A small solid-bodied woody

**IanW** · 2nd October 2011, 12:10 PM

I had a bit of 38mm x 6mm high speed steel left over from when I made a small high-angle smoother about a year ago. There was also this small chunk of Cooktown Ironwood kicking about, so I decided to have a go at making a small, solid-bodied plane, out of curiosity. The piece of Ironwood was not the most attractive bit of wood, as it had some small checks at one end, and a nasty one at the other. However, when trimmed to the size I wanted (60mm wide by 50mm deep by 175mm long), the worst of the cracking had been removed. This was intended to be a quick job, just to see how hard it is to make a good blade bed with chisels & files.

Well, I can tell you it ain’t easy if you choose to work with Ironwood! Making a small opening is probably more difficult than a larger one because you have less room to work in, but the chief problem was the wood itself – it is a hard, crumbly & altogether difficult stuff to dig a neat hole in. I now have even more respect for Terry Gordon and the faultless jobs he does on his Ironwood planes! It took me most of a day to make just this one little plane, so I don’t think I should try making a living at it…

Anyway, eventually I got a semblance of an opening & wedge slot, and managed to get a reasonably flat & square bed for the blade. It required a lot of fiddling with the wedge before I could get a firm fit, but finally, I was ready for a trial run down some cranky-grained Camphor. Straight off, it made nice curlies (pic 1), but the wedge was still not quite right, and the opening still needed a lot of cleaning up (pic 2). But I had a rather bad mouth – careful as I was, the front chipped, too deeply to plane or sand out without risking a too-wide opening, so I finished the day by inletting a toe piece of 1/8” brass. It was bedded in epoxy & ‘clamped’ with brass screws. These were driven hard into shallow countersinks, & I had hoped the heads would clean off, leaving a near-invisible mark, but these Philips-head screws are very deeply punched, so the drive recess is still visible after everything else was nicely levelled. (pics 3 &4).

A final cleanup, and a bit of relieving around the edges of the body, followed by a good soak in some Danish oil, and she’s good to go.(pic 5) Not the prettiest plane you’ll ever see by a long shot, and a bit fiddly to adjust because of the short blade, but after a few attempts I got a fine set & it produced nice full-width fluffy shavings. I am still deciding whether to leave it as the plain-Jane (but very stable & quite easy to hold) thing it is, or give it a body that’s bit more shapely – I had intended to shape it as a small ‘coffin’ smoother. And I think the wedge could have a fair bit trimmed off it, which might help with the setting.

The blade angle is 57.5 deg., btw, chosen simply because I already have a 60, and am (still) making a 55 deg. infill, so thought I’d try an in-between angle on this one.

**Ironwood** · 2nd October 2011, 12:25 PM

Nicely done Ian, looks like a good user.

I can appreciate what it took to put the mouth in, having done a bit of work with Cooktown Ironwood ( and still got a shedfull to go yet

)

**simonmags** · 11th October 2011, 10:52 AM

Hi Ian,

It looks lovely, I've often wondered how hard it is to actually cut out mouth of the plane in a solid piece of wood. Nice to see that you managed it with Files and some Chisels, did you drill the bulk of the wood out first? I like the chamfered sides but i think it would look great as a coffin bodied plane. I can't believe you finished it in a day, that would take me weeks of head scratching

**IanW** · 11th October 2011, 07:07 PM

Originally Posted by simonmags

... I've often wondered how hard it is to actually cut out mouth of the plane in a solid piece of wood. Nice to see that you managed it with Files and some Chisels, did you drill the bulk of the wood out first?

Hi Simon, I did drill out a little bit over the deepest part, but I had no way of being sure I wouldn't drill into the wrong parts, so very little wood was actually removed this way. The task itself is quite straightforward - once you visualise what the 'hole' needs to look like. I just chopped away until I'd dug out the basic shape, then laid out & cut the sides for the wedge/blade slot, then carefully trimmed & pared 'til it was right. The slope in front of the mouth is still a bit steep, & I think it would improve shavings clearance if I ramped it forward a bit more. I'll no doubt fiddle with it over the coming months, & either improve it, or wreck it altogether!

Originally Posted by simonmags

... .. i think it would look great as a coffin bodied plane...

I'm inclined to agree. It certainly looks a bit mawkish as-is, but it works quite well. I was using it to plane some pretty 'orible Bull oak on the weekend, & it made a good fist of handling that, which is no mean feat. The HSS blade held it's nerve pretty well, too.

Originally Posted by simonmags

... I can't believe you finished it in a day, that would take me weeks of head scratching...

Well it was a looong day! Actually, if I had chosen a less recalcitrant wood, it would have been a very much shorter job. As I said, I have even more respect for Terry Gordon after this - he would have to churn these things out in a fraction of that time, & to a higher standard than mine!

Cheers,

**MajorPanic** · 11th October 2011, 07:42 PM

Well done Ian, looks like a keeper

**IanW** · 20th October 2011, 07:23 PM

I'm pleased to report that my little plane has indeed turned out to be a good user. It handled some gnarly Bluegum this morning that my Clifton wasn't doing too well on, thanks to the the extra 12.5 degrees of blade angle. However, it certainly was no looker, so I've given it some curves. I was worried that reducing the area of the sole on such a small plane might make it wobbly, but it has made no discernible difference, and is actuaally nicer to hold.

I'm still getting it properly fettled. Initially, I had the points of the wedge going too close to the cutting edge of the blade, which blocked the shavings & caused a bit of choking at each side of the mouth. Careful paring back of the wege points has eased that, but I think it needs a bit more, which I will do at the next sharpening.

Another small problem is that shavings tend to build up in the throat, rather than self-eject. I'm thinking that reducing the slope at the front of the throat might help, but then again, it may not. The high blade angle & taking very fine shavings are probably to blame - the shavings coming through the mouth aren't stiff enough to keep pushing the preceding ones up.

So here she is - bit cuter than the mawky thing in the first post.....

**kevjed** · 20th October 2011, 10:01 PM

Now we're talking. That lis a lovely plane Ian.

That wedge is a biggen but I'm sure it does its job. Well done.
Kevin

**IanW** · 21st October 2011, 08:30 AM

Originally Posted by kevjed

Now we're talking. That lis a lovely plane Ian.

That wedge is a biggen but I'm sure it does its job. Well done.
Kevin

Thanks Kevin. I agree - the wedge is destined for a drastic weight-reduction programme, too, but I want to change the wood, so it will have to wait for another rainy afternoon when I feel like fiddling with it. The wood I chose for the original is a bit too hard, & I think it would be better if it were a bit softer, allowing it to 'bite' into the slot more easily. So I will try something like Crows Ash. If nothing else, it will provide a strong colour contrast!.

Cheers,

**MajorPanic** · 21st October 2011, 09:08 AM

Ian,

It might be an exercise in frustration if you use Crow's Ash.

Being a naturally very oily timber you might find it hard to keep the wedge set.

**IanW** · 21st October 2011, 02:32 PM

You are sort of right, MP. As it turns out, I was waiting for our new front door to arrrive this morning, & snuck into the shed & had a go at it. I admit I had forgotten how greasy some bits of Crows Ash can be, & the piece I picked up is probably as oily as it gets. Anyway, I pressed on, just to see, and in fact it held ok, but I was hurrying & could not get both sides of the wedge to grip evenly. Then I decided I didn't like the look of it after all, & ended up going back to the original (Bluegum) & trimming it down to a proper fit.

All is well.....

And just to show the size of this thing better, here it is beside a #4.

Cheers,

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