Thread: Rebate Block Planes: Henry Eckert vs Lie Nielsen

Very well said, Paul. Mike very objectively documented and photographed a series of problems in a rebate block plane, and the spokesman for Henry Eckert Tools admitted the problem with quality control, logically discussed production issues, and fixed the problems. Behind the scenes I suspect that this very small company was accutely embarrassed by the slippage and that it had been so publicly aired in such a critical forum.

The only issue that I have with that response was that the posting was not personalised by the author but was from an anonymous spokesman for Henry Eckert. The literary style implies that it was written by David Eckert, but that is only my summation!

In his letter the spokesman said "... To be mentioned in the same sentence as Lie-Nielsen & Veritas is encouraging for us, I know we have improved over the last year but we have a little way to go. ..." Very honestly stated, but realistically Henry Eckert must compete with LN and LV. There is no way that an Australian tool manufacturer can compete on price with Qianshang, Stanley, et al - labour costs and economies of scale, for starters - which leaves the premium end of the market. But forty years ago no one thought that LV and LN would so emerge.

I sincerely hope that Henry Eckert can consistently produce a high quality product and that we may then speak of HE, LN and LV.

Graeme

I am pleased you picked up on the style of signature. I did not mention it as quite frankly I thought it had been such a humbling effort for HE to speak out so openly in the first place. A cynical person might well say it was damage control and when stripped back to bare bones it was, but there are a multitude of companies out there that would have thumbed their nose at the customer base or sought to justify what had happened. Henry Eckert to their credit did not take the easy way.

I think that on the Forum, where it is very easy to become personally involved, many people adopt their Forum name rather than their given name when conversing. So we could put it down to the anonymity given by keeping some things at arm's length and many people, whom I know personally, I still refer to on the form by their pseudonym. However, in this instance, where the primary objective was to reassure both the potential market and the immediate customer, possibly a more personal touch would have been impressive and the final resolution.

Regards
Paul

Originally Posted by GraemeCook

Very well said, Paul. Mike very objectively documented and photographed a series of problems in a rebate block plane, and the spokesman for Henry Eckert Tools admitted the problem with quality control, logically discussed production issues, and fixed the problems. Behind the scenes I suspect that this very small company was accutely embarrassed by the slippage and that it had been so publicly aired in such a critical forum.

The only issue that I have with that response was that the posting was not personalised by the author but was from an anonymous spokesman for Henry Eckert. The literary style implies that it was written by David Eckert, but that is only my summation!

In his letter the spokesman said "... To be mentioned in the same sentence as Lie-Nielsen & Veritas is encouraging for us, I know we have improved over the last year but we have a little way to go. ..." Very honestly stated, but realistically Henry Eckert must compete with LN and LV. There is no way that an Australian tool manufacturer can compete on price with Qianshang, Stanley, et al - labour costs and economies of scale, for starters - which leaves the premium end of the market. But forty years ago no one thought that LV and LN would so emerge.

I sincerely hope that Henry Eckert can consistently produce a high quality product and that we may then speak of HE, LN and LV.

I agree with you Graeme, HE must directly compete with LN and LV. And they must realise that QC and level of finish is critically important in the upper segment of the market. There can't be any more lapses. And I believe they must differentiate their products by offering additional features and functionality. The main reason I chose to go with their RBP was not because of the white bronze and thicker blade, but because it was available with a more robust fence and a sub-fence that could be used for consistent chamfers. These are features that increases the versatility of the plane allowing it to be used for more tasks. I reckon HE realise this and that's why their planes come with HE adjusters and PM10V blades as standard. But they need more. Imagine if their LA Jack was available with a similar fence system. It would definitely make it a more attractive proposition that's for sure.

And that's why I don't understand their standard LA block plane. It's made from more exotic materials (white and manganese bronze) and is $20 cheaper than the LN version, but it doesn't come with an adjustable mouth like the LN. For me that's a huge fail. I know which I would prefer and I think most would agree and that's without taking into consideration the level of finish. I think the lack of an adjustable mouth would be a deal breaker for this size block plane. I could understand the omission if it were an apron plane.


I think we all share your hope that HE eventually reaches the level of LN and LV. They only need to look at the example set by HNT Gordon for inspiration. Cheers.

Well, I didn't know I had a 'literary style'... yes, it is me David Eckert replying to KayoyKutter on behalf of Henry Eckert Toolworks. Wasn't meant to be anonymous, just not quite sure how the system works. A long while back when I was involved with LN, I noticed Rob Lee got involved with Forums but Tom L-N didn't. I figured Tom was wise, (then again, I used to think whatever Tom did was wise, probably still do!) because it can be tricky with woodworkers opinions, putting things in writing etc etc.
But Im happy to talk about our tools, I benefited from most of KayoyKutter's observations for sure. Also understand his comment re our bronze block plane. At the time I decided to make that tool I was keen to go in a different direction than LN & LV. But, I have realised that some tools are in fact 'core tools, as LN say, so you made need to wait a little longer...

What does Derek say?

Regards from Adelaide,

David Eckert
Henry Eckert Toolworks

I am very empathetic towards Henry Eckert Tools. They have chosen to enter an incredibly difficult industry. Just think of the number of tool makers in Australia, Britain and the USA in 1950 - how many of them have survived today? The vast majority have failed.

And then there are the success stories like LN, LV and HNT.

And the "super-niche" occupiers like Chris Vesper, Colen Clenton and Ron Hock.

In the past, I've had both the LN skew rebate plane with fence and the 10 1/2 or 10 1/4, whatever they call it. I could never find a practical use for either plane, and in everything where someone shows a rebate plane being used, there's a far better tool (bet it chisel, float, rabbet plane, etc).

There's a good reason they didn't sell historically compared to other tools.

David, what other tool would you use to do this?



Regards from Perth

Derek

Originally Posted by derekcohen

David, what other tool would you use to do this?



Regards from Perth

Derek

Wooden rabbet plane with a skew iron, without a doubt. longer sole, more to hold on to and if someone felt they needed a couple of them, they're inexpensive and easy to refit (commonly available from 1/2 to 2" wide here on the ground for about $10-$20).

One of the interesting things (keep in mind, I had three different shoulder planes and then two infills, and I also have a bullnose slater that someone gave me for free, thus will never sell) about these types of planes is that rob cosman also shows a video of this operation with a lie nielsen 10 1/4 or 10 1/2 in one of his videos. I recovered from watching things like cosman or charlesworth furniture operation videos years ago as they show operations that would never have been used in any shop. Cosman's video on flattening the inside of a case was absolutely agonizing.

All of these planes pop up that are either hard to find used or are new now and were never popular before, often with the catchy message that "only now with malleable cast and heavier castings are these planes usable", but what we get as a replacement is some hand aching agonizingly slow plane like a block plane replacing a rabbet plane, and in cross grain work, I can't think of a rabbet plane that I've used that wouldn't go across the hardest of woods to fit a drawer.

We get things like the LV skew rebate plane, which is a perfectly made plane that is a very poor performer compared to a wooden moving fillister plane paired with a rebate plane if someone is afraid to work right to the mark. The friction from the iron rabbet/fillister planes, again, stands in the way of quick accurate work. You can get accurate, but quick, no.

I think it's a cognitive trap because people imagine the older planes being tricky or not accurate enough, but they're three times faster to use leaving you plenty of time to check or sneak up on a mark.

I wanted to find something that I could use my skew block plane on - tried using it to touch up raised panels, tried using it on rebates, etc. it was completely pointless. The only thing I wish I'd have done differently is held on to it long enough to sell it in the pandemic drought. It's my opinion, perhaps only mine, but I don't think you'll find professional shops using little planes like this to do anything (nor would have in the past). If there was a market for an iron rabbet plane or rabbet block planes, they would've stuck and stanley would've made them. If they needed to be heavier with malleable cast, stanley would've made them that way (as they made several other tools in steel or malleable cast).

If someone wants to buy one of these block planes just for fun instead of using something more normal like a skew rabbet plane bedded at 55 degrees, then that's entirely different. Escapism is OK.

David, I think you are searching

I could have used a metal shoulder plane, which would be about the same height as the wooden rabbet, but did not as it was too high and there was not enough space for the plane and my hand. I also did not have a wooden rabbet (rebate) plane. The rabbet block plane is the best plane for this job (and I have done on several builds), having a low centre of gravity for least physical effort, wide, and is easy to adjust.

Regards from Perth

Derek

Originally Posted by derekcohen

David, I think you are searching

I could have used a metal shoulder plane, which would be about the same height as the wooden rabbet, but did not as it was too high and there was not enough space for the plane and my hand. I also did not have a wooden rabbet (rebate) plane. The rabbet block plane is the best plane for this job (and I have done on several builds), having a low centre of gravity for least physical effort, wide, and is easy to adjust.

Regards from Perth

Derek

I think you would have to use a wooden rabbet plane for a while to make that decision.

A shoulder plane is a poor plane for this job, also. It doesn't clear its own chips, it's sticky on wood in a place where you can't get much room to work and it's too heavy.

A 1 - 1 1/2 inch skew rabbet plane would be easy to work in there. it could be used upright with the case on its side or on its side. The skew block plane gives a poor surface for grip compared to a rabbet plane and suffers from geometry in that you have to push it down whereas pushing at the top back of a rabbet plane puts downforce on the cut just by pushing it forward, and the friction is about a third.

This low center of effort argument that you push is errant. the downforce from pushing on the back of a plane above the level of the mouth is essential for decent function. We've been down this road before. Nobody gets down and behind a plane and then pushes down on the front to make up for it.

When I say a wooden rabbet plane, I don't mean one of the gordon monstrosities with brass bits on it and a 60-70 degree angle. I mean something like the attached picture. This was probably the 2nd wooden plane I got. I had no idea what to do with it at the time but it seemed like it would be smart to have because of the nicker and because it was big and $10 - it took a decade for me to get away from routers and metal planes and the idea of a tool creating accuracy or whatever by precision to figure out how to halve the work involved. It's not a matter of cost savings, either - this is an expensive hobby - it's realizing that something inexpensive works better and wondering why the reputation of these planes being supposedly hard to tune sharpen and set keeps people from learning to use them. once you learn to sharpen the iron on one of these types of planes without a multitude of gadgets that still have some error (vs. just sharpening the iron so that it matches the sole and grinding the primary bevel back never grinding the edge off) they're all kind of the same.

All you have to do with a plane of this type is to bump the iron a tiny amount left or right and if you're using the nicker, switch sides. It wouldn't need the nicker for any of this work.

I was disappointed to not find a good use for the LN rabbet plane or the carriage maker plane or whatever the 10.x plane is called because they were so interesting looking and pretty.

This plane laid on its side (and even one an inch) goes through this cut with ease and it shears the wood off of the sides rather than rasping/scraping straws off.

https://i.imgur.com/r0Xyn2o.jpg

It's a bit dusty from sitting on the shelf next to more used planes (like a moving fillister, H&Rs, dado planes, etc). I have a smaller rabbet plane that gets used with the moving fillister if there is any close work to do to land right on a mark.

I'm sorry to see the little gadget planes go because they're so interesting looking and pretty, but not sorry to not be using them.

It's a shame that people believe that they want to make nice furniture (which is complicated) and believe at the same time that they can't pick up older tools like this and get them in good working condition, as after one or two are set up, the rest are fast to do. The same as it is to freehand hone one of these. Grind the primary out of the way and direct biased pressure toward the side that's a little out of shape with the sole - do it each time, and the honing process is about 60 seconds total. Compared to "skew jigs" and this or that which can or can't hold various irons and chisels. It makes no sense.

I also understand the underlying M.O. here, which is for most people who give info out about tools to want to be able to point to a stock number, because it's fun for people, it seems promising. "if I just get the right things, it'll be like having the right router table setup. I can just be there with the tools and they'll be soooo good things will just sort of happen". It's not to be. When someone complains about being early on in the hobby but they really really want to make things, and the answer is, learn one thing at a time and allow those things to add up rather than feeling like you need to have a huge bag of individual little tricks and jigs - that's hard for people to swallow. What do I need to buy? I don't know, can you buy experience and feel or should you just accept that you can gain that and be much further ahead in the same time when you decide you'll sell the rabbeting bench planes and such later?

David, sometimes your typing finger & enthusiasm work up more momentum than my monster infill panel planes...

What tool bloke A reaches for to do job X may be quite different from what bloke B uses, and yet both may produce an equally splendid result as 'efficiently' (i.e. in the same number of minutes). I don't share your enthusiasm for all-wood planes; I fully concede they are lighter and more slippery, but that advantage is outweighed by the stability of metal when you live in a very variable climate & work in an "airy" metal shed. I went through a stage of acquiring & making wooden planes a long time back, but the constant tinkering it requires to keep them at peak performance where I live just ain't worth it, imo. I want to be using my tools, not adjusting them. And besides, most of us effete modern wood-worriers (pun intended) need more exercise, not less, so you could argue that pushing a little extra mass around is a bonus..

While the metal "block" plane may be modern (if you call anything after 1850 "modern"), small planes that could easily be used one-handed go a very long way back, judging by some of the things that have been dug up from Roman & medieval times. Low-angle, bevel-up configuration had to wait for metal soles, given the structural limitations of wood, so earlier "block" planes are bevel-down, but cutting angles aren't all that much different. I have several small planes that are "block" size, a couple of low-angle BU and a couple of BD types. I'll admit it's more than I "need" but they cost me little other than time to make them, and it's too hard to decide which to cull. The two I would hang onto to the bitter end are my "chariot" plane, which is just a metal block plane in fancy-dress: New knob.jpg, and a little 7 inch rear-bun smoother (45 deg bed): 4.jpg

It's all in the mind, of course, other planes could do any of the jobs these do, but they just feel right in my hand, and when you feel at ease with a tool, it does a much better job for you. Never gainsay the placebo effect!

I don't know why you disparage HNT Gordon's planes. As wooden planes go, they are pretty damn good, the woods he uses are a lot more stable than Beech, and if you are determined to control tear-out with a single-iron blade, high-angle BD planes make more sense to me than grinding a 20 deg BU blade to give a cutting angle of 60 deg. No matter how perfect the intersecting edges are, the more acute-angled sharpening bevel of the BD plane (25-30 deg) is going to penetrate wood more easily than the 40 degree bevel of a 20 deg plane ground to give the same cutting angle (it gets worse if you use a 12 degree bed!). I've been a convert to "proper" use of cap-irons for quite a while but still use a high-angle plane occasionally because I find it handles certain situations better than the best-fettled, cap-iron equipped, 45 degree plane I own, the reasons for which I admit I don't fully understand.

I do agree with you that the best tools don't guarantee good work in unskilled hands, but I also accept the argument that starting with a good tool gives a beginner the best chance of success. I have seen breathtaking work done in poky little dirt-floored sheds in Asia with tools you probably wouldn't give a second glance if you saw them on a flea-market table, but the hands that wielded them had been training for 40 or 50 years to make them perform magic. Bringing an old tool back to peak performance is satisfying, environmentally sound, and good for your tool budget, but that's another skill that takes time to learn to do well - I made more than one plane worse than it was when I started, in my early days.

True skill comes gradually for most of us, especially when day jobs consume so much of our time. It also needs to be acquired along with understanding, for best effect, and that takes time to acquire too. I've sometimes been told I make some task or other look easy, but it certainly wasn't always easy for me. If you want to toss off a process like a concert violinist tosses off a complicated cadenza, you've got to be prepared to put in a bit of regular practice...

Now I've worked up some momentum....

Cheers,

Very well put, Ian. Yep, there are several ways to skin a cat (I prefer to use a vegetable peeler). It's one of the things I like about this hobby. But others seem to be of the opinion that their way is the only way. I try to avoid those type of people at parties.

Hi, Ian - this isn't about ideals, it's about what works better.

In the course of a season, my shop goes from generally -30F dewpoints to 75F dewpoints. I doubt anyone experiences bigger swings in humidity. I can have unfinished beech that's 10 years old end check overnight sometimes (in planes with their ends sealed, this isn't a problem, though - it's the ends where beech loses it).

As far as planes go and gordon's gidgee or whatever the planes may be, they are gentleman's planes. They will work if what you want is a little here and there but to do nothing in volume, but a 60 degree+ angle is scraping. If it does something better than a cap iron set, then something is wrong, but in joinery, we rarely want to make a finish cut 300 times vs. something other than that 25 times and perhaps a finishing cut 3. planes of the type that terry makes are sort of the brain child of "let's make it so that nobody can fail", but what happens is they become shelf queens other than small touch ups and the idea that hand work can't be done in acceptable volume is lost to forum advice from people who haven't done it in volume.

as far a beech goes and comparing high density timbers, beech causes problems when it's poorly sawn. In most older american and english palnes (until the death throes days), this isn't an issue as the plane billets are sawn end to end straight down the line on both sides. What happens with a rabbet plane then is that over time, the bottom of the plane shrinks a little more than the top, but this is only a little (the bottom is the bark side). The movement is in the width of the plane, but as volatile gases leave the wood over time and the plane stops springing back, and eventually shrinking, this is over. You can tell which planes season properly by picking the ones where the iron is too fat but the body parts ahead and behind the mouth are in the same plane. This isn't a matter ideals again, it's the normal case. If anything, the iron needs to be ground back to the sides once.

It's also not about ideals in terms of gliding for the sake of something akin to ice skating in the mind, it's about focusing effort on the cut. All planes have a hand orientation that pushes diagonally toward the mouth until the rush of the bevel up planes, but the bevel up planes are not more efficient - they come out of the cut sooner perhaps causing the user to bear down. Reduce friction on the more classic plane and you have the ideal situation where the force is mostly forward but the natural push adds a few pounds of downforce (perhaps up to 15 in a very very heavy cut). The downforce is relatively harmless as long as the sole friction isn't too high.

in the case of sizing sides for drawers, you're generally working across the grain, so the issue of infills going more heavily through really hard woods should be a non-issue unless you're using something like gombeira for a case (if you are, the sides will eventually crack). Long story short, take away the discussion of ideals - a beech rabbet plane is better unless the plane is defective.

These skills are not that hard unless hand tools are hardly used, but if one wants to use hand tools once a month, they'll be in for nothing but punishment. The same is true of power tools. If you want to line up a very fast coarse ugly build and whiz things through power tools, i'm not your guy. I use them a couple of times a year and other than doing rough rough work, I always have to follow them with hand tools.

(and, i use a metal smoother, so it's not like I"m not familiar with metal planes. I also use a metal jointer for match planing joints that need to come together with no pressure at all, like rub joints).

There have been a couple of things that I've done that have illustrated just how much effort I'm wasting if using infills to do coarse work or using metal rebate planes to do cutting of rebates. For the infills, it's just doing the same task with two planes. I had the same reservations early on about how imprecise wooden planes work, and without understanding how to use the cap iron, one is in for at least double or triple the work and time to do anything more than very thin shavings (back from above - the only answer is to declare it impractical and get something else out to do the work. An opportunity is lost, and it's not one of herculean strength or george wilson fineness, it's more like learning to drive a stick shift in a car). Where I learned just how much of an effort soak the metal rabbet planes are is in having to cut a large number of feet of trim/transition pieces for my house. I have two wooden moving fillisters and at the time, I had both sides of the veritas skew rabbet planes. The wooden planes were easily half or less the effort to use. The cut was comfortable, it wasn't like driving with an E brake and I sold the skew rebate planes from LV shortly after. They seemed so promising, and they would've felt as so if I hadn't taken the time to learn to set up the "imprecise" wooden moving fillister planes. What needs to be learned with those? You work right up to the mark with them but if you need the finest work surface, not into it (a rabbet plane set finely makes the last two passes). The issue of the plane drifting away from its cut width is a setup problem. The nicker on a moving fillister plane defines the width of the cut and the iron must come just short of it to sever the shavings off (not unlike the rakers in a combination tooth lumber saw). once this clicks, very heavy cracked up pigtails of shavings come out of the wooden plane with little effort while you're stuck with the metal veritas plane constantly waxing and when it binds into a cut and gets friction on both sides, it's even worse.

Any supposed advantage of modern precision and V11 this or that is lost - it can't do a fifth of the volume removal of an older plane with a laminated iron, including in hardwoods.

settling in and determining to learn each of these things provides another layer of understanding and all of it compounds with all of the tools and suddenly it just makes sense. If you pick up something like the LN rabbet block plane to make a confined cut after you've used a plane like the one I've showed, you'll wonder what you were thinking.

If the objective is to work with a plane that just looks a certain way and it's really about escapism and you don't want to feel that flow and ease, then I can't really offer any suggestions other than to say that using these rabbeting block planes against a plane that would've been used originally for this work will quickly illustrate why they were never popular. Using infills for all work and not just smoothing will illustrate why most people never spent the money to spring for them, too (and I have at least 14 infills at the moment).

And, yes, I've used terry gordon's planes, and have owned a couple at one point. They're kind of a modern solution to give instant success - like telling someone to play golf only with a putter so that they won't ever drive the ball out of bounds.