Upgrading Plane Handles

[nuhobby]

Well, I started this chilly Saturday with about 90 minutes of sweat and 3 hacksaw blades.

If this thing works out, it will be a dandy... really massive:

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[nuhobby]

Well, as you may have guessed, I got a very old, cracked wooden Jack Plane and decided to build a new version.

Here was a website that was a great inspiration:
http://www.inthewoodshop.com/ShopMadeTo ... Plane.html

My version, using a vintage iron with a chipbreaker:
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Some high points of my experience:

The Old Blade -- what a demonstration of metallurgy! I decided to cut off the top of it for cosmetic reasons, no big deal with fairly soft steel at that end. But woe to me trying to do anything like making 2 skinny blades out of 1 big one -- that cutting-edge steel at the bottom was harder than anything! So I kept it Wide.

Laminated Maple body -- It was a good way to use up spare hard maple scraps. I oriented each so the grain would "feather" the correct way during use of the plane. My 3 middle planks were a tad too narrow to space the plane-body correctly for the "fattie" blade I got. So... I laminated some scrap hardwood veneers between them to compensate. It looks nice, too!

The Cherry Wedge -- this was my favorite part of the job. It's all hand chiseled. The several facets are copied from the original, meant to guide the shavings smoothly out of the plane. Plus, I used my #4 metal smoother plane, inverted in the bench vise, as a Small Parts Jointer: extremely helpful for forming the wedge.

The Mouth -- Had some trouble chiseling all the facets to my satisfaction. I ended up adding some epoxy filler to correct some tearout. That's why I painted it flat black. Lodgepole: I also had used flat black on the other #4 metal plane's interior.

The Strike Buttons -- These are the sanctioned way to retract/adjust the blade on a wood plane like this. The old plane had one ebony button near the front. After trying my mallet a few times, I decided to use 2 buttons since my aim is poor. I used bits of Wenge (and the plug-hole cutter bit) for this.

The plane in action (it works!):
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I really need a break from this job. I was covered in sweat every time I got near it!

Happy Woodworking,

While my wooden Jack Plane still gets used for hogging-down rough or off-size pieces, I wanted an extra-fine plane next. Here's my new Krenov-style plane based on a blade & stock kit from HOCK tools. I made a few small changes to bring it into the spirit of the Krenov originals. The custom pivot-pin was turned on the Shopsmith lathe (small job, big satisfaction!) Right now it has no finish on the wood (Bubinga kit, custom Myrtle pivot-pin). It's very heavy for its size .

Krenov_Plane.jpg (115.89 KiB) Viewed 3188 times