Hand planes vs planer / jointer?

[Guy LaRochelle]

Does a thickness planer and a jointer replace hand planes? Do the guys who own a planer / jointer find that hand planes are no longer used or do you just find that you don't need as many? Regards. -Guy

[Lowell Holmes]

No and no to both questions. :-)

[Glen]

I once thought, as a newbie, that power tools were the answer and I tried to the extent possible to model my shop after Norm. After I practiced a while I realized that while power tools have their (valuable) place, but they will never replace hand tools. Yes, I have a good planer (Delta) as well as a jointer (Jet), but I also have a growing collection of hand planes, all users. Yes, I can cut half blind dovetails on my IncraJig or through ones on my Keller, but if I only have a few to do it is satisfying and therapeutic to cut them by hand. I work wood as a hobby, thus I have time to kill. It is nice to be able to enjoy the peace and serenity of a quiet shop. Would I give up my RAS, BS or TS? No way. But neither would I give up my old Disston saws or my old Sargent planes (nor the Veritus shoulder plane SWMBO got me for Christmas- note the drive by neener!)

My ramblings, nothing more.

Glen

[Scott Post]

Machines don't replace handplanes, they just take the drudgery out of rough stock preparation. Planes are still the fastest way to get rid of the machine marks - certainly faster than a random orbital sander.

Every once in a while when I'm building something small like a box or end table I'll do all the face jointing and thicknessing by hand because it can be enjoyable and give a sense of satisfaction. However, most projects I do all the stock prep with machines. I usually remove planer marks with a smoothing plane and I'll often make a pass or two with a jointer plane to get the ripples out of an edge before glueup. I use a block plane to fit doors, trim off protruding dovetail pins/tails, add bevels, and work on small areas of tearout. I'll use a shoulder plane to get perfect tenons after cutting the on the tablesaw. I use wooden molding planes to, uhm, do moldings. The list goes on.

[Andy Dingley]

Not at all.

They never did, never will do. You still need the hand plane for smoothing, as machine planers leave planer marks behind. There's also the issue of planing something to width, cutting a rebate etc. Now it might be possible to do this by machine for a production run, but as a bench-working one-off, it's time to pick up the #5.

At one time, rough stock preparation was done by hand with a scrub and a fore plane, and edge jointing was done with a jointer. Now for those two tasks alone, there's a reasonable argument for the machines.

-- Smert' spamionam

[Steve Knight]

as others have said no. you can get away without a jointer using hand planes and not work too hard. but it is hard to replace the planer with hand planes. it's a lot of work to dimension lumber by hand. not so much to flatten it enough for a planer.

[B a r r y B u r k e J r .]

Ditto.

Sometimes something won't fit in the power tool, other times the hand tool is simply quicker. Of course, the power tools can prepare a whole bunch of stock to close tolerances in a short time, so both are handy to have.

A well tuned hand plane can leave a surface pretty much ready for a finish. No power jointer or thicknesser I've ever used is capable of that. I had the power tools first, and did a lot of hand sanding until I saw the light of the hand plane and scraper.

For me, the major utility of hand tools became apparent when I learned how to properly sharpen, and the value of a good quality chisel or plane iron.

Barry

[Guy LaRochelle]

What is the scraper plane used for? Regards. -Guy

[dave]

"Find that you don't need as many?" OK, this is either blasphemy or a troll. Need as many, as if!

Dave in fairfax

[Mark Wells]

I followed the advice of Bob Key and I'm really happy with that. I started using mostly hand tools. When something gets too time consuming using a hand tool, I switched to power tools. As Steve said, after trying to thickness a board with a hand plane, you will be VERY grateful for a planer, even if it does make too much noise.

[Larry Bud]

As someone who first thought it was ridiculous to spend time hand planing boards, there are times when it actually IS the fastest and best procedure. for example, I built a coffee table with mitered ends, and with some walnut stripping around it. They ended up not being quite flush. Sanding would have taken forever, not to mention messy. A small hand plane made quick work of the uneveness, and made the sanding much easier.

[Silvan]

I'll say this much... I don't own the machines, don't have room for them, and can't afford them. I'm getting by without them. Therefore, the answer is "yes, you can make do without the machines." I don't even have a scrub or a fore yet. I make do with a #4 and a #5 and ajust them constantly.

However, stock preparation is a *big* part of the time I spend working on a project. I do everything I can to cut corners. For example, the box will be lined, so I don't plane that face of the board. I buy wood that's semi-rough, but has been run through a planer enough to establish something close to flatness, so I don't have to do a lot of face planing. I remove only just enough material to get a smooth, flat surface, and don't try to thickness an entire board to a specific dimension unless absolutely necessary.

After a few months of this, I can definitely see why the machines are nice to have. There are days when I don't feel like Neandering, but I have no choice in the matter.

Work or not, it's much better to do this and be able to use walnut than to settle for the S4S oak-or-poplar stuff I had been using previously. This is *definitely* better than nothing.

[Fred the Red Shirt]

A scraper, with or without a plane around it, is used to smooth wood. A well-tuned scraper can eliminate any need to sand with paper coarser than about 400 grit.

A craper can be held in the hand, held in a holder like the Veritas or Hartville holders, or in a plane as simple as the Stanley #80, or as elaborate as the #112, or #12 3/4.

[Steve Knight]

I sure wish I knew about hand planes when my jointer crapped out. a scrub plane to knock off the high spots on the twisted board then through the planer.

[Andy Dingley]

My thickness planer paid for itself in a month. It saved most of its price by letting me buy a buttload of timber as-sawn, then I hired it out to the sawyer to plane the rest of it, which he sold on to others.

-- Smert' spamionam

[DarylRos]

The basic rule is no matter how wide a jointer you have, the next nice piece of wood you want to keep in one piece will be 2" wider.

I now have a 12" jointer. So naturally, my next peice called for a 1 peice cherry top, said cherry being 16" wide (a 16" wide. 8/4 plank) that would ultimatley be 13" wide.

So out came the scrub plane, the jack plane, the jointer, and the smoother. Yes, it took a few hours, Yes there were a lot of shavings to clean up. Even a few to admire. But it is one nice top.

[Andy Dingley]

Ah, but if you can get up to a 12" planer, then anything over that width is probably unstable anyway and ought to be glued up from narrower boards.

-- Smert' spamionam

[DarylRos]

Normally I agree. I ususally try to keep boards when glued up no more than 4" wide. Frank Klausz told me with that max width, it didn't matter what the grain orientation was. In this case, it was a one piee top for a demi lune table, which mounts with the edges floating on all sides, so it can expand and contract. Much nicer in one piece.