Greetings, I'd like to whittle custom wood totes (and knobs) for my new planes. I can't afford the lovely rosewood sets sold everywhere. Besides, I want to do it myself. (And save my pennies for Hock blades...) So would someone who owns a plane with a wood tote kindly tell me which way the grain runs? Fore and aft? Up and down? (Yeah, make one each way and find out for myself!)
Front to back. David
remove the key to email me.
If you're doing it yourself, find wood which makes the turn on its own, so you can have a broad enough base to attach without the long grain running across the narrow portion.
Web is full of pictures showing fore-to-aft pattern.
Get the A2.
Just a note to say I like your nom de web. Scobis from scobiform (sawdust). :-) mahalo, jo4hn
I don't want to start a flame war here, but I'm going to fly in the face of conventional wisdom. I make my replacements slightly differently than the originals. If see lots of toats that break along the grain line about half way up the shaft of the tote. what I do is make the grain go vertically rather than horizontally, and dado the base of the tote so that it has "shoulders" that fit down around the foot that a tote would normally sit on. This gives increased lateral support as well as increased fore-aft strength. Since my handls a re bigger than some, the extra size of the tote makes it more comfortable as well. Try making one each way and see what works best for you. If you want I'll re-post a pic that you can use aas a template for cutting your blanks. I start on a bandsaw, clean up the edges on a router, and then cut the dado with bandsaw and chisels.
Dave in Fairfax
Is this on wooden planes or metal planes. On wooden planes, I can see this working. I've done it that way myself on a panel raiser I made. On metal planes, particularly of the Stanley Bailey or Bedrock variety, the bottom of the tote would be too thin and would be more likely to break. Also, a bigger tote would interfere with the lateral adjuster. It seemed to me that the OP was asking about metal planes, although I could have just assumed wrongly.
David
remove the key to email me.
I'm tallking about metal planes, and the height of the tote doesn't need to be any higher than on the usual tote. Just make the base slightly thicker and dado out the difference. Works fine. I think that you were thinker the tote would be higher than it really is. If that isn't clear enough, e-mail me off-line rather than burn bandwidth and I'll try to make more sense out of it. Dave in Fairfax
Gotcha.
Who's burning bandwidth? This seems pretty relevant and on topic to me.
David
remove the key to email me.
HomeOwnersHub website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.