Replies

1. 
   thumbnailed | Sep 16, 2008 12:27am | #1

   I cradle the plane upsidedown in my hand, and firmly smack the back end with a raw leather mallet. It needs to be a pretty good smack, but you need a non marring mallet, or a rubber deadblow hammer or something similar. With a finger or two hooked around the wedge bulb, you'll feel the wedge let go when it does. Perhaps the wedge throat is dirty or restricted in some fashion, or the iron rusty or bent. Also, unless you know all the parts are original, someone may have replaced the wedge and gotten the angle slightly wrong. Usually you can see a patina difference if the wedge has been replaced. Good luck.

2. 
   EdHarrison | Sep 16, 2008 12:34am | #2

   Samson, I definitely do not have more experience (I often learn quite a bit from your posts) but I got a couple ideas. I put paraffin wax on the wedge before it goes in, to help get it out later. Pure paraffin wax is my friend when using bench planes and molding planes.

   I tap on the rear of the plane (forcefully) with the urethane-coated mallet that I use for carving. To me, that keeps from damaging the planes, which are sometimes in the neighborhood of two hundred years old. Others will have more ideas, good luck, Ed

   Oh yeah - you probably know already, but make sure there is no rust on the flat of the iron that the wedge rides against,...

3. 
   JeffHeath | Sep 16, 2008 03:13am | #3

   Samson

   I've never had a wedge stuck so bad that I couldn't get it loose with a couple of well-intentioned wacks on the back of the plane.  I use either a deadblow or my shop made mallet, which has a cherry head, and is softer than all of the plane woods,  and give the stubborn one's a good smack.  They always come loose.

   Jeff

1. 
   Samson | Sep 16, 2008 03:28am | #4

   Maybe I'm too dainty with my smacks.  I'll get a soft mallet and see if that's my problem. 

   Thanks, all.

4. 
   chuckh | Sep 16, 2008 06:32am | #5

   Samson,

   I bought a big round at a flea market once for three dollars.  It had some rot on the nose but I thought, no big deal, I can cut that out and fit a piece in.  It might look awful but it'll be functional.  The wedge and iron were really stuck tight so I gave it a good whack on the heel with a leather mallet and the whole front half of the plane fell off!  A little more rot than I thought.

   Anyway, most of these old irons are tapered - thicker at cutting edge and tapering thinner up the shaft.  The best way to remove an iron that is frozen by time is to simply tap the end of the iron as if you were setting it for a deep cut and drive it out the mouth of the plane.

   If the wedge is in good shape it will typically have that nice round bulb (sneck) on the exposed end.  Once you have the plane cleaned up with the wedge fit properly, you'll be surprised how light a tap it takes on that sneck to pop the wedge loose.

   Much better than whacking the body.

   Regards,

   -Chuck    

    

5. 
   slashdev | Sep 16, 2008 04:51pm | #6

   If gentle taps on the iron don't free the wedge, try this:

   Grip the wedge with a wooden handscrew clamp.   Turn it upside-down and tap on the nose of the wooden jaws.  Add a shim to the sides of the wedge if you need to get the noses away from the plane body.

   Be sure to line the jaws up with the bed and that you strike along the same line, close to the body.  Ya' don't want to blow out the sides or snap the wedge off.  Likewise, never wiggle the wedge side-to-side, just front-to-back.

   You may find that the body has warped, trapping the wedge.  This can also make the tang snug, or reduce the lateral adjustment range.

   HTH!

   ---------------

   /dev

6. 
   dkellernc | Sep 16, 2008 06:37pm | #7

   Samson - I use a lot of wooden molding planes, and rarely if ever use the modern equivalent (my router table).  In general, wooden molding planes that are in good shape and functioning the way they were intended will operate the way you've read - tapping the back of the plane will loosen the wedge (and set the iron deeper), tapping the front will retract the iron.

   However, it's been so long since molding planes were produced in any quantity that they tend not to work this way any longer.  For the wedge to retract by smacking the back of the plane, it has to be pretty smooth, and the wedge slot can't have much in the way of dry rot. 

   My take on removing a stuck wedge is a bit different than what Mike Dunbar advises in his tool re-habbing book.  I've never had much success clamping a wedge in a vise or clamp and driving the body off - the racking forces alternately hitting the toe and the heel of the body of the plane seems not to do much.  Not saying it wouldn't work in some cases, but it doesn't seem too reliable.

   My first attempt is indeed to smack the back of the plane very hard with a dead-blow mallet.  That doesn't generally work, but it's worth a shot.  The second attempt is to -carefully- drive the iron through the mouth of the plane.  The problem here is that old molding plane irons are generally laminated and the tang is very, very soft iron.  It can easily bend or snap off.

   Finally, if all else fails, I use a thin bar of brass against the cutting edge of the iron, with the body held in a vise, to drive the iron back through the body of the plane and out the top.  The fairly soft brass doesn't seem to do the iron much damage, and this method has never, ever failed to free the iron and wedge.  Naturally, though, I try the the two methods above first, as there's not as much risk to the edge of the cutting iron.

   And a couple of comments about maintenance/fettling once you get the iron free:  I will generally smooth the front and back of the tang by removing all rust, and lightly lapping it on 400 grit paper.  I generally don't think it's a good idea to smooth the iron tang to a mirror polish, because some roughness is necessary for the iron to hold its set in normal use, but it is a good idea to remove any "mountains" caused by corrosion over the years. 

   It's also quite common for the body of the plane to have shrunk to the point where the wedge bears on the sides of the wedge mortise, as well as the front and back.  That's bad from the standpoint of keeping the wedge from getting stuck in the future, so I use a planemaker's float to enlarge the width of the mortise until the wedge doesn't hang up there.  By the way - you could also take a few shavings off of the sides of the wedge, but that will completely destroy any collector's value that the plane might have.

   And - never, ever, wax the wedge or the insides of the mortise (though waxing the sole of a molding plane is a very good thing that will make it last far longer in use).  Doing so will make the wedge very slippery and will likely result in problems holding the set during use.  It's far better to correct the dimensional problems the mortise or iron might have. 

1. 
   Samson | Sep 16, 2008 06:57pm | #8

   Thanks for the detailed answer.  I'll take all that good advice into consideration as i try to dope out the answer for my various individual planes.

   I was just thinking the other day about how long it has been since I've used my router table and whether I'm ever likely to ever use it again.  I do use my router for handheld operations reasonably often, but the table, pretty much never.

2. 
   EdHarrison | Sep 16, 2008 08:05pm | #9

   >And - never, ever, wax the wedge or the insides of the mortise (though waxing the sole of a molding plane is a very good thing that will make it last far longer in use). Doing so will make the wedge very slippery and will likely result in problems holding the set during use.<Works fine for me. I have both 18th and 19th century molding planes, both British and American, and both the shallower bed angles for softwood moldings and the steeper bed angles for hardwood furniture. I note that in almost all cases the wedge is finished with BLO or equivalent. The geometry of the cutting angle of the iron and the wedge and the mortise is what holds the iron in place. Friction plays a lesser role than most people think. Most people I have seen using molding planes have the wedge slammed in there way too tight.But whatever works,...more than one way to skin a cat. I'd be interested in L. Williams' thoughts on this. I tend to subscribe to his philosophy that by the 19th century, the design factors of molding planes were pretty well distilled and perfected (if those are the right words). Everything is there for a reason. Like a short story where every word contributes to the whole.Take care, Ed

1. 
   dkellernc | Sep 16, 2008 08:56pm | #10

   Indeed, whatever works for you is absolutely fine.  But I'd note that the majority of molding planes made in the 19th and 18th centuries were not finished with anything.  Some of the British makers put a french polish finish on some of their costlier boxwood and other planes, but it was not common.

   That's not to say that users didn't apply linseed oil - I've a bunch of British planes that smell strongly of oil, and it was common advice 50 years ago that wood needed to be "fed" with oil to prevent them from cracking and warping.  Based on my observations, that advice didn't work out too well - many of these oiled planes in my workshop have checks and somewhat warped soles.

   For what it's worth, I've specifically had to remove wax from the wedges of a few molding planes I purchased from old-time collectors.  The iron would simply not stay set, though removing the wax with mineral spirits immediately solved the problem with no other modifications necessary.