im trying to rough, joint and smooth waterfall bubinga with hand planes for the first time. it has been very difficult and tears alot, does anybody have any experience or pointers for me. thanks to all.
SHAYN SMITH
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Replies
Sharp, SHARP, SHARP blades
Light cuts--lace
Tight mouth on the plane
York pitch
"Light cuts--lace""Tight mouth on the plane""York pitch" Boy, he's going to have a helluva time with that protocol given he's working this wood from the rough and presumably wants to bring it to its finished state will nothing beyond hand tools.All planing is not finish planing/smoothing.Look again at the original post.
Edited 12/5/2008 3:34 pm ET by TaunTonMacoute
I agree that you should try to take as heavy a cut as possible. The problem is that very challenging woods just don't let you get away with it for very long. A little tear out may be OK in the early stages, but when you get to the point were tear out is the main enemy, not saw marks or unflat portions, you have to shift to the finishing mode relatively early. The tougher the planing gets the more like finish planing it has to become.
In some cases Voo Doo can help but three legged chickens are getting harder to come by.I think Shayn has gone over the wall. Has anyone heard from him? Speak to us man. Are ya' there ? Are ya' all right lad ?
Edited 12/6/2008 12:07 am by roc
Look again at the original post.
Sure, let's do this Charlie ...
Shaun wrote ..
im trying to rough, joint and smooth waterfall bubinga with hand planes for the first time. it has been very difficult and tears alot, does anybody have any experience or pointers for me. thanks to all.
I'd say that Steve is spot on when he responded to you that hard wood with interlinked grain deserves respect.
Regards from Perth
Derek
It's going to be an interesting exercise in handplaning for the OP if he's a quarter inch away from desired thickness and he takes the advice of those who see every plane as just a different length smoother.
Hopefully by now the bloke is in his shop figuring it out for himself.
Charles
Your'e trying to win a point at all costs and, as a result, looking at the situation in a black and white manner.
No one suggested that you use a smoother to plane 1/4" thickness. I most certainly would not do so. Frankly, I'd use a bandsaw to remove close to that thickness first before planing. The alternative is a careful use of a scrub plane, set quite shallow (1/16" at most, possibly only as much as 1/32") and assess as I go. On hardwoods like Jarrah and Karri, which are quite brittle, there is no advantage in blundering in like a bull in a china shop. You will just experience a great deal of tearout - deep and destructive. A narrow scrub blade is preferred over a wider jack blade in this instance. For less brittle wood I'd use a jack with a strongly cambered blade. I'd be expecting to stop short of the line, more so than with softer woods, and just accept that I would need a high cutting angled blade set for a fine-moderate shaving, then increasing finer.
I am not sure how much time you have on similar woods, and I am genuinely interested in your observations on such timber.
Regards from Perth
Derek
Edited 12/6/2008 7:12 am ET by derekcohen
Do I hog out tropicals like they were creamy Poplar? No.
I don't quake and quiver, either. But yes, Derek, I'm sure I would start with a blade projection on a scrubber and jack a little on the skimpy side compared to other species. Surely, this isn't some ground-moving revelation coming from anybody's mouth, is it? I have no clue how much or how little. I'd set it, hit the wood, and adjust it, and move on.
My smoother is set as close and fine as I can set it and it pretty much stays that way. I would imagine that I would have to scrape a spot or two, or even sand a spot or two, of the figured Bubinga. I've already pointed this out. I suppose this should make me shy to stand at the urinal with the rest of the big boys.
If you have some magical protocol and set of tools that keep the odd piece of sandpaper or card scraper out of your hand then I assume that congratulations must be in order - you've apparently achieved some sort of goal that you've set for yourself.
So, accept my congratulations for.... whatever......!
Edited 12/6/2008 7:26 am ET by TaunTonMacoute
Charlie, you sound confused. No more than usual. But I just thought I'd point it out.
Let's see. You disagree with Steven's recommendation. I offer the same advice. Which you now accept. Then you sulk. Presumably because you can't disagree.
This thread really is about providing the above advice to Stuart, who is not as experienced as you, and wanted some guidance. No ulterior motives.
Regards from Perth
Derek
Edited 12/6/2008 7:43 am ET by derekcohen
Yeah, Derek. I'm confused.
Edited 12/6/2008 11:18 am ET by TaunTonMacoute
Shayn
First of all, WF bubinga has wildly switching grain, so unless your planes have irons bedded at 60 degrees, you won't have much luck. Scraping will give you the best chance of succeeding. A card scraper works well, but it's a lot of work. If the surface is large, a Stanley #80 scraper or a scraping plane as a #12,#112,#212,#85 et.al will all work. Scraping techniques are a must in your arsenal of surface preparation.
Regards, Sean
Yep, Yep,
I would add bevel up planes. I use a sharpening angle of between 40° and 47° even more. The plane bed on bevel up is 12° so is between 52° and 59° cutting angle ( to state the obvious). Bevel up blade is more rigidly supported and often has thicker blades. I have both bevel up and bevel down.
A couple of other things to keep in mind:
Radius your blade edges. Makes it easier to get some depth in this insanely hard wood.
It is possible and useful to back bevel a scrub plane blade I use 15° bb.
Have a very low bench so you can get your legs into it (you are going to need 'em) ! ! !
Planing cross grain or diagonal can prevent tear out or cause it. Depends on the plank.
Planing cross grain may be the only way to hog off any depth on the harder specimens of bubinga e.g., I just did a table top made up of several planks. The sharpening on the blades lasted way longer than expected on all but one. That one would dull blades fast and was so hard I could not get any depth of cut unless I went cross grain for most of the flattening.
Here is my big secret that you won't hear hardly at all. I share it with the hope that you will use some bubinga for your own use then lay off it because, unless something has changed recently, the status of bubinga is endangered and we should abstain from over harvesting. (I know single man shops compared to commercial is no big deal but some thing to work toward any way).
The BIG SECRET; wet the surface where you are planing and it makes it easier and prevents tear out. Wet it as a last resort. If the wet wood reacts with the iron in your planes and turns the wood gray it is no big deal. On your final finishing passes use a super sharp blade and no water this will take off the shallow discoloration. I keep a stack of blades near by and change out often for final finish planing. Be sure to dry and oil your planes when you take a break because it obviously causes rust.
I almost never use scrapers. Mostly just to take off the little ragged strings left from short passes just before I put my straight edge on for a check.
Edited 11/30/2008 11:45 pm by roc
Good advice. Only thing that I would change is the cutting angle. I use 60-65 degrees on BU planes. I have read that David Charlesworth will take his as high as 70 degrees. If yiu don;t have a BU plane, you can try a backbevel on a BD plane, or otherwise use a scraper plane and cabinet scrapers.
I'd really like to hear what Charles or Napie would do with a Stanley bench plane - no sarcasm intended. I am genuinely interested. Backbevel? Cabinet scraper? Standard frog and unmodified blade? Sharp is a given. With switching grain directions it is not possible to follow the grain direction with the plane.
Regards from Perth
Derek
This is a #3 with a LN (iirc) blade.
View Image
No back bevel, about 3 thou shavings. Not waterfall, but nicely curly.
While it never tore out, the reversal wasn't nearly as smooth as it ought to be, as can be seen in this closer picture of the edge grain:
View Image
Several minutes with a scraper solves that.
However, the higher angle of the LV LA provided a better, though still not "finished" surface. It did mean less scraper work. Because it was a short piece, the scrapers were hand held. On a larger surface, I would have used the scraper plane.
Take care, Mike
Please tell ME how to use my new Scraper Plane!
It is way to aggressive for me. Only used hand scrapers before with gloves to keep the heat at a reasonable temperature on my fingers!
LV one. Nice but I'm not smart enought to ues in on some sticks...
Try not using a hook, if you are. Get use to how it cuts with just a honed bevel of about 45 degrees on the blade. Bevel to the rear (bevel down, so to speak).
With the plane on a flat surface, the blade holder at about an 80 degree forward leaning angle, lower the blade until it touches this flat surface, the camber knob backed off. Tighten the blade locking knob.
You can at this point add camber or raise the blade holder. Try taking a little push as you make fine adjustments.
Keep adjusting until you are satisfied.
For using a hook, once the hook is on the blade, try using the blade by hand to find its "sweet" angle. Adjust the plane's blade holder to match that angle, install the blade as above and adjust as above.
Take care, Mike
Mike..
Rarely used a 'hook' on my handscrapers.. Just a SHARP 90 dregee angle or a 45 Angle.
I will try your suggestions. Think I have doen before but will do again.
Hi Will
Mike gives good advice.
My only alternative is a very fine hook rather than no hook. The blade will cut more aggressively with a hook, but a blade without a hook can struggle to cut at all. So add a fine hook, then do as Mike suggests and fine the sweet spot/angle of attack by trying it first as a handscraper.
Regards from Perth
Derek
Belt sander.
Yeah, I was gonna mention sandpaper, but was worried about being burned at the stake. ;-)
I think Maloof has it right that there is something about sanded - almost polished wood purfaces that are tactile and inviting. Planes and shaves yield such glass-like surfaces in many situations, but sometimes, sandpaper it the best bet in my experience.
We are in good company, Tage Frid had no problem firing up the P-C 3x21 if that would get the job done. I really love my planes but it is more the end product that matters to me not the process of getting there. <!----><!----><!---->
Plane it then scrape it. I'd plane it dead straight across and then scrape it in its length with a Stanley cabinet scraper with the screw barely bowing the blade. As far as I'm concerned as long as a scraper is producing shavings the wood is basically being planed (without getting into all the boring minutiae).If after all this the surface still didn't look good I'd sand it with garnet SP on a cork block and move on.I couldn't care less if there is a smoothing plane out there somewhere that theoretically would handle this with no tearout. I don't think such an animal exists, at least consistently day in and day out (please spare me the photo of one test board, I can't do $hit with a test board). One smidge just the wrong side of perfectly sharp and hell they'll all produce tearout.
Edited 12/2/2008 1:58 pm ET by TaunTonMacoute
TaunTonMacouteMilitant aren't we ?You would be surprised what a bit of "boring" investigation of cutting angles can do for you.I have several planes that if used with the proper cutting angle, ~ 60° or more like was being recommended by others, WILL NOT tear out on the finishing pass with a less than sharp blade.Takes a fair amount of effort to push this angle for the flattening stages so we use less angle if possible. I have a nearly finished bubinga dining table top sitting right next to me with NO tear out, no scraping and no sanding. Granted it is not all highly figured but I went way shallower on the sharpening angle. On the gnarly stuff the steep angles work great.And usually what happens when the blade with the 60° angle gets quite dull is I get less depth of cut, some skipping and uneven marks in the work and a lot more effort to push it. Not tear out.
Edited 12/3/2008 3:02 am by roc
I investigate what does and does not work in the context of live woodworking. Everything else is just pudding-off in the shower - it feels okay but it's still not the real thing.I have a jack, a smoother, jointer and a scrub plane. That's my bench plane lineup - one of each. It gets done with these or not at all. I have a few high-angle cutting tools, namely, a cabinet scraper and a card scraper (or two).I think I'm good to go. Stupid me.
>*******-off in the shower. . . aaaaahhh . . . alllll right.I think you got the wrong web site on that last post there buddy. This is the KNOTS woodworking chat. But now I can under stand why you don't have the time, or energy, for research into the finer points of hand planes.
Edited 12/3/2008 3:07 am by roc
Roc,
You have failed to undertand that Charles (TTM in yet another of guises, which are all rather samey) knows everything via a special process that allows him to dispense with experience of things he has taken agin' and to substitute, well, just being RIGHT. OK?
How could you question this wise woodworker? I mean, just look at his excellent work! (Oh, we have never seen any. I forgot).
Lataxe, who wishes he had the Charles universal know-it-all gene as it must beat having to actually learn about stuff by experiencing it.
Lataxe,You got more disguises than I can keep up with ! Now Philip is getting into the act.I used to have a neighbor who was, let us say, unique. On his wall in the living room was a photograph of John Wayne in full army/battle dress. Probably leading the troops onto the beach on D-Day.The caption at the bottom, yes it had a caption, said " life is hard, real hard, and its even harder if your stupid ". I am not sure what that means, since I am stupid and all, but it must apply here some how.Ever been to Findhorn in Scotland ?
Edited 12/3/2008 10:48 pm by roc
"I'd really like to hear what Charles or Napie would do with a Stanley bench plane".
Well Derek, the question was answered , predictably, at short notice with little thought for the original poster.
One didn't read the question which indicated that the OP wanted to use planes/cutting tools. Evidently he is also unaware that one cannot belt sand everything.
The other once again informs us that he only has one or two planes and a six inch nail, has never tried any others, never will , and therefore any tools additional to this are mere extraneous ####.
So here is what I would do with the Stanley or Record planes that I have had all my life: use my Record #51/2. I have several blades, all standard old Stanley or Record. If the tear out was such that a following card scraper would not cope I would take up one of the blades on which I have put something approximating a ten degree back bevel. Bubinga is relatively lacking in silica therefore not that abrasive so I would expect (know) that I wouldn't be spending excessive time honing.I would plane in any direction most suitable, taking as large a cut as possible. After that I would expect to maybe do some scraping, then hand sanding for tactile purposes only (Not for fixing surface defects). If it were large surface areas such as table tops I would like to have a nice scraper plane-maybe I'll just make one one day, but until then it is that #79 or the card item.
I have never worked Bubinga with my bevel up Veritas plane because I only got that when I came to New Zealand, but I am sure it would do fine, using a high angle blade, but I would try to get away with the lowest angle that does the job, because I think that cutting angles in excess of 55 or 60 degrees take too much effort-unless one has a very heavy plane.
Since others have found surface dampening to be helpful I would at least try it if I get to use Bubinga here in New Zealand.Philip Marcou
"[Napie]didn't read the question which indicated that the OP wanted to use planes/cutting tools. Evidently he is also unaware that one cannot belt sand everything."
Well, Philip, (your snarkiness aside), I beg to differ on these points. The OP can be read as asking about how to "rough, joint, and smooth" figured bubinga. He is indeed using hand planes right now. It is not unhelpful or unresponsive to mention to him that the alternative of sanding exists for successful smoothing - notably, the main operation of the three mentioned where tear out is a major set back.
As far as not being able to "belt sand everything," I take it you mean that pieces of a certain size or shape might not be easily belt sanded. Then again, anything susceptible to planing with a bench plane is a good candidate for accomodating a 3x21" hand held belt sander. Especially when fitted with a sanding shoe, they are quite tame and capable.
I'd really like to hear what Charles or Napie would do with a Stanley bench plane". <!----><!----><!---->
Well Derek, the question was answered , predictably, at short notice with little thought for the original poster. One didn't read the question which indicated that the OP wanted to use planes/cutting tools. Evidently he is also unaware that one cannot belt sand everything. The other once again informs us that he only has one or two planes and a six inch nail, has never tried any others, never will , and therefore any tools additional to this are mere extraneous ####.<!----><!---->
Well I see that being condescending has not departed your skill set. If you would have cared to read some of the other posts I do own and use many more planes than the two I mentioned. However since not every woodworker has the extensive resources of yourself or the sage from Perth I believe that offering an alternative is justified. For me, and I do not wish to impose my beliefs on anyone else, the end product is what I enjoy about working wood, less so the process. <!----><!---->
Dear Napie,
Having just read the posts you talk of I would say that you have many more resources than me-TWELVE routers?? Maybe I am just more resourceful (small joke).
Condescending?? I don't think so. The man wanted to know about using handplanes to work his Bubinga. I can't see how a belt sander will joint his edges for glue joints or thickness his boards from the rough sawn state but sure he could use one for smoothing and levelling if he liked, still gotta get rid of those scratches though.
Come on man we have lots in common-where is your sense of humour? Just now you will be on permanent standby to proclaim (testily) "Dovetail jig and router" every time someone asks a question about hand cutting dovetails (;)Philip Marcou
Philip,> I can't see how a belt sander will joint his edges for glue joints or thickness his boards from the rough sawn state but sure he could use one for smoothing and levelling if he liked, still gotta get rid of those scratches though.At work when some body says why do you "need" that tool. Or all I do is "______".I just say "when you are really good you can fix everything with a hammer; only I am not that good yet".Shayn,I am still waiting to hear back from you. What level of work do you hope to come out with? Real flat and filled surface like some of the nice old French polished antiques or kind of free form and rustic with a lot of "character" and "intentional distressing" to make it look old?God I hate intentional distressing and finishes that are made to look worn. Drives me up the wall ! ! ! roc calm down. . . just breath . . . slow . . .and . . . regular like . . .just breath . . .Edited 12/4/2008 11:37 am by rocEdited 12/4/2008 11:51 am by roc
Edited 12/4/2008 11:56 am by roc
Roc,I ain't never been to Findhorn as it is full of hippy folk and Diggers - perhaps also Levellers. Now, I quite admire these community-minded folk for some of their aspects but then there is all that spiritualism..... And who know; they may burn a stranger each year to the fertility gawd. It might be me, were I to visit unannounced!!Loch Fynne is not far away from Findhorn and I recenty sailed all over that lovely water in a wee boat. Scotland is indeed bonny, especially from the deck at moonrise when full of single malt and water from the burn.Lataxe, who cut off his long hair in 1971.PS Philip makes Campaign furniture of precision & beauty. I don't believe he introduces false horse-bite marks or even spear gouges.PPS I have a friend who swears he can build furniture with nowt but a carving axe. So far he has shown me an ugly stool and a lopsided table.
Lataxe,In 1980 I had all saved up to do a bicycle tour from England to Scotland with Findhorn as a curiosity on the trip. Then I lent the money to a girl friend I was sweet on at the time to buy a fine bike. We did some bike touring together and snow shoeing including a week long snow shoe up and around a bunch of fourteen thousand foot peaks so she wasn't such a bad sort. Turned out she was batting for the other team though.Wish I hadn't lent her the money; though she paid it back a little at a time. I think I needed the Scotland trip more than she needed the money/bike. One thing and another ( about thirty years worth ) and I never got around to the trip. Just wondering if Findhorn was still going.That is saying something for a commune to last forty years and more ! ! ! Maybe we should grow our hair out and trade everything in for a shovel and some beads. What say?wo this ot to be over in the Jointer Plane ThreadHope we didn't scare Shayne offEdited 12/4/2008 2:23 pm by roc
Edited 12/4/2008 2:24 pm by roc
Roc,
It is never too late to pedal about the countryside. I live in England (75 miles from the border with Scotland) and have spare bicycles, as well as a friend in Scotland living just to the west of Glen Coe. He likes visitors and may also take us on his saily-boat to strange shores on which reside even stranger pubs.
So there is an invitation. Of course, you may be decrepid now. I am fighting to retain the creps myself, so far with successs, which I put down to lots of planing wood, riding that bicycle and eating the wonderous fare conjured up by the ladywife. She is also involved in that other activity which keeps one young (or feeling it).
Beads is going too far as they will attract guru-men and avaricious gypsy wimmin. Also, it will be too much of a drag up Shap and across Rannock Moor if we put shovels in the saddle bag.
Lataxe, who often wonders if it would help to put helium in the tires.
>invitation
Thank you !
Soon as the coffers are flush, off I go to your shores.
A year or two with luck but keep them spare bikes oiled up.>creps
yah I got some of that around here some place . . . can't remember where I put it off hand . . .
These days mostly I ride to work and back. Some times I think if I headed for the city limit my body would go the same distance as my commute and then just stop. : )>Shovels/communal gardens
Plants and growing green stuff I was never much good at so it is just as well. I can kill a cactus if left in my care too long.>Helium
funny you should mention that
Here is a "better ?" use for the funny gas:
Go to iTunes
Look up "NPR: Car Talk Podcast" then don't subscribe just click the aero and you should get a short list
get episode 0848 Nov 29 2008
it should be free of charge.Or go here:http://www.cartalk.com/ct/review/index.jsp( not sure what all you have access to on your end )
A guy can't just sit around.
rocEdited 12/4/2008 3:52 pm by rocEdited 12/4/2008 3:53 pm by rocEdited 12/4/2008 3:56 pm by roc
Edited 12/4/2008 4:21 pm by roc
yesterday i went and bought a large scraper plane, im going with a low angle jack for roughing, my no.8 jointer, orbital out the rest of the tear out my jointer doesnt get then go with the scraper how does that sound? im a very new wood worker using hand planes for about 2 months. you can tell how sure of my self i am hahahaha
One other note no one has mentioned. DO NOT USE OIL BASE FINISH. It will turn your Bubinga black and before you know it you'll be hating life because the color will penetrate the below the surface. I only know because it happened to me. Shellac, laquer or waterborne poly should be fine. Stay away from oils such as Spar or any similar product.
>OIL BASE FINISHWeeaaalllll . . . Maloof always works great for me ( with my super secret elixirs and potions before hand ). But Malloof by its self (no shellac sealer) was no problem just less spectacular on bubinga than on walnut etc.Maloof is 1/3 tung oil, 1/3, boiled linseed oil and 1/3 polyurethane. That's a lot of oil . . .Shayn
To be safe do a lot of testing on the exact wood you are using to find out best bet.
I did get the darkening/blackening with pure oil.
Edited 12/4/2008 4:07 pm by roc
>orbital out the rest of the tear out my jointer doesnt get then go with the scraper how does that sound? Nah Dude Nah ( a really young kid I used to work with used to say that. I try to never miss an opportunity to use it. We used to ask him questions that could only be answered "no" by him just to get him to say it. ) But that isn't helping much so here is what I think:Orbital sander. Think of any tear out removal this way; you will need to take the entire surface down to the bottom of that tear out ( scrub plane or 4x24 belt sander time) to get the surface flat. If you are making a more rustic piece of furniture and some ( ok, allot of ) undulation in the surface is OK with you then do what you described.Do you see how if you have a dip (torn out crater) and you sand there until it is smooth you have simply dug the dip deeper. To get it to look like a nice flat table top you will need to remove all the wood around the crater on the whole table top to the depth of that crater.Tear out is not fun.Also I don't like to mix sand paper and hand planes going back and forth. The grit left over in the wood could be a night mare. Dulls your plane blades on the first pass.Some people claim they can brush the surface and vacuum the grit up but sounds like extra work to me.If you are going to sand maybe just find a commercial shop that will run your glued up planks through their wide belt surface sander for a fee.That doesn't teach you hand planing skills for bubinga though.Hand planing bubinga is brain surgery compared to less hard or complex wood. You may want to let this bubinga project "acclimate to its surroundings" for a year or two while you practice surface planing and jointing on some less ambitious wood/project.I am not kidding. Some of my purchased wood sits around for years before I get to working the wood. Buy the wood when you run across it; do the work later " when it is time".This wood working thing is a different sort of activity than most modern people are used to because you just can't rush wood working and get the best results. Takes learning/reading/class time, tons of practice and some thinking about all the things that will happen if " I do this or that".What do you mean by roughing? Taking off a sixteenth or a quarter of an inch? If more than a sixteenth in bubinga you might want to consider bandsawing off the excess or a scrub plane. More likely use both.For instance; I usually set my scrub plane by trial and error but I was in an experimental mood so I put a stack of heavy weight paper strips on my bench and put the scrub plane on it so the blade could extend down past the stack to the bench top to set my depth.I used ten sheet of heavy paper ( .0055" each ) to start. Was about 1/16". I couldn't push the plane it just dug in. I removed five sheets and tried again. Same result. I got down to two sheets of paper before I could power the plane. (Not enough ballast I guess. Can't drive a stake with a tack hammer.) : )But you see I was now taking off only 1/64" or less per pass ! ! ! In most other wood I could have set the blade much deeper and hogged off bunches more per pass. Taking off a quarter of an inch on one or two humps in your plank at this rate is going to turn into serious work.Ok the lighter stuff is serious work and the above is just purgatory.I admire your ambition. I have been studying woodworking using mostly hand tools on difficult/hard wood for more than nine years now and am just getting to feel semi competent so give your self a break ( difficult to learn sharpening in two months unless you got a teacher looking over your shoulder).Seriously; practice on softer wood with little figure like poplar. When you can get that flat, if that is your goal, then move on to maple. Get the maple flat and the jointed edges to fit up. Only after that move on to your bubinga. You may, for good measure, want to take a whack at planing some figured wood with reversing and rowed grain that is softer such as walnut before tackling the figured (tear out prone) bubinga.Other wise you may be so frustrated you won't have a chance to acquire the basic skills of planing flat and straight and learning to sharpen. You will just be fighting the unknown that the previous woods can teach you one at a time instead of all at once in a crash coarse.Well that is my "two cents" anyway.
roc
Edited 12/2/2008 5:48 pm by roc
Shayn,
I recently finished this waterfall bubinga table. I was responsible for smoothing the faces, carving the edges, and finishing it http://forums.taunton.com/fw-knots/messages?msg=43946.1.
There was a fair amount of material to be taken off and we had a tight timeline so we elected to use a 3x21 belt sander. We started with 60x. We also experimented with planes with different angles of blades. With a sharp blade at an estimated effective cutting angle of 80 degrees in a good plane, we still got considerable tearout - making more work. Going cross grain worked much better. Scraping worked better yet, but it is labourious.
While not nearly as enjoyable, sanding was the solution for this 12' x 42" table (which by the way has two sides!). Please don't discredit me for saying this!
Chris @ www.flairwoodwork.spaces.live.com
- Success is not the key to happines. Happiness is the key to success. If you love what you are doing, you will be successful. - Albert Schweitzer
thanks for your help i figured yesterday i would start with a low angle jack to rough it then my no. 8 and i got a reason to go buy a large scraper plane, which will be labor intensive, but i will orbital the rest of the tear out then finish with the scraper plane it should turn out good i can only hope hahah
Shayn - if you choose not to take the piece to your local cabinet shop with a wide-belt sander, you can use any/all of the techniques listed above with handplanes to get the job done. One thing I'd add to the discussion, however, is to suggest that, using the tools that you have (perhaps only a "standard" Bailey-type plane with a bevel-down blade), that you wet the surface and plane it before purchasing a new tool or modifying the ones that you have.
That was mentioned before, but what I'll add is that you do this with denatured alcohol, not water. Denatured alcohol will soften the end-grain of the figure in the board, making you planing go much easier, without excessively raising the grain or absorbing deeply into the wood, nor making your steel tools rust. The problem with using water for this purpose is that it's easy to overdo it. If you put too much water on the surface, or the wood is especially porous (not likely for Bubinga), quite a bit of it will soak in deeply. You will then flatten the surface to your satisfaction with your planes, then come back to the surface 2 days later in the project only to find a depression where the wood's absorbed a lot of water, swelled, been planed off, then dried back out and shrunk.
dkellrnc,Tung in cheek; do you recommend he set up some kind of regular training sheduul drinking, lets say, Aberfeldy single malt? You know. To fortify himself against the fumes of the denatured. Purely as a precautionary measure of coarse. : )Wow there is so much to investigate in this woodworking stuff ! Thanks for the tip about the denatured instead of water, I am going to try it.rocEdited 12/2/2008 5:50 pm by roc
Edited 12/2/2008 6:23 pm by roc
"Tung in cheek; do you recommend he set up some kind of regular training sheduul drinking, lets say, Aberfeldy single malt? You know. To fortify himself against the fumes of the denatured. Purely as a precautionary measure of coarse. : )"
You know, funny thing about this is that it is actually possible to get wasted by breathing in ethanol fumes, though there's little chance of that when using it in small amounts to aid in planing end-grain. There's actually a device (that's been outlawed in several states) that vaporizes alcoholic drinks so that the participant (victim?) can breathe in the fumes and get a "rush". Personally, I'll take a Guinness over that any day. ;-)
After a day of finishing with a danish oil in a fairly well ventilated area without respiratory protection, I felt light headed and a little woozy. Working in a more confined area with more potent chemicals could easily get to you. No wonder the finishing room was the most popular hang out in high school! I remember when one idiot decided to see how flamable the finishes really were...Chris @ http://www.flairwoodwork.spaces.live.com(soon to be http://www.flairwoodworks.com)
- Success is not the key to happines. Happiness is the key to success. If you love what you are doing, you will be successful. - Albert Schweitzer
"I remember when one idiot decided to see how flamable the finishes really were..."
Youch! I'm severely hoping that finish of choice wasn't laquer!
Fortunately, the human body's tolerance for ethanol is a great deal higher than laquer thinner, mineral spirits, and the like, so it's fairly unlikely that someone would be overcome with ethanol fumes in a normal shop setting (i.e., an old basement with a lot air leaks (my shop), or an unheated garage or shed). But you've a point - painting the inside of a closet with the door closed is asking for trouble. ;-)
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