15° plane bevel?

[Tipi]

Apologies if this is in the wrong section, please move if more appropriate elsewhere.

so, I’ve inherited a 17” wooden jointing plane with no iron. So I bought one off eBay.

The iron was listed as new old stock and doesn’t appear to have been sharpened. The weird thing about it is that it is ground to about 15° not the usual 25-30°.

can anyone ahead any light as to why this might be? Have I bought a low angle iron by accident?

Thanks for any enlightenment
Tom

 

[FerlasDave]

It sounds like a low angle iron to me. Years ago there was a culture of secondary bevels on planes so it could be for adding a secondary bevel to whatever degree you choose? I would just re grind it though as secondary bevels on plane irons are more trouble than anything.

If you have any pictures that might help too?

 

[steve a]

My understanding is that the irons for both standard and low angle planes are ground to the same angle, typically 25-30 degrees. The low angle comes from the bed or the frog of a low angle plane being made at a shallower angle, that combined with using the iron bevel up in a low angle plane gives you the difference between the two.

 

[demographic]

My understanding is that the irons for both standard and low angle planes are ground to the same angle, typically 25-30 degrees. The low angle comes from the bed or the frog of a low angle plane being made at a shallower angle, that combined with using the iron bevel up in a low angle plane gives you the difference between the two.

More or less that^.

Can't say I've come across any blades (I used to call em irons but then read some stanley bumf from yonks ago and they called em blades so I can't be done with the confusion it causes some people) ground to 15 degrees and I've got a good selection of low angle bevel up, normal angle bevel down and even high angle bevel down planes.
I've even got one with a backbevel to increase the angle on wild (ish) grain and a toothed blade for veneer for wild grain work.
Personally I'd just sharpen it to the normal 25 or so degrees and hone it to 30 or so.
Microbevels on handplane blades are nothing to be scared of, just a way to quickly touch an edge up.

Oh and wooden handplanes? Some of them are a joy to use. Spend a bit of time learning them and they can be very rewarding indeed.
Think I have a block plane (to be fair that ones a bit Meh) , a rebate, a lignum soled Jack, a lignum soled toothing and a 550mm long beech jointer. All wooden planes.
Then a fair selection of metal planes also.

Some old plane blades are laminated and you'll see the slightly different sheen on the bevel as you sharpen it.

 

[Tipi]

Some pics

 

[Tipi]

Thanks for the input guys. It’s also my understanding of low angle planes is that they are also 25° Bevel and the low angle bit is in the bed.

I’m tempted to sharpen it and see what it does. Should think it’ll cut well at first but loose it’s edge pretty fast. May even chip if I hit some gnarly bits

 

[demographic]

Thing with low angle planes is you can alter the cutting angle by changing the bevel angle.
For example, say the bed angle is 12 degrees plus the bevel angle of say 25 degrees gives you a total of 37 degrees. Only eight degrees less than a normal bevel down bench plane.
Lower bed angles usually used for cutting endgrain and they don't help when cutting wild curly grain.
But... sharpen that bevel up blade to 50 degrees and all of a sudden you have a total angle of 62 degrees. Often a lot better for wild grain although its harder to push that plane.

Then theres bevel down planes, or basically normal benchplanes.
The bed angle (or frog angle depending on if it even has a frog) is maybe 45 degrees common pitch or higher.
If you're sharpening to 25-30 degress or so and finding problems with edge failure you can just sharpen it to a bigger angle and it's not going to affect your cutting angle. Maybe 35 degree bevel (don't forget that your cutting angle is still the same of 45 degrees or so) works better and has less edge failure.

Just because most benchplanes say sharpen to 25 degress on the blade doesn't mean you can't have a play about with angles. Have a go and if you're not keen, alter it. Edge failure? Bigger angle might provide better support.

Don't go to the point where the clearence angle is too small or the plane will skate across the wood without cutting.

Oh and the main thing I found helped my plane usage was to learn how to put a bit of a camber on the edge so the corners arent digging in when the centre is cutting.
That allows me to plane a board thats wider than the blade without making a mess of it.
Shallower camber the closer to finishing the work the plane is used for.
Scrub>Foreplane>Smoother.

I left a few out of that list cos things like jackplanes get used in so many situations its hard to say where they go.

Basically, have a play about, it's fun.

 

[Toddy]

A quick chip in (no pun intended) I thought very low angle was for blockboard and parquet flooring.

I'm getting old, my Dad was a joiner, it was a veerrry long time ago since I toddled behind him playing with the shavings.

Interesting thread thank you

 

[Tipi]

The plot thickens...
I Found another 2 1/2” blade / iron on eBay this one also seems to have a low angle bevel. Bevel width looks very similar to mine.

Vintage 2 1/2" tapered plane blade iron old tool by Highgate Tool Company | eBay

The blade is 2 1/2" wide x 8 1/8" long.

www.ebay.co.uk

 

[Tipi]

My plane restoration, sharpening and use knowledge come from YouTube. Have found Rex Krueger and Paul sellers partially helpful.

when my house renovation is mostly done hopefully I can find time to play with the planes a bit more and make some stuff.
will report back how the 15° bevel works out

 

[Tipi]

A quick chip in (no pun intended) I thought very low angle was for blockboard and parquet flooring.

I'm getting old, my Dad was a joiner, it was a veerrry long time ago since I toddled behind him playing with the shavings.

Interesting thread thank you

Is that low bed angle or low bevel angle do you know?

all interesting stuff these old tools! Both of my grandads were carpenters / cabinet makers of some sort, sadly I never met them though.

 

[Toddy]

I don't know. I have a kist up the loft that's full of old moulding planes, and a couple of wood soled ones too. I really ought to clear them out I suppose.
It's simple Stanley ones that are in my own toolbox.

Dad did his apprenticeship as a joiner, worked as a benchhand joiner/cabinet maker, and he built wooden boats It sometimes felt that my brothers and I spent half our childhoods in every wee boatyard up and down the Clyde and it's lochs
I still have pieces of furniture he built too

 

[demographic]

Bill Anderson Wood and Shop stuff is good on Youtube also.
P.aul Sellers is good. Rob Cosman as well.
Oh and The English Woodworker is pretty entertaining with his no nonsense delivery.

I know it seems fashionable for tradesmen to act like they came out of the womb knowing everything but I'll learn stuff where I find it and Youtube has taught me far more about handplanes than any tutors ever did when I was at college.

 

[demographic]

I don't know. I have a kist up the loft that's full of old moulding planes, and a couple of wood soled ones too. I really ought to clear them out I suppose.
It's simple Stanley ones that are in my own toolbox.

Dad did his apprenticeship as a joiner, worked as a benchhand joiner/cabinet maker, and he built wooden boats It sometimes felt that my brothers and I spent half our childhoods in every wee boatyard up and down the Clyde and it's lochs
I still have pieces of furniture he built too

By wood soled do you mean metal mechanism with a wooden sole like the Stanley Transitional planes which were the intermediate stage between wooden handplanes and metal ones or do you mean they have a different type of wood for the sole?

I have a three which have (I think) Hornbeam bodies and Lignum Vitae soles, the Lignum soles really glide across the work.

I've never even seen a transitional handplane in the flesh so I assume they're more common in the US.

Good thing about wooden soles on planes is if they're not flat you can plane em flat with another plane.

 

[Toddy]

Two are plain boxwood (I thought, certainly the right colour, etc., they're old, Victorian old, my Dad got them second hand when he was an apprentice in the 1920's, but you might well be right on the hornbeam) the third shorter one has curved sides and the base is black. It's sort of chubby looking.
I haven't looked at them in over twenty years. I cleaned them, rubbed in some real turps/beeswax polish on the wood, wiped the irons with WD40 and put them away thinking my sons might be interested, but they've sat up there since. They're wooden with no metal adjusting mechanism. The wooden wedge goes down into a slot that's shaped at the edges like a half dovetail, iirc.
My Dad's stamp is on them, but there's another man's stamp on them too, so I know they weren't bought new by him. Apprentices got their stamp when they finished their time before they did their Journeyman. Well, round here they did apparently.

My brother has the huge kist of tools, and there were a lot of iron soled planes in there. These old were just ones that were around when we cleared out a workshop and fancied the moulding planes.

I'd offer to go up and look, but right now, there's no way I'm trying to climb the ladder and try to find anything up the loft. Sorry, not a lot of help.
I just minded the thing about the shallow iron for the blockboard and the parquet blocks. No idea if I've even minded it correctly.

M

 

[Stew]

What about this plane @demographic ?

I was given it though haven’t tried it on any wood.

http://[img]https://i.postimg.cc/L6X0yCLw/83103888-3-EF5-4-D6-A-9-F95-A57-ED5648-C85.jpg[/img]

 

[rickwhite]

Is that a scraper plane? It looks like the blade is set just slightly off the vertical which would be appropriate for a scraper, assuming the the sloping handle on the right of the picture is at the back?
I use cabinet scrapers, which leave a really great finish, but dont have a scraper plane.

 

[Stew]

I don’t know. I guess it probably is because of the angle but I’ve not seen one before.

I have a lovely spokeshave style device that holds a scraper blade really well. A pleasure to use!

 

[demographic]

What about this plane @demographic ?

I was given it though haven’t tried it on any wood.

http://[IMG]https://i.postimg.cc/L6X0yCLw/83103888-3-EF5-4-D6-A-9-F95-A57-ED5648-C85.jpg[/IMG]

I've not seen one exactly like that and would say its been made by someone handy with a welder to serve as a scraper plane.
I'm guessing its got a very slightly cambered blade because most scraper planes have a way to actually flex the centre of the blade/scraper into the cut.
That wont have that mechanism to flex the blade and I'm guessing the blade will be too thich to flex.
Or it could also could have a toothed edge which amongst other things can be used to prepare a surface for the type of glue used for veneering.
Toothed blades are also handy for very wind grain and then it gets cleaned up with a hand scraper to get rid of the striations.

Being home made is no bad thing by the way and looking at the sharp cornerz on the top of the blade (the top being the non sharp end) I suspect that blade wil be laminated steel.
The ones with the more rounded corners werent usually laminated but the sharp cornered ones often are.
The lamination of harder steel forms the cutting edge and only goes to just less than the slot in the blade.
You'll be able to see the different shade on the edge bevel when its freshly sharpened and on the laminated blades I have I'm guessing its amout a milimetre thick? I've never measured it so that number is just a guess though.

 

[demographic]

More accurately, the bracket that holds the Bailey pattern frog is the part that I assume was home made. As well as the wooden sole.
The frog blade and adjusting mechanism look to be standard Bailey pattern plane parts to me.