Set-up Breakdown

I've been mostly home sick this week, so decided to edit a little video about setting the blade of a wooden plane. Yes, this will explain the jump in posts over the next couple of days. The process isn’t overly complicated, but that’s not to say that it isn’t entirely simple. After a little practice, I can almost get the blade set without any test cuts. Anyway, the clip is after the jump.

Present Perfect

If you know me, you know I have tool problem.

Aside from the problem I have that tools seem to keep following me home, I have a problem with tools that try to do too much and don’t do anything well. You know what I am talking about, the tools that usually fit on a benchtop and claim to be the only tool you’ll need for every task. There’s usually some lasers or GPS involved.
However, I am pleased to say I have absolutely no issues with the most recent member of my tool foster-family, a small wooden smooth plane made by Don McConnell and Larry Williams of Old Street Tool.

Resurrection

When I decided to start using handplanes, I was somewhat at a loss as where to start. I had very little experience using planes and,in hindsight, the experience I had was probably more of an obstacle. As I planned my first purchase, I had to decide whether to buy a new plane or fix up on old plane. I ended up buying an old plane: an old Stanley Bedrock Style 605 from the 1920’s off of E-bay for about 90 dollars. The plane was in rough shape, but all the parts were there and nothing was damaged. Using Garrett Hack’s Handplane Book and some tutorials from online, I set about restoring the plane. The first step was to take the plane apart and figure out try to figure out how it did it- I would later have to figure out how well each part was doing what it was doing.

The Invisible Hand

This week I cut a set of mortise and tenon joints for the base of a display case. I decided that I would try out the new mortising chisels I got last month and some sweet new sawing skills that I have been working on. After carefully cutting and fitting the parts, I started thinking about how all of the time and effort put into these joints would be hidden from view the moment that I placed glue into the joint and clamped up all of the parts. I also considered about the myriad other ways in which this joint could be constructed(i.e. dowels, dominos, screws, biscuits, etc.) or handful of less manual techniques that could be employed to the form the parts (i.e. mortising machine, a router jig, table saw, drill press and on and on and on…)

The question is why bother this sort of thing by hand?