Thread: Well trod path - Kanna compared to Bailey..

I'll be interested in finding what your conclusion is at 40. I think warren believes he's sharpening everything around 30. Once in a while, he actually visits here, and he brought a chisel last time. I need to be more bold and slip the tools under the microscope and see what I can find

Actually, I don't think he'd care if I did that.

I found with plane irons, trouble starts to occur below about 32 degrees. It's not trouble that ceases function of the plane, but rather in hardwoods, edge defects that punish the initial edge become more common. this still may not sound like an issue, but what occurs with minor defects is a 30 degree edge that should last longer will last a little less long, so the virtue of really pushing the limits is lost.

It's probably fair to say that I appreciate that margin that's allowed. Not only did stanley do it, but double iron wood planes also did it. holtazppfel, interestingly, suggests a 25 degree grind and a 35 degree final edge target for hardwoods. I think they just - like me - hated unnecessary edge damage. It's not kind to the lazy.

(I second the sentiment on the LA LV planes. I had two - the bus and the LA jack, and just didn't feel like changing the handles on them early on because there's a two post design or something if I recall - on a regular bench, the orientation of everything just killed my wrists. I wasn't even old back then - early 30s.

it's possible that wouldn't happen on a high bench that was kind of the popular notion at the time, but I don't have a high bench. The lower bench allows us to lean and extend arms and still get downward force on the plane without feeling like we're pushing down, but rather just forward. It all works together, especially when doing repetitive work like try planing. A friend and I shaped a maple countertop back to the wall in his not-so-accurately made 1970s house. 8/4 hard maple and the LA plane - we were coked up on the low angle being just the ticket for it.

As he referred to it - maybe this is an English saying as he's English - "we must be doing something wrong. It doesn't seem like there should be two men with balls on floor to remove this small amount of wood". He's far from being a hand tool worker, but his bench is probably 35 or 36 inches in height. We were tired and broken and I was disappointed, though we'd have troubled with just about anything. it'd be interesting to do that again - some parts of the countertop toward the ends were relieved up to 1/4" from the maximum depth. it would still be a lot of work, but I think i could do it in one shot myself without any pain.

Hi David,

You're likely to more exact than most, hand sharping can take toy to say 37 or higher angle very easily and then even at 45 degrees planing will be hard.
I do try and put a small buff to the edge as the tip itself has a size, based on your suggestions- very small. I don't regard that momentary buff as "micro bevel", just enough to strengthen the tip. But at 40 degrees clearance angle is becoming tight, while maintaining a buffed tip.
Generally aiming at sat a may bevel of 25 degrees or a tad less ( I think this is also based on your suggestions) plus buff to tip to reinforce, and hopefully obtain a edge that "feels sharp".

yeah, that or brisk stropping or whatever else gets less and less room to operate.

At one point, I was not buffing at all, was planing a lot more than I am now (but I'd still be the same accuracy) and someone was asking what angle should you sharpen at. the lowest angle that minor defects stop occurring is my view, but I didn't know what it was. I ground shallow, honed secondary mostly with a washita at the time and then stropped, now and again if the edge needed help, using something like a trans rolled slightly at the tip.

There are old posts on wood central where I was trying to convey that you can sharpen faster with slow stones (because they allow you to do that minute shaping at the edge rather than just honing things off quickly). Never managed to get that point across - but the buffer isn't much different in princple.

Anyway, I had no clue what angle I was sharpening at as it never needs to be mentioned. I checked four or five irons and they were all within a degree of 33.

I think anyone who freehand sharpens and does it at least several times a week falls into a habit of feeling a certain thing when holding an iron. If you vary by more than a little, it feels wrong. Warren probably sharpens everything within a degree and maybe less.

the significance of that 32/33 is I never measured an edge, but very deliberately when starting to freehand sharpen found the lowest angle I could work most irons at and find no edge defects of note in regular work.

At the time, or around then, I was also testing plane irons for wear life and took a lot of feedback that honing the iron at 35 in a guide was dumb because the edge life gained by going to 30 or even 25 would be proportional. it's not. I tested that. in a planing test where the wood is clear and the cut is continuous, knocking back to just above 30 ..I can't remember. if life was longer in beech than 35 it was by little. it takes something really detrimental at a final angle of 35 to create a measurable defect - like a mineral deposit. and even at that, an edge at 35 degrees takes much less deep damage than one at 30.

these are all my thoughts. Holtazppfel doesn't say anything about where 35 came from, but I think it is the intolerance in regular work when work was hand tools only - for unexpected stops to occur and to do more than hone wear out of irons and chisels. If counting time, those things start to be a problem.

They also played into me just giving up on 8/10bu japanese planes - there is just too much unexpected nicking at an edge in hardwoods. maybe a lucky person with 750 board feet of yellow cedar or fresh clear white pine wouldn't have the same issue (almost certainly) but the stars never lined up for me, not even in cherry.

Just to put a bit of trig in this - with a 40* bed and a final sharpening angle of 30 on your blade, you have 10* of clearance. I consider that the minimum for wood, you'll get away with less on some woods, but it's safer to stick with the 10 deg minimum, imo.

In my simplistic view, cutting resistance depends on both the angle of the edge and the angle at which it is presented to the wood. The more acute the blade edge, the easier it penetrates & shears the fibres. Over a limited range, I should think blade sharpness (i.e. the included angle of the cutting edge), would be at least as important, if not moreso than the angle of the leading edge of the blade (note I said limited)

I certainly don't wish to rain on your parade, but I'd advise some caution when interpreting the results of your trial so far. I recommend you use your modified plane for a month or three before rushing to the patent office. I've had a few occasions when I thought I'd invented a better mousetrap only to find after a while that the mice were still smarter than I am....

Cheers,

Ian

On these points I can be definitive.
- it is easier to push a 40 degree plane than a 45 degree with intensely sharp blades and well set chipbreaker. And if you happen to have a 55 degree bed plane with trip breaker it will be a bear to push.
-changing the pitch down of a standard Bailey frog was easier than I anticipated.

On point I only have an impressions they are:
The chipbreaker at 40 degrees is still controlling tearout
Seems to be maintaining sharp blades with good enough base clearance at the lower pitch
The little buff I give the front edge is give eggs that resist chipping and provides adequate durability

Overall this seems to a good thing, but I do will some projects before I change additional planes to the lower pitch, but I am tempted to make my LAJ redundant. The current uses larger planes uses are generally less demanding anyway - jointing boards or traversing stock flat. \

To support my conclusion I will also present , Derek Cohen's comment, say here, Required clearance angle on plane blade . The wood mix Derek is using is similar - if only I would just use straight grain easy to plane boring timbers.
Also the main driver for exploring this was issues with soothing WA some timbers and noting that a common issue was incomplete stroke- rather than tearout


As for the patent office, I think the Japanese beat me to that by a 1000 years. A near miss.

David - in regards to edge chippiness I would suggest that I a perhaps others are more tolerant of that sort of defect, The bright, translucent, mirror finish that some softwood provide does not happen is exactly that form with WA timber perhaps because the grain tends to hide such things. Likely perhaps we all accept that a degree of final sanding is essential - there lots of silica in the wood which is no good for edges. But I have made a few projects that I didn't sand.

PS- my slightly dodgy digital inclinometer starting working - and now we know - the perfect plane bed angle is 39.73° - never to be disputed.

Originally Posted by MartinCH

David - in regards to edge chippiness I would suggest that I a perhaps others are more tolerant of that sort of defect, The bright, translucent, mirror finish that some softwood provide does not happen is exactly that form with WA timber perhaps because the grain tends to hide such things. Likely perhaps we all accept that a degree of final sanding is essential - there lots of silica in the wood which is no good for edges. But I have made a few projects that I didn't sand.

Yes on the wood - I chanced into a way to set up the edge with a buffer where even silica doesn't dent it, but there's a sizable concession to clearance and you can feel it when you plane.

AT lower angles than 45, pretty sure it's a no go, though the geometry could be added to the back side.
https://i.imgur.com/hVS0o7y.jpg

As with chisels, it works better than just flat bevels or back bevels in terms of edge protection vs. cutting resistance.

The picture here looks kind of minor, but these little nicks entered into an XHP iron (V11) about 61 in hardness are quick to cease a plane entering a cut at all.
This is the same iron "unicorned" on the back side, which isn't viewable - the metallurgical scope only likes flat things that reflect straight back and mine isn't - dimensionally or the way it's made - very easy to fixture something to hold irons at an angle. It could be done, but I'm way too lazy.
https://i.imgur.com/jWNFBFW.jpg

Same wood, same iron, same plane, and admittedly lazy finishing of the edge (thus the scratches - the conundrum of edge damage is it takes a while to get out and can point you to being lazy and those scratches on a marginal edge can become failure or erosion points).

The shaving on the left here is the cocobolo that's silica laden with the nicked iron, but only after about 80 feet or something of planing.
https://i.imgur.com/JZviysE.jpg?1

The one on the right is a shaving after several hundred.

This has extreme applicability to your woods, but I haven't ever been able to communicate it that well. The loss of clearance makes planing a little harder (starting a cut and keeping the plane in the cut), but not much. It's like trading one and getting 50 in return in terms of function.

Silica dents can be 2-4 thousandths in depth, and they only need to be on a small section before the deflections stop cutting.

The same thing will happen with some woods like limba and mahogany that have silica. They are bizarre - limba is like marshmallow and when it has copious silica, it will convince you that your plane is defective. There can be so much silica that the whole surface is just ridged quickly and the iron seems like one that's been poorly heat treated with large grain (something you're not likely to encounter).

If you're working by hand, the same kind of thing you're chasing (ease) becomes a big deal. You can see the shavings in the picture above and ultimately, planing is about removing wood in a controlled way. The shaving on the right has come from a blade with something like 250-300 feet planed (don't recall exactly) and probably weighs at least 4 times as much. The shaving is smooth and planing is predictable and no surface defects or grinding out nicks.

this is one of the things that keeps me at 45 degrees - being too lazy to have more than one smoothing plane under the bench and wanting to be able to have room to make a modification like this on mahogany, limba, rosewood and cocobolo. Those are the three woods that I use that have reguar appearance of silica. Strangely, the wood that i've used that's probably the hardest (gombeira, and slightly less hard, katalox) has none of it so far. Katalox has a lot of interlocking sometimes, though, and runs out into faces - miserable to plane when it's dry if it's not straight.

David,

Theo photo indicates the sort of error that the lower pitch plane helps correct, without introducing tearout, it seems. On denser timbers, or where the timber varies in resistance there is chance that the plane will halt. It's not a fault that is mentioned often, I assume because the reason there is a line is obvious or perhaps I the only person who makes these kind of stupid planing defects. They are annoying because they can take 5 or so sweeps to clean up. So singlehandly they significantly extend time spend smoothing.
Worse is, not spotting one, until your applying finish. My workshop catches the setting sun - and it just so happens that when I trying to finish a project - not a great time to spot an error

Woody smoothers when planing dense timbers can be bad offenders in this regard - A jump in resistance can applying enough force so that body is bent concave, digging the blade in deeper, which drive the resistance up higher that bend the body - you can see where this going.


The lower pitch frog is quite noticeably less likely to cause this type of issue by at leat an order of magnitude. It is not problem at all in alot of timbers that shave easily.




IMG_6190.jpg


Also for intent a pitch of shavings from 40 degree (left) and 45 degree frogs.

IMG_6192.jpg

Cheers

I don't know what to make of this one, Martin. If I don't position myself so that I can carry through with each stroke start to finish, maintaining a steady & even push, I can run out of puff near the end of the board & the plane stops (part of getting old & feeble, I don't remember having this happen until the last couple of years!). But that only requires re-positioning myself a little & finishing the stroke. There might be a very faint mark where the plane stopped, but that disappears on the next pass, it certainly doesn't require several passes.

What I'm seeing in your pic looks as if the blade has dug in below the planed surface. According to theory, that shouldn't happen, so something is amiss. The only way I can see that the blade could dig in below the surface already planed is if it's not properly supported and flexing backwards under pressure, that will increase the set and cause it to bite deeper. I'd be very carefully examining the blade/frog contact of that plane. If that's all fine & good, then I'm stumped....

Cheers,

Hi Ian

The example is deliberate, wanted to show the mark type, and just used small small of pre planed timber to simulate. Usually I starting with a rougher finish- plus knots or other curls can denser.

Impressed you can clean them in a single swipe. When I create them the side of the plane are riding on higher wood and unless I put "exactly" back in the track I need to take the sides down before I can clean such a mark.

Cause I don't really know what I am talking about most of the time dropped rough saw log of sheoak into a vice and clean up a face.

Started with a 45 degree plane- a really nice plane, new old stock if there is such thing with a 1933 plane. My 95 year neighbour ( no children) gave me her father's plane, when she decided she couldn't maintain a house further and it didn't look used - th plane has a laminated sweetheart blade that seems to get really sharp and hold a decent edge.

Blade was advanced enough so the plane was taking pretty decent shaving. I wish it cut through sheoak like this
【大工仕事録】木と土の家 #05　梁のカンナ掛け、研ぎ　Carpenter's work : Plane of beam and blade sharpening - YouTube.
But it really didn't. Occasionally the plane would bog down, leave oblique marks and so on. Less faults as the timber became flatter but the potential was still there.

Then half the rough saw area 40 degree plane. That plane didn't stop, at any stage. Could feel a jump in resistance at some points but it ploughed on through. Cannot say I cleaning up the timber at the speed of the video but it was moving compared to what I could make the 45 degree plane do.


Summary |
- Would have cleaned the face up with a jack plane, before the smoother- normally, but I forcing issues.
- The 45 degree plane was significantly easier to bog down the 40 degree plane
- the 40 degree plane was significantly quicker to work the face, (cause it was harder to catch out) and more enjoyable to use (cause the process was "smoother")
_ the 40 degree plane left a pretty good finish
IMG_6193.jpg


PS - there lots of reference in descriptions of a particularly heavy plane that say something along the lines go " the extra mass powers though cuts easily". This sort of statement I don't think is about steady and even pushing of the plane. It is suggestive that operator was pushing though a temporary resistance and that there an alternative (poor) outcome of you don't cut through.
I have used this strategy as well, when I noticed that wood has potential to "stop" a plane. The 40 degree version is also good at powering though but not for the same reason, and appears easier.

Originally Posted by MartinCH

David,

Theo photo indicates the sort of error that the lower pitch plane helps correct, without introducing tearout, it seems. On denser timbers, or where the timber varies in resistance there is chance that the plane will halt. It's not a fault that is mentioned often, I assume because the reason there is a line is obvious or perhaps I the only person who makes these kind of stupid planing defects. They are annoying because they can take 5 or so sweeps to clean up. So singlehandly they significantly extend time spend smoothing.
Worse is, not spotting one, until your applying finish. My workshop catches the setting sun - and it just so happens that when I trying to finish a project - not a great time to spot an error

Woody smoothers when planing dense timbers can be bad offenders in this regard - A jump in resistance can applying enough force so that body is bent concave, digging the blade in deeper, which drive the resistance up higher that bend the body - you can see where this going.


The lower pitch frog is quite noticeably less likely to cause this type of issue by at leat an order of magnitude. It is not problem at all in alot of timbers that shave easily.




IMG_6190.jpg


Also for intent a pitch of shavings from 40 degree (left) and 45 degree frogs.

IMG_6192.jpg

Cheers

that wood surface behaves like mini ribboning. I never looked with a small scope to see what's going on - that area always seems less dense, but I wonder if it's not so much density as it is orientation of the grains.

In woods that have drastically different early and late wood, the middle that cracks is obviously softer and less dense, but on woods like you show, I'm not as sure of it.

what I have noticed, though is if the straws do point back up toward a plane, its' like trying to cut a straw cutting 5 degrees from the orientation of the straw's length. the cap iron pushes on those fibers but the iron doesn't cut them and they get squashed forward enough that they're closer to straight up and then they get cut off.

the result is like that and not good.

agree on the woody planes - if they get held up and stop, the result cutting is bad, there's always a little lip unless you plane a lot, and if you do a bunch of it in a day, you can have wrist and elbow soreness that doesn't go away in a day.

David, what you are looking at is the tangential surface of a wood that has huge medullary rays (all the casuarinas do, with a few exceptions). The rays themselves are as hard as nails, but the parenchyal tissue between them is (relatively) soft. The WA species (Allocasuarina fraseriana) is usually considered one of the 'softer' casuarinas, but is still pretty tough stuff - I've only had a couple of sample bits to play with and while I found them a bit better than the eastern 'forest she-oak' (A. torulosa) it was still up there, with plenty of edge-destroying silica like the rest of them.

Martin, the situation I was describing was when the plane stops because I'm not well-positioned & just run out of reach - I don't need to lift the plane, just re-position myself & put a bit more ooomph behind it & I don't move the plane before finishing the stroke. That may be the difference, I'll have to try deliberately stopping & lifting the plane off the work & see if I get the same effect (got plenty of she-oak to use as demonstration material.. )

Momentum can certainly be your friend, but it comes at a cost! When I built my first infill panel plane, I was greatly impressed by the way it keeps going once started; it just glides through anything in its path:
Shavings.jpg

But it comes at a cost, 10 minutes of pushing it around is like 30 minutes of using my 5 1/2. I've never been able to ascertain just how these beasts were used back in their day. I suspect they were reserved for final finishing of parts like bookmatched panels (hence their name??), at which mine excels. It takes the reversing grain of a bookmatch in its stride. I sure would not contemplate using it as an everyday general-purpose jack like the 5 1/2, though!

Cheers,

Ian,

Trying quantify something without a common reference is a challenge.
I'll try this statement
- Have a fair degree of confidence that sharp 40 degree plane can shave deeper than a sharp 45 degree plane. At similar cut depth a 45 degree plane will be "difficult to use". The net upshot is significant improvement in time and ease is ability to convert a rough sheoak surface to a near finish level.

I tey an aim for an idea that planing a board should only take a few minutes - otherwise mechanical means should be considered.