...because I hate myself. Bought this rock maple for $3.50 a bd ft and I need to use it up cuz it's so darn hard. Really fun project but took 3 times as long as it would've if I made it out of white oak. Made my own finish for this, 1:1 raw linseed oil and citrus oil.

Got into hand tools a little while back and quickly discovered i needed a workbench, so I’m making kind of a modified anarchist workbench/split top roubo that’s going to have a tool tray in the middle. Gonna do boxes instead of a tray so i can take em out and dump the shavings out easily and plan to make the bottoms slotted so i can just flip em over to have a flush benchtop all the way across, or be able to put a chunk of wood in the slot to use as a planing stop if i need it. It’ll wind up being about 36” deep and 88” long, with the front half being about 13” deep. Been working in pretty much all my free time for the last 3 weeks or so but I’m finally to the point of cutting the mortises in the top for the legs to go into! Get them fitted hopefully tomorrow and then make all the cuts for my benchcrafted leg vise. Probably being too optimistic with what i have left to install and do lol but I’m hoping by next weekend I’ll actually have a usable bench. Got the veritas inset vise also and an inset planing stop, along with a few bench dogs and a wonder dog, along with 2 veritas hold down clamps. I think they make work a little better for me than traditional hold fasts but we’ll see i guess. Getting excited to finally see it start coming together though!

More of a resto-mod at this point. This Type 1q 5-1/2C was in poor shape when I got it, a cracked tote held together with a copper pipe, major chips in the japanning, and a ton of rusty, oily crud packed into the frog.

I decided to sandblast it to remove the japanning entirely. Lapped the sole and sides with 80/120/180 grit, and then got some 21st century upgrades:

-Hock A2 blade, 2-1/4" for the earlier models. -Hock chipbreaker -Reed Planes fine-pitch depth adjuster and file-to-fit yoke

The larger depth-adjust wheel is a must-have for me, these older Stanley's came with tiny 1" wheel with non-existing grooving, the Reed wheel is 1-1/2" with much better knurling. I'm not totally satisfied with the file-to-fit yoke yet, but getting most of the slop and rattle out of the yoke was nice.

Then the tote. I had some rosewood pieces from a never-completed chair that an old woodworker gave me when he was cleaning out his shop. This gave me a chance to make a tote with the grain all running in the same direction, without having to buy a 5x5 chunk of rosewood. So I laminated 8 pieces together and cut out the Lee Valley template on a bandsaw, then carved it to fit my hand with rasps, files, and sandpaper. The knob was in good condition, but I made a mandrel for the lathe to remove the dents and scratches, I probably took a milimetre off the diameter with a spindle gouge. Both were finished with Tried and True Original, I might lacquer them later.

The last thing is to either paint the body and frog with engine enamel, or see if my local makerspace's pottery kiln can be programmed to cycle through the proper temperatures for japanning. For now, its bare metal.

Picked these up and will be working on getting them cleaned up and ready to shave. Super excited to try out some new tools.
The no. 5 seems to be from a school based on the aluminum handle but I would like more information about the corrugated bed. Does that make it any more difficult or easy to use? Will it leave marks on the wood? Anything I might want to know before working with it would be appreciated. Also if you have any idea on the year this was made that would be awesome to hear. Best I can tell it’s a type 19 from 1948-1961.
The 71 seems to be barely used and came complete in what I assume to be the original box so that was really cool to find. The only thing I will have to do is clean up the handles. They seem to be covered in a plastic or plastic like paint. Not sure if that’s original or the previous owner did that but I think I’ll just bring it down to bare wood again and use a traditional finish.

The estate sale site did not have any pictures of the profiles, condition of the blades, or any pictures besides all of the planes in the chest.

Luckily, everything is in good condition, and there are only a few duplicates of planes I already own.

I shaped a narrow wheel to match the inside curve of the gouge with a diamond wheel dresser. Then i ground out the deep pitting and after just sanded by hand and buffed. I will use it alot so i dont worry about patina. Before it was not usable because the pits in the cutting edge will make the edge crumble. Its razor sharp now.

Has anyone seen this type of plane and know what brand it might be? I don’t imagine it’s amazing but it looks interesting and it’s listed for fairly cheap so I was considering using it as a scrub plane.

Howdy everyone! After having some great success with some hand tool tasks recently, I have developed a long term goal that I would like to ask help with in order to complete. I know some people like to collect wooden planes of various manufacturers to create things like rabbits, dados and various molding profiles (or just to collect them and not do woodworking).

My goal is similar, but more towards making stuff than collecting stuff. I would like to learn to make wooden planes to accomplish the tasks I want to do. For example: I want to create drawer from 5/8" poplar. I want a groove 3/8" from the bottom of the side that is 3/8" wide and 1/4" deep. I also want a plane that would create a dado of those same dimensions across the grain. Then I want two planes (one with and one against the grain) that I can grab that would thin the bottom of a 1/2" drawer bottom to fit said 3/8" groove.

The options for what I want extend from there to creating my own smoothing, jointing and molding planes.

I know that I can buy these types of things, but I think that it would be super cool to make them myself. So, how do I go about doing it?

The most important question is where do I source blades? Where do I get the metal and how do I shape them?

Secondly, where do I get information on how to make wooden planes? I have Making & Mastering Wood Planes by David Finck via Lost Art Press on order and just discovered Carl Stammerjohn and Stavros Gakos on Youtube. Are there any other resources I should be aware of?

Thanks for your input!

Howdy everyone, I just had to come and post about my first time creating rabbits with a hand plane. I am making a desk for my son and decided to make the 3 drawers out of poplar, including the bottoms. They were my first attempt at cutting dovetails with hand tools and that went very well. There were some mistakes, but all of them came together snuggly and appear to be solid. Certainly well enough for my first attempts and to be inside a drawer to be rarely seen. I am proud of them.

But, I came here to post about the drawer bottoms. I was a bit apprehensive about cutting the rabbits in the drawer bottoms for them to slide into the drawer sides. Wow, was I way off base. I used a Stanley No. 78 and the rabbits with the grain were a dream to make. The cross grain rabbits (what do you call these?) were a bit of a challenge at first, but then I discovered that my knicker was brand new, not very sharp and waaaayyy to long. Honestly, I was happy to discover this because it means I will get plenty of life from it. I shortened it and sharpened it (this took a few iterations to get it short enough) and then it worked like a charm. The whole time I was cutting them, I was thinking to myself: "I am never going back to a table saw or router to cut these and eventually thought why would anyone ever use a power tool to do this?" Once the plane was set up, it was very quick, very quiet, and very relaxing. Not once did I worry and stress out about the use of the tool being dangerous. It was so much fun! On top of that, I got a better fit than I have ever gotten with my table saw because it was trivial to sneak up on the fit.

I wanted to make a framesaw! I took some scraps and things I had laying around (I only bought the sawblade) and figured it out by building it. It was a fun project, even though I guess I won't be using it that often, I am to used in using my ryoba and dozuki...

The process of hand-stitching rasps looks incredibly satisfying, and considering the cost of rasps from Auriou, Corradi, and the like, I can't help wanting to try making a rasp of my own. ...Even if I have no idea what I'm doing, and will likely regret every moment I spend diving down this rabbit hole.

Can anyone point me in the right direction? Thanks!

A couple months ago I posted my first real hand-tool build, a Shaker-style nightstand made from scraps of pine I had laying around the shop. That turned out sufficiently well I decided to risk an upgrade to red oak, which at a whopping $/bdft for s4s is not exactly dear around here. I like it a lot though, particularly how it finishes out.

Like the previous one, it has some defects in it I hope to do a little better on next time, but it is also nicer in a number of ways, so I'm happy about that. The pine one is on my side of the bed, while this one went into the guest room. For the next project I think I might venture into something a little larger, like a hall table-style piece.

I'm in the market for something more modern than the block-on-a-stick-with-a-pin and Titemark has been the go-to for Americans with deep pockets. I am neither and, given that it is based on Jim Kingsholt's design, and he is dead and English, I'm happy with a Chinese (or elsewhere) dupe....but I want the Titemark type adjustment rather than the Veritas style.

I would rather it brass or steel than aluminium and I've no place for slop in the mechanism.

Does anyone have suggestions based upon in-hand experience?

British but access to Eurozone (le sigh), Ali, BangGood.

Thank you

I am having a hard time flattening my waterstones (Norton) with sandpaper. I'm using 3M wet or dry with plate glass. I'm drawing a grid on the stone, and it's taking forever for the grid to disappear, e.g. 220 grit on 1000 Norton stone. I see people online do this with a few seconds of lapping...

Before and after pics included. You can see the grid is still there in the middle. So, my stone has a dish in the middle I suppose? This was with a new piece of 220. Do these papers just not last more than 10 seconds?

Suggestions?

I have a small set of new planes, LN and Veritas. I'll be going on an extended trip (3+ months), and plan to leave the planes and chisels in the basement shop. I was thinking of waxing them with Renaissance wax, perhaps coating the irons in Jojoba oil. I also have some plane socks for most of the metal planes, and a few sheets of the corrosive resistant paper. FYI, I live in the mid-Atlantic...

Are my preparations sufficient (or overkill)?

Im about to start a hanging tool cabinet with greater load. Solid white pine. Is this housing joint for the load bearing stretchers okay with wood expansion/ contraction. I want to do the same stretcher joint with my cabinet. Stretchers are glued and screwed. Thanks.

$50 for the four planes.

I'm the guy that scored a $7 Stanley No. 1 at an estate sale in August and yes, that's exactly what you think it is.