11-11-2016, 07:39 PM
As some of you know my wife and I have a hobby store that is open once a month. It is in Nashua Iowa and we just happen to be open tomorrow. It is also general knowledge I deal a lot in hand planes. But I also deal in used woodworking tools and machinery. And I asked here for a recommendation on a hand plane DVD to be shown all day long in the room that houses the planes and tools. I bought the DVD Coarse, Medium, Fine by Christopher Schwarz. A lot agreed that there were a lot of better DVDs out there but a lot agreed that Chris would be a little more entertaining to the passer by.
I found what he had to say interesting at least.
First off he used a transitional as a scrub plane. I have a couple setting on the shelf and the one thing that stood out to me is they have a large mouth and it can not be adjusted. I am not a fan of them so I didn't spend a lot of time really looking it over. I thought why not they are reasonably cheap, I probably have $15 each on the ones I have. He liked jacks and fore planes for this job. I would tend to disagree on the fore plane if it were metal, but it is making good use of a transitional.
He also stated that he uses a lot of power tools, which I totally agree with but that there is a place for both. Sometimes it is faster to use hand tools Which I also totally agree with.
But then we get to the medium plane, and the first words out of his mouth, is copied word for word, don't skip the jointer plane. And this is where sole flatness becomes important. You want it as flat as you can get. If you are going to spend a lot of money on a tool, the place I would start to spend it is, I would really look at spending it on a Jointer plane. And I find it almost impossible to get an antique jointer flat. without the help of a specialized machine . And to this I totally agree with this. In fact I have ground so many planes after someone tried to lap them it would astound you.
The one flaw I found in what he had to say is it was filmed in Lie Nielsen's studio and their #7 was used in the DVD. A LN's #7 really is a large investment.
Anyway I found the DVD interesting. And even though I have been doing metal planes for several years now I still learned quit a few new things especially looking at it from a different point of view.
So at this point I would like to thank all who responded to my post. I followed the advise given here on this forum and purchased the DVD. It met every need I had of my particular application. I liked the DVD and learned from it
Thanks again,
Tom
I found what he had to say interesting at least.
First off he used a transitional as a scrub plane. I have a couple setting on the shelf and the one thing that stood out to me is they have a large mouth and it can not be adjusted. I am not a fan of them so I didn't spend a lot of time really looking it over. I thought why not they are reasonably cheap, I probably have $15 each on the ones I have. He liked jacks and fore planes for this job. I would tend to disagree on the fore plane if it were metal, but it is making good use of a transitional.
He also stated that he uses a lot of power tools, which I totally agree with but that there is a place for both. Sometimes it is faster to use hand tools Which I also totally agree with.
But then we get to the medium plane, and the first words out of his mouth, is copied word for word, don't skip the jointer plane. And this is where sole flatness becomes important. You want it as flat as you can get. If you are going to spend a lot of money on a tool, the place I would start to spend it is, I would really look at spending it on a Jointer plane. And I find it almost impossible to get an antique jointer flat. without the help of a specialized machine . And to this I totally agree with this. In fact I have ground so many planes after someone tried to lap them it would astound you.
The one flaw I found in what he had to say is it was filmed in Lie Nielsen's studio and their #7 was used in the DVD. A LN's #7 really is a large investment.
Anyway I found the DVD interesting. And even though I have been doing metal planes for several years now I still learned quit a few new things especially looking at it from a different point of view.
So at this point I would like to thank all who responded to my post. I followed the advise given here on this forum and purchased the DVD. It met every need I had of my particular application. I liked the DVD and learned from it
Thanks again,
Tom