How To Set Up A Stanley No 4 Plane

Vii Steps to Peak Handplane Performance by J. Norman Reid Delaplane, VA

You've just purchased that new smoothing plane you've had your heart on for and then long. Or y'all've lovingly brought an older Stanley Mitt Plane to bright and shiny condition. And now you're gear up to put a fine finish on a treasured piece of wood. But is your aeroplane ready to make the wispy shavings you're hoping for? What can you do to set up your plane for the all-time results? Here are seven steps to get peak performance from your mitt planes.

Sharpen and Hone the Blade

Your plane will never work as information technology should without a well-sharpened and honed blade. Premium planes volition cut reasonably well right out of the box, but to perform their best even they need a little preparation. Upkeep planes and survivors from an earlier era crave fifty-fifty more attention.

First, flatten and shine the back of the blade to remove any machining marks. Work your blade dorsum and along across the sharpening stones, starting with your coarsest grit and working up through the grits until all scratches take been removed and you achieve a mirror polish. This task simply needs to be done once, but fifty-fifty on premium planes it'south a necessary step. Don't become overboard; you are really only concerned with the final one-half inch or and so of the blade'due south dorsum. The residual of the bract will never touch the wood and tin can exist safely ignored.

Next turn your attention to the bevel. The principal bevel on almost plane blades should exist 25°. Exceptions are blades set at a higher cut angle for difficult grain. If your bevel is not at the right angle, the edge is not square to the sides, or the cut border is nicked you'll need to regrind it. This can be washed on a grinder—an eight inch irksome-speed grinder is all-time for this work, a water-cooled, big wheel grinder even better—but adept results tin be accomplished by working the blade on PSA sandpaper attached to a dead apartment surface. I kickoff with fourscore dust paper and work up to 120 grit. Once the bevel is shaped to the proper angle, it, besides, will need to be polished mirror polish by working your way through the grits of whatever stone or sandpaper method you use. While some woodworkers are able to go adept results by paw holding their blades, I highly recommend a honing guide to produce consistent, repeatable results.

If your restored aeroplane has a bract that'south in very crude condition, you may detect information technology easier to purchase an aftermarket replacement blade. Not only will you get-go with a blade that'south in premium condition, simply it will be made of a more than durable modern steel than was available when the older planes were originally made.

Once you have a high polish on your primary bevel, you want to constitute a secondary or micro bevel about 2–five° higher than the primary bevel. This volition need to be done on all blades, every bit even premium blades do not come with a micro bevel. Once once again, start with your coarsest rock and stroke until yous've established a thin line evenly beyond the tip of the bract. Then proceed to the next higher grit. Finish by giving information technology a mirror smooth with your highest rock. Practise a careful job here; information technology's the micro bevel that meets the wood and produces those fine shavings.

Finally, to get the sharpest edge, use David Charlesworth's ruler trick to put a very slight back bevel on the blade. Place a sparse ruler lengthwise on the rear edge of your stone. Then, lay the blade on the stone bevel side up with the cutting border off the far edge of the rock. While making back-and-forth sideways motions, carefully pull the blade onto the stone, and then push it off again, repeating the process up to x times. Do this using each of your stones, working to your highest grit. The result—a high polish on the extreme tip of the blade back that gives the sharpest edge. Once washed, this footstep need not be repeated, though you may wish to refresh the back bevel with your finest stone each time you lot re-strop your microbevel.

Now that your blade is sharpened and honed to perfection, you lot volition ordinarily simply need to refresh the micro bevel on your finest stone from fourth dimension to time to go on it in top cutting status.

Upgrading Your Plane Blade

If your blade is in bad shape—either desperately nicked or rusted—you might exist better off installing a new replacement bract. Several manufacturers offer replacement blades in a multifariousness of widths to fit older Stanleys, Records and other brands. Some blades are equally much every bit 25 percentage thicker than the original blades and employ modern steels, including both A2 and 01 steel. Replacement chipbreakers are too available.

Thicker blades reduce the likelihood of chatter and offer greater stability, but they may require adjustments to the frog or even the size of the mouth opening to accommodate the greater thickness. Available blades vary in thickness, so have this into account when purchasing. A thickness of .095 inches or less will likely work in most older planes.

Replacement chipbreakers in item may be thicker than the original parts and may not fit older planes. Cheque with the manufacturer before ordering. Highland Woodworking carries Stanley replacement blades and chipbreakers.

Set the Oral fissure Opening

While the lion's share of attention goes to getting a keen border on the blade, several other steps volition assistance yous go the best from your aeroplane. One is adjusting the mouth opening. On a bevel down plane, this is achieved by moving the frog forwards or astern until the opening is slightly wider than the thickness of the desired shaving. For smoothing planes, very fine shavings are the goal so y'all volition desire to gear up a very narrow gap. The opening tin can be wider for jointers and wider yet for jack planes set up to accept thick shavings when roughing out a board.

Set the frog with the bract in place and slightly projected. On planes based on the Stanley Bedrock model, which includes Prevarication-Nielsen planes, adapt the opening by loosening the two screws on either side of the depth aligning wheel. So advance or retract the frog as necessary by turning the large screw located between the ii locking screws. One time the frog is adjusted, loosely tighten the locking screws, remove the bract and sight downwardly the frog to the mouth to confirm that the frog is perfectly square to the mouth. Then tighten the locking screws alternately and gradually until tight. Don't over tighten them to avert stripping the threads.

The more mutual Bailey-style planes have a slightly unlike spiral system—2 locking screws located nether the bract-chipbreaker assembly and an adjusting spiral at the rear of the frog. This ways you lot may have to insert and remove the bract and chipbreaker associates several times until y'all become the rima oris ready the mode you want it. Otherwise, the aligning procedure is the same as for Boulder-fashion planes.

Some newer planes—including block planes and other bevel-up planes—are built with adjustable mouths. Usually the rima oris is loosened past turning a lever at the base of the toe, then sliding the rima oris assembly frontwards or backward to obtain the desired opening.

Adjust the Chipbreaker

The chipbreaker on a bevel downwardly plane should also exist set so the altitude from the bract border is slightly more the width of the shavings you lot intend to make. For smoothing most hardwoods, 1/32 inch is proficient, though you may want to ready information technology at ane/64 inch for hard wood prone to tearout. For softwoods, 1/xvi inch may be more appropriate. The distance will vary for individual planes set up to achieve different results. Bevel upward planes, of course, take no chipbreakers and need no such adjustment.

Arrange the Cap Iron Pressure

The cap atomic number 26 should agree the blade and chip billow firmly to eliminate chatter but non so tightly that the depth adjuster can't be easily moved with two fingers. With the lever loosened, tighten the spiral until it holds the blade and chip breaker snugly in place, then snap the lever down and test the ease of aligning. Once yous've achieved the right amount of pressure, leave the screw lonely and remove the iron by raising the lever.

Set the Depth Adjuster

At present we come up to the business end of the adjustments, where the metal meets the wood. On nigh planes, y'all plough the depth adjustment cycle clockwise to deepen the cutting and counterclockwise to retract it. However, there are exceptions. I recently came upon an old Crusader where the depth adjuster was turned in the opposite management, then bank check your plane to see which rule applies.

Unfortunately, because of the unavoidable condition of backfire—backlog play in the wheel aligning—setting the blade depth so it does not slip in place requires a little more technique. The rule is to stop all depth adjustments with a downward, normally clockwise, movement of the bicycle. Declining to keep downward pressure leaves the blade in a loose condition that lets it slip, and you tin can rapidly lose the adjustment yous just carefully prepare.

Thus, if the blade is gear up too deep, back information technology off by turning the cycle counterclockwise until the blade is fully retracted. So make small downward (usually clockwise) adjustments, testing later on each motion, until you lot get the correct depth. If you observe you need a more shallow set, repeat the entire process by backing the bract out and and then deepening the cut past small degrees.

Lateral Adjustments

The rule of thumb hither is to slide the lateral aligning lever toward the side of the blade that is cutting too deeply. Yous can test the balance of the bract depth by sighting down the sole and looking for the black line that shows the presence of the blade. Or you can look directly into the mouth from the lesser of the plane to judge whether the blade is the same distance from the mouth edge on both sides. A third method is to take a sparse forest bit and stroke it gently on each side of the blade, paying attending to the size of each shaving produced likewise as the audio as the chip passes over the cutting edge. The acid test, however, is to make a cut on a scrap lath to see if you go shavings of equal thickness from each side of the blade. On a flat board, you would look to get a full-width shaving of uniform thickness. If the shaving is light on one side or missing birthday, move the lever slightly to the side that is cutting heaviest and retest. A series of small, successive adjustments will usually produce better results than making wider swings in the hope of hit the correct setting in 1 motion. Often, moving the adjustment lever affects the overall depth of cutting, so exist prepared for follow-upward depth adjustments.

Cambered blades, considering the blade corners are curved, are easier to put into balance. This is one reason why they are recommended for most users, particularly those new to using hand planes (run into below).

To Camber or Not to Camber—That is the Question

Aeroplane blades can be cambered or kept straight, according to the user'due south preference and skill level. The temptation—especially for new users—is to get out the bract edge just every bit it comes out of the box: straight. But information technology is precisely new users who tin do good the most from a cambered blade. Why? Because a cambered bract is more forgiving when it is not precisely set to equal depth on both edges. A blade that's not balanced is very likely to dig more deeply into the wood on i side than the other, leaving "tracking" marks on the surface.

To camber a blade, divide the bract edge into fifths and with your index finger on each fifth of the blade take progressively more strokes on your stones every bit you work farther away from the centre. By taking slightly more metal from the edges than the center, you'll create a slight curvature to the cut edge. Count the strokes and use the same number on each side and with each of your stones on both the primary and micro bevels. For best results, record your strokes in your store notebook so you can repeat the same process each time you re-strop the blade. Smoothing planes can be cambered very slightly; blades on planes intended for heavier stock removal can be given greater curvature.

Lubrication

Lubricating the aeroplane'southward sole makes a surprising departure in the ease with which the airplane glides over your workpiece. I more often than not make a series of X marks on the sole of my plane using a stick of beeswax. How often should you do this? The simple answer is, whenever you experience the resistance begin to build against the polish motility of your plane. That tin range from every dozen or and so strokes to every ii or three boards. It's a matter of personal preference and whether you're working a rough or smooth surface.

In addition to beeswax, paraffin or mutton tallow work well. Or, you can brand a plane oiler by gluing a piece of discarded carpet to a forest block and spraying information technology lightly with Camellia or jojoba oil. Elevate the plane backwards over the rug to coat information technology lightly with oil. None of these lubricants will interfere with your finish.

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The author is a woodworker, writer and photographer living in Delaplane, Virginia, in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains with his wife, 4 cats and a woodshop total of power and hand tools. He can exist reached by email at nreid@fcc.net.

How To Set Up A Stanley No 4 Plane,

Source: https://www.highlandwoodworking.com/woodworking-tips-1305may/peakhandplane.html

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