Set-up/using a hand plane?

[TNHillbilly]

Got an old Stanley No.5 plane I've had for years(never used it either). I was working on the forestock piece for my rifle and decided I needed to level it out-maple! Took the blade out and honed it. Put it on the wood......chunk, chunk, chunk. Couldn't get that thing to cut nothin'! Tried adjusting every lever and knob, nothing..digs in or does nothing. Took it apart and discovered this whole 'blade holding chunk of metal thingy' was adjustable.....but how, where to set it? It obviously moves the blade back or forward. Advice, or opinions, welcome on the care and use of a hand plane!

 

[pichou]

The frog should be even with the bevel of the throat. So it should make one continuous line like /

You didn't know you had a frog in your throat, huh? :blah:

The frog needs to be tight. The cap iron (on top of the blade needs to have a crisp, flat edge where it meets the blade near the cutting edge. That prevents chatter.

Anyway, that is too big a plane for stock work. A block plane, and some tiny trim planes are what you want. And they need to be razor sharp. These planes have a lower angle on the blade.
:v

 

[TNHillbilly]

Uh hmmm! Excuse me, I was clearing my throat. Well, I learned something! Guess I'll go dig in my cabinet and find a smaller one. Curious though, why to big? What's a 'No.5' used for?

 

[Doc Arroyo]

...chunk, chunk, chunk.

Sounds like...
1. Cutting to deep
2. cutting against grain
3. Cutting highly figured wood
4. Blade is dull

That noise comes from any one or any combination. When I started using hand planes a friend gave me a book. Most of the info seems to be here...

Hand Plane basics

 

[Vaino]

To begin with I don't use any sort of plane for shaping a stock. I have one but it's just occupying space on one of the lower shelves of my bench. After the blank {bbl and RR work was sent out to either Miller or Rase} is bandsawed, there's very little wood to be removed. Where on a blank after bandsawing, is a plane more useful than say a "Surform", especially if the bbl is swamped? This isn't criticizing the use of a plane....if some good reason is tendered for it's use, I'll buy a suitable plane. Just wondering....Fred

 

[paulvallandigham]

A hand plane is difficult enough to use on soft woods like pine. On hardwood, the edge has to be both straight, razor sharp, and stropped so smooth that it offers no resistence when cutting. Check that website for basics.

I have to go along with the recommendation that you use files, and mini rasps, like the sureforms, to remove small amounts of wood. Then switch to hand scrapers. Unless you are working a huge stock blank, and are NOT sawing the blank down to the initial shape, there is almost nothing you can use a large plane to do on that hardwood. I am betting your plane is going against the grain, and that is why its digging into the wood, rather than shaving off a thin layer of wood.

MY brother went to a class put on by Woodcraft, at a store an hour's drive from his home, several years ago, and learned How to sharpen Plane and knife blades, as well as chisels. The course was very instructive, and he ended up buying a honing wheel for his shop, which he needed anyway. I have seen and used his chisels, and they are sharpened at the correct angle.

 

[TNHillbilly]

Let me be a bit more definitive. Building a swivel breech, the front half is really two pieces of wood, when finished, like two big slivers. When you're finishing the top of your stock(the top of the barrel channel), how do you get it straight without using a plane? So, just think of mine as a normal stock split down the middle.

 

[rich pierce]

Folks who build w/o power tools use planes and spokeshaves a lot. Planes have to be super sharp for curly maple and you have to really know the feel of the plane. There is danger in popping out a piece of the curly stuff at the end of the cut (muzzle). I use a small plane with a very shallow cut to level areas such as you describe. I use it for the top of barrel channel, sides of fore-arm and fore-stock before rounding, the fore-stock before making the ramrod groove, the lock and side panels before inletting, toe of stock, etc. I use a spokeshave to do much of the first stages of rounding also wherever it fits.

 

[paulvallandigham]

Using only handtools, I use a line to set the straight edge of the top, then use files and scrapers to take the wood down to the line. I use a steel straight edge, to check and locate and mark high spots. as you remove a high spot, you re-check, and remark the spots, until you don't see light between the straight edge and the wood.

 

[44-henry]

I use planes for stockwork a #5 is bigger than I normally use though. If you sharpen it correctly and have it tuned it will literally zip through curly maple, it helps if you skew your cut across the grain a bit. I also like spokeshaves.

 

[hatchetjack]

The No. 5 is a jack plane and is usually used for fast stock removal although some people use it to true up board edges before glue up. The plane blade should be sharpened with a slight crown and it has to be razor sharp. Crowning a plane blade is tricky if you have never done it before. You also need to set the chip breaker close to the tip of the blade so you can take a fine cut without to much tear out, especially on curly maple.I would suggest you practice using this plane on scrape wood untill you get a feel to how it cuts.

 

[Allan Gray]

The frog should be even with the bevel of the throat. So it should make one continuous line like /

You didn't know you had a frog in your throat, huh? :blah:

The frog needs to be tight. The cap iron (on top of the blade needs to have a crisp, flat edge where it meets the blade near the cutting edge. That prevents chatter.

Anyway, that is too big a plane for stock work. A block plane, and some tiny trim planes are what you want. And they need to be razor sharp. These planes have a lower angle on the blade.
:v

Good advise.

Tuning a plane is an art in itself, but not so difficult once you understand how things work.

You need to also have a solid understanding of grain "run out", that is, which way to go to get a nice shave or when you get the "chunk chunks".
Many times it's been compared to petting a cat. One way is smooth, the other resistive...something that one learns with practice and examination of the wood grain.

Either way, I agree that your jack plane is too big for working on a gunstock. It's really a tool for cabinetry. I like to use a spoke shave, but ever so carefully and for quick roughing-out work. Rasps and files afterwards, slow and careful!

 

[TNHillbilly]

I looked through my stuff and found an old Stanley 10 1/2(?) also. I got these from my uncle 30 + years ago, he was 95 when he died. I noted the no. 5 was put together wrong. Cleaned and sharpened the blades. I practiced a bit with the 10 and was getting a nice roll of chips. Guess the point of this is twofold: learning to use original tools, and recreating historical objects. Is a CNC/machine made longrifle authentic? Are perfectly fitting pieces consistent with original pieces?

 

[Elnathan]

The sole also needs to be perfectly flat around the mouth, heel, and toe. The mouth opening depends on the thickness of the shaving - fine for a thin shaving on a smoothing plane, wider for the thicker shaving taken by a jack or scrub plane. The edge may be curved or cambered depending on its use. The best resource I can send you to is Garrett Hack's The Handplane Book.

A jack plane will have limited use when building a longrifle apart from truing up the stock preparatory to laying out your lines, but you will find other uses for it. A block plane or a spokeshave will be a lot more useful for shaping - I know Mike Brooks uses a block plane for most of his shaping, and there is at least one surviving longrifle that shows evidence of having been shaped with small planes.

Elnathan
(who wants a set of wooden bench planes in a bad way...)

 

[paulvallandigham]

`Original, hand made stocks, always show some flaw. On top of that, wood swells and shrinks with the changes in humdity, so a " Perfect fit" is a rare, and possibly a transitory event. :hmm:

I would not worry about a gun made with CNC equipment, because even those stocks are hand finished, and sanded before the oil or synthetic finish is applied. This is called " Inspection touch up" and other euphemisms in the trade, but even in mass produced stocks, there is some hand work done, as needed.

You don't see it with laminated stocks these days, of course, because the laminations are so thin, and the glue is so thick, that inspectors simply reject a stock if it has a flaw, rather than spend the time in labor ($) to repair such wood.