I could be better at....
Cheers,

Thanks guys for your posts I've been meaning to put a fence on it for some time now and will definitely do it now, I guess I will have to leave it till the weekend to try it again. I was making a tongue for the groove but the tongue is offset so it essentially is a rabbet. Rabbets are great for certain clocks otherwise I don't have much use for them, however I do like sometimes using this plane to clean up a tenon, one or two passess is all it takes. Anyway I'm hoping all it is is the rods but I'll find out soon enough and will post the results.

I want to share with you something I just viewed on the Logan cabinet shoppe by bob rozaieski on how he uses his rabbet plane, he doesn't have a veritas version rather an old vintage one but the method is still the same. He starts off the cut by tilting the plane towards the wall then he slowly levels out after he reaches his depth he levels the wall and runway using another rabbiting plane much like a shoulder plane or dadoe plane. So it seems to me that his method proves that it just might not be possible to achieve a square solely with a rabbet plane without the aid of a dado or shoulder plane.

Dunno ... especially with the Veritas tool ...
How to Cut Rabbets by Hand