Back Bevel on Bench Plane blade

[petermichaux]

Hi,

The usual bench planes have the blade with the bevel down. The bed angle is 45 degrees. With a single bevel blade, This gives a cutting angle of 45 degrees which is good for long grain on straight grain hardwoods like maple. For figured woods it is recommended that planes have higher bed and cutting angles of 50 - 60 degrees. That means owning different planes with different bed angles. Do we need to own a smoother, jack, and jointer plane of higher bed angles or can we get away with only a high angle smoother?

Could we play this trick? For an normal 45 degree bed angle plane, can we put a 5 degree back bevel on the blade to make the cutting angle a total of 50 degrees? Is there loss of performance with this set-up?

Thanks, Peter

[Jeff Gorman]

Yes, but the plane becomes a bit harder to push.

It works on reverse grain because the action becomes more of a scraping action in which the blade has less tendency to lift and then break the fibres.

There's something about this on my web site - Planing Notes - Coping With Gnarly Grain.

Jeff G

[Jeff Gorman]

Yes, but the plane becomes a bit harder to push.

It works on reverse grain because the action becomes more of a scraping action in which the blade has less tendency to lift and then break the fibres.

There's something about this on my web site - Planing Notes - Coping With Gnarly Grain.

Jeff G

[Jeff Gorman]

Yes, but the plane becomes a bit harder to push.

It works on reverse grain because the action becomes more of a scraping action in which the blade has less tendency to lift and then break the fibres.

There's something about this on my web site - Planing Notes - Coping With Gnarly Grain.

Jeff G

[Jeff Gorman]

Yes, but the plane becomes a bit harder to push.

It works on reverse grain because the action becomes more of a scraping action in which the blade has less tendency to lift and then break the fibres.

There's something about this on my web site - Planing Notes - Coping With Gnarly Grain.

Jeff G

[Andy Dingley]

If you can afford timber that really needs this, you can afford an extra smoother with York pitch.

[Ron Hock]

Allow me to recommend Brian Burns' _Double Bevel Sharpening_ available from LMII and, I believe, Japan WW'r.

[Larry Jaques]

On Wed, 23 Feb 2005 10:47:58 -0800, the inscrutable Ron Hock spake:

--snip--

Out of curiosity, do you put any double bevels on your products, Ron?

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[Ron Hock]

No we don't. I think that's best left to the user. I've read Burns' book (and he's a friend) and I think he makes sense and his methods are well thought out, thoroughly researched and extensively tested. DB sharpening on a bevel-down blade allows infinitely adjustable angle of attack and can tame the wildest grain. The only problem I have with DB sharpening is that, if you want to go back, you must take off a lot of blade length. So I'll leave that modification to you.

[George]

And sell a few more blades for those who keep modifying?

[Lowell Holmes]

I have a number 3 Bailey that I stick an old iron that is crowned like a scrub plane and use as a scrub plane. I then put the normal blade back in the plane for normal smoothing.

I have your irons in my Bedrocks and I would entertain having an extra iron with back bevel on it for use when I think it's appropriate to do so.

[AAvK]

I think there is something of another point in how a blade edge is shaped,

I suppose if a regular blade has a standard 25º bevel, and Leonard Lee instructs to add only 1º for the micro bevel,

suppose it would be a better idea to have the main bevel at 20º opposing a back bevel of 5º with an added micro bevel of that 1º added to the 20º side for 21º cutting edge result,

you would still have a proper 50º cutting angle for hard or figured woods. Extrapolation to 60º capable.

This way you still have the same actual cutting edge as a normal 26º blade. Correct if I am wrong, anyone.

[AAvK]

Ron, BTW thank you for the super fast arrival of the 2-5/8" chip breaker. On the 'phone you had said a week or eight days, it got here in three days. I appreciate that! You must have went ahead and made it right then, ay?

[Ron Hock]

Heck yeah! They don't wear out _nearly_ fast enough. I may have to change my sharpening notes... something about _always_ starting with

60-grit... yeah, that's it. And always test an edge by dropping it on the concrete floor. If it dings, it's not ready yet. Whaddya think?

(Why couldn't I have come up with something consumable? Oh, yeah, shellac! There's an idea!)

[George]

Sounds like the kids at school. One of the real problems with industrial arts in our no responsibility public schools is trying to keep any semblance of a respectable edge on a tool used by those who didn't pay for it, didn't sharpen it, won't be using it next hour, and can say "that's not the one I was using" with a straight face after trimming a few brads.

Student mentors and I could barely keep two or three in condition on any given day.

[Dave in Fairfax]

What if we combine the two. Shellac the blades as a feature. Then sell more shellac to be used in the honing process. Maybe we could get O'Deen to sign on and reinvent the wRECk. %-) Just a thought, Dave in Fairfax