Reading Philip Marcou’s post in the “New Brese Plane is Awesome” thread:
>>”should any “difficult” timbers fail to respond to to a Brese plane the final solution in the form of a formidable array of Marcou Planes awaits them”<<
it got me thinking – what is the hardest wood to plane smooth? Lignum vitae? The end grain of a really soft wood like cottonwood?
Replies
Chris,
There are so many wonderful woods for cabinet/furniture use that have great working qualities this search for "impossible" woods seems so senseless. It reminds me of the "finest shaving contests" where the shaving becomes the end product and actually making something doesn't even enter into the picture.
That said, one of the most difficult woods I've found to work with hand planes is Western red cedar. Most of the wood is so soft it wants to tear instead of cut so one needs a very sharp irons with acute bevel angles and bedded at low angles. Western red cedar also has a high silica content that makes maintaining a sharp edge difficult. It's loaded with frequent knots that are as hard as any wood going and those knots have a weak bond to the surrounding wood making them prone to just falling out rather than being planed. These hard knots tend to destroy acute cutting edges on contact.
Sir Chris.. I would think Purpleheart may fall into the almost impossible. I sand and then use a card scraper. And then again there is Jatoba...
Hardest wood to plane
Simple, Ever try to plane petrified wood. You set yourself up for that one. ;-)
Now here is a thought, sharpening plane irons with petrified wood. After all it is a very fine grit.
What a novel market it could be. A Million $$$$ opportunity,
Now somebody will do it ! And I'll only have the Idea in my pocket.
Hi Chris
I am of a similar mind to Larry, that is, if by "harder" you mean "difficult", then something along the lines of Paulownia, a softwood, can be a real challenge. The pieces I tried came from a tree we removed from our garden. It air dries very rapidly, and I made a few boxes out of boards after a few years. This wood is light like Balsa (another challenge?) and only the very sharpest blades stood a chance of cutting it as the "straws" just bent. Plus the grain reversed frequently. The remaining boards I have are not inviting.
If by "hard" you were being literal, well I was running a workshop on dovetailing a few weekends ago. Some of the guys brought along boards of their own to use (which they did not use as I had them all work with straight grained pine). We were chatting beforehand, and one handed me a rough sawn board. It was only about a foot long by about 6" wide and 1/2" thick but it weighed a ton. I was asked to plane it down. I missed the smirk on his face. Anyway I pulled out a plane with a 60 degree cutting angle and a CPM 3V blade and planed away. I really didn't think too much about the planing as the blade kept cutting and the shaving kept coming, and eventually the face was smooth and shiny. The eyes of this fellow kept getting bigger and bigger .. which I finally noticed, and I asked what the big deal was. Well it turned out that the board was Wandoo (Wandoo Eucalyptus), and when I heard this, my eyes opened wide as well.
Wandoo is one of thise superhard woods, in the same range as Ipe, with a similar Janka rating. It is sometimes used for flooring ... if you can get anyone to agree to lay it! It cannot be nailed without predrilling, and sanding wears out belts before the wood.
Something to be said for CPM 3V steel!
Regards from Perth
Derek
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