Make a Krenov plane in twelve films, with my feedback on your work.
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The Plane
make the tool, then take your first shavings
Twelve films, from a single block to a working plane. At any point, on any film, ask me a question or show me your work, in photographs or a short film. I answer here, within 24 hours.
0 of 12 watched
Stuck, or want me to look? Show me your work at any point, in photographs or a short film. I answer within 24 hours.
I answer every question within 24 hours. Once I have, your question and my answer appear here for everyone working through this film.
1Up to four photographs in plain light, close enough to see the surface.
2A short film often says more. Put it anywhere you like (YouTube as unlisted, Google Drive, iCloud) and paste the link below.
3Two sentences on what you're unsure about.
I look closely and reply within 24 hours. Once I have, your photographs and my feedback appear here, so everyone learns from them.
If you want a deep dive
A private half hour with me.
Thirty minutes on a video call, one to one: a piece you're stuck on, your workshop, whatever you need help with.
Choose a time and pay right here. Before the call I'll ask you a few short questions. They're there so I can prepare, and so we can spend the whole half hour on your work.
Over the next twelve films we're going to take a solid block of hard timber, cut it into three pieces, do all the work on the inside while it's open, glue it back together, and then cut and carve out our very own Krenov-style handplane.
I learned this method from Robert Van Norman at Inside Passage School of Fine Cabinetmaking, where I studied for two years. Robert studied under James Krenov at College of the Redwoods and built Inside Passage on his teaching. It came down a line, and I'm passing it on the way it was given to me — along with everything I've picked up since, from making these planes for years and from helping a lot of people build their own.
Read this whole page before you buy anything.
Who this is for
You have a workshop. You've been working wood for a while — long enough to have opinions about it. You can sharpen a chisel properly, you know your way around your machines, and you're not looking for someone to explain what a jointer is.
What you're looking for is depth: the reasoning behind the decisions, the tolerances that actually matter, the things that only come from making the same tool many times over.
That's what this course is. I won't be padding it with basics you already have.
If you're newer than that, you can absolutely still follow along — but expect to pause and look things up, and expect the sharpening to be the part that catches you out.
This is a hybrid method — machines and hand tools
I want to be direct about this, because it affects whether you can start.
This build uses machines and hand tools together, and I don't recommend attempting it hand-tools-only.
That's not purism in reverse. It's the way Krenov worked, and the way I was taught: bring it ninety percent of the way there with the machine, and do the last ten percent by hand.
Machines are our friend. They are very good at the tedious, repetitive, dimensional work — and they're fast at it. Every hour you don't spend hogging material off a blank is an hour you get to spend on the parts that actually reward attention: the fitting, the paring, the shaping, the moment the plane starts to feel like yours. Why would you want less time for the good stuff?
That thinking runs through everything I teach at this school, not just this course. You'll see it again and again.
In this build specifically, a few operations — resawing a thick blank accurately, bringing a center block to a thickness measured against your iron, holding parallel across a block that's about to receive glued-on cheeks — are genuinely difficult to do well by hand, and getting them wrong compounds through every film that follows. That's the ninety percent. Let the machine have it.
And then the last ten percent — paring, fitting, shaping, the beaver marks, everything about how the plane finally feels in your hand — is yours.
Machines you'll want:
Bandsaw — with enough resaw capacity for your blank, and ideally a carbide-tipped blade
Router table — with a ¾" bit
Jointer
Thickness planer — a helical head is a real advantage in hard exotics, though not essential
Hand tools:
Sharp chisels, including a rounded chisel or gouge for the beaver marks
A Habilis file, no. 0
A block plane
A square you actually trust
Marking gauge, good light
Your sharpening setup, working and familiar
And a flat reference surface. Granite slab, cast iron machine table, tempered glass, or a board you genuinely trust. You'll be lapping surfaces on it and checking others against it.
Abrasive: sticky-back rolls, 80 and 180 grit. I use 3M — they do a red series and a gold series, and the gold is noticeably better quality if you're not wasteful with it.
The iron
Hock. That's what I use and what I'd recommend. They're widely available, the steel is good, and they arrive flat enough to work with.
1½" is my usual size and a solid default
1¾" is what I'm using in this build — a wider iron for a short, chunky smoother that covers more of the board in each pass
Order the iron first. Everything in this plane is dimensioned from it, and it's the long-lead item. When it arrives, measure the actual iron. Not the spec on the packet — the thing in your hand.
The wood
Go hard
This is a tool, not a piece of furniture. A dense hardwood holds a tight mouth, resists wear at the sole, and will still be working in thirty years. Softer wood gives you a plane you're constantly re-flattening.
Hard exotics are what I recommend. Ekki is what I'm using here. Ipe is another good one — worth knowing that it's a known allergen, so mind the dust. Anything in that density class will serve you well.
It's harder to work, and I won't pretend otherwise. Sanding this material is not an enjoyable process. But these woods are genuinely gratifying to use as a plane, for years and years, and that's what you're building for.
Use flatsawn
This sounds backwards, so here's the reasoning.
Your blank is a thick, relatively narrow piece — the sort of thing you'd rip out of 8/4 or 10/4 stock. In flatsawn material, the growth rings run roughly parallel to the wide faces.
Those wide faces become the sides of your plane. So when the plane is assembled and standing on its sole, the rings are running vertically — from the sole up through the body, perpendicular to the sole.
Flatsawn on the bench becomes quartersawn when it stands up. Which is exactly what you want, because rings perpendicular to the sole are what keep the sole flat through seasonal movement instead of cupping across its width.
Good news for sourcing: flatsawn is the ordinary, available, less expensive material. You're not hunting for anything exotic in the way it's cut — only in what it is.
One consequence you need to know today
Your resaw cuts run parallel to those rings. So each cheek, sliced off on its own, is a thin flatsawn board — rings running flat across its wide face.
Thin flatsawn boards cup. That's not a risk to worry about, it's simply what they do.
This is precisely why the cheeks rest for a week or two after resawing while the center block doesn't. And it's why the cheeks have to go back exactly where they came from: when they do, the rings line up again through the assembled body and the whole plane reads quartersawn.
Flatsawn blank → flatsawn cheeks in the middle of the process → quartersawn plane at the end.
If you can't find stock that big
Hard, dry, and thick enough for the whole blank is a real sourcing problem. You have options, and none of them is a compromise:
Glue up separate pieces to reach the width or thickness you need
Laminate several pieces before resawing — build the blank, then treat it exactly like a solid block from Film 1 onward
A laminated plane is a perfectly good plane. Some of them look better than the solid ones. Just make sure the glue-up is sound and the stock is dry, because you're about to cut it apart and find out.
What to reject
Anything still wet. Heavy figure or visible runout — save that for a wedge.
Cracks are normal in exotic timber: the outside dries much faster than the core, so the board sits under stress and cracks as it settles. Thin CA handles them, and the glue-up restores strength right across the area. Don't reject a board over drying checks.
You're not doing this alone
These are the same films that are on my YouTube channel. The difference here is that I look at your work.
At any point in the build, on any film, send me photographs or a short film of where you've got to, or ask a question. I answer within 24 hours. You don't need to wait until something has gone wrong, and you don't need to wait until the plane is finished. A photograph of your layout lines before you cut is often the most useful one you can send.
And when something goes wrong, show me that too. Getting stuck, and finding the way back, is where most of the learning happens.
Once I've answered, it stays under that film for everyone. So you'll also find other people's questions there. Read them: someone has usually been stuck exactly where you are.
How long this takes
Six to eight weeks, and that isn't padding.
After you resaw in Film 1, the cheeks rest for one to two weeks while the wood finishes moving. You cannot skip it — everything after depends on the pieces having settled.
Work at the pace the wood sets.
Before film 1
Order your Hock iron — 1½" or 1¾"
Source your blank — hardest thing you can get, flatsawn, dry, thick enough
Get your flat reference surface and abrasive sorted
Check your sharpening is where it needs to be — there's chisel work coming on exotic end grain and it's unforgiving of a dull edge
Say hello under “Show your work” on this page: where you're building from, what wood you found, what machines you're working with, and what you want to plane with it
Introduce yourself. Where you're building from, what wood you found, what machines you're working with, and what you want to plane with it. A photograph of your blank, or of your bench, is welcome.
Before you watch
This first video does two things. It walks you through every phase of the build so the whole thing is in your head before we start — and then it takes the block to the bandsaw and cuts it into three pieces.
That order is deliberate. You'll make better decisions at the saw if you already know what the inside of this plane is going to look like.
What's in this one
The whole build, start to finish, laid out in advance
Why we cut a solid block into three pieces instead of hollowing one out
Choosing your timber — and why you want flatsawn stock
Working wood that's already cracked and already under stress
Setting up the bandsaw for a cut you can't undo
Why the center block wants to be barely wider than your iron — and why I used to get this a bit wrong
Bringing the center block to thickness while the cheeks go and sit in the corner for two weeks
The method, and where it comes from
There's more than one way to make a wooden plane. This one — one solid block, cut into two cheeks and a center block, all the internal work done while the pieces are apart, then glued back together — is what I learned from Robert Van Norman at Inside Passage.
Robert studied with James Krenov at College of the Redwoods, and built Inside Passage on his teaching. Krenov advised the school and gave the students weekly lectures over the phone until he died. I spent two years there.
So this isn't a method I read about in a book. It came down a line, and I'm passing it along the way it was given to me.
It does add work — resawing, then regluing, and everything has to go back together accurately. But it makes the inside of the plane far easier to reach and to shape, and I think that trade is worth it every time.
The wood: hard, exotic, flatsawn
Go as hard as you can get. This is a tool, not a piece of furniture. A dense tropical hardwood will hold a tight mouth, resist wear at the sole, and still be doing its job in thirty years. Soft wood makes a plane you'll be re-flattening constantly and replacing eventually.
This block is ekki. Extremely hard, and it will show you its challenges — it is genuinely not comfortable to work. But that's the trade, and the finished tool justifies it.
Buy flatsawn — and here's why that isn't backwards. In flatsawn material the growth rings run roughly parallel to the wide faces. Those wide faces become the sides of your plane. So when the plane is assembled and standing on its sole, the rings run vertically, from the sole up through the body, perpendicular to the sole. Flatsawn on the bench becomes quartersawn when it stands up — and rings perpendicular to the sole are what keep it flat through seasonal movement instead of cupping.
Your cheeks will be flatsawn, and that's the point.
Your resaw cuts run parallel to those rings, so each cheek, taken on its own as a thin little board, has its rings running flat across its wide face. Two things follow, and both matter today:
Thin flatsawn pieces cup. That's not a risk to worry about, it's simply what they do. It is exactly why the cheeks have to rest after resawing and the center block doesn't.
The cheeks must go back where they came from. When they do, the rings line up again through the whole assembled body. That's your cabinetmaker's mark earning its keep.
Flatsawn blank, flatsawn cheeks in the middle of the process, quartersawn plane at the end.
If you can't find stock that big: glue up separate pieces to reach the width or thickness you need, or laminate several pieces before resawing and then treat the result exactly like a solid block. A laminated plane is a perfectly good plane — some of them look better than the solid ones. Just make sure the glue-up is sound and the stock is dry, because you're about to cut it apart and find out.
Expect cracks, and don't panic about them. Exotic stock dries much faster on the outside than in the core, so it sits under internal stress and it cracks and warps as it settles. I glued a few on this block with thin CA. Once everything is milled and glued back into a whole, there's plenty of strength across those areas. I'm not worried about them.
What to reject at the yard: anything still wet, and anything with heavy figure or visible runout — save that for the wedge.
The blank is tight — plan the whole thing first
I'm short on width here, so before anything gets cut I stand at the bench and add it up. Everything that eats material:
Cheek one, cut oversize~9 mmBandsaw kerf~2 mmCenter blockiron width + 2–3 mm at the sawSecond kerf~2 mmCheek two, whatever's leftneeds to be ~9 mmPlaning between cutseats a little more
If the arithmetic doesn't work, you find out now, at the bench, with a pencil. Not halfway through the second cut.
Don't resaw a cheek thinner than 9 mm. The final cheek is 6–7 mm. That surplus isn't waste — it's what lets you recover if the piece twists or winds after it's cut. Below 6 mm the cheek stops being useful.
Mark the blank before you cut it. Cabinetmaker's mark, across all three faces, while it's still one board. Once there are three pieces they go back together one way only, and the mark is the only thing that remembers which.
Close is better than loose — and I learned this the slow way
The center block only needs to be a little wider than the iron. About a millimetre and a half, maybe two. Roughly a sixteenth of an inch.
When I first started making planes after Inside Passage, I left much more room than that. My thinking was that more space means more lateral adjustment, and more adjustment must be better.
It isn't. Over the years I came to understand that when there's too much space in the center block, you lose your sense of where the iron is actually cutting. The gap gives you a false reading. You end up adjusting by trial and error instead of by knowing.
So: close-fitting center block, thin cheeks. The body is just a bit more than the width of the iron and no more. That's the plane that ends up feeling like part of your hand.
At the saw I won't go more than 2–2.5 mm over the iron. On this build I tried 3 mm first, looked at it, and moved the fence back in. Final measurement came out at exactly 1.5 mm.
And measure against your actual iron. Lay it on the wood. Don't trust the number on the packet.
The one-millimetre test cut
Set the fence by eye against the blade. A carbide-tipped blade helps here for a reason that has nothing to do with cutting — the flat sides of the tips give you something visible to align to.
Then run the saw and go in about a millimetre. Stop. Look.
That millimetre tells you where you actually are, while being wrong is still free. If you're happy, take the whole cut — nice and slow.
On this block, as soon as I got into the cut the kerf started opening in a way that wasn't parallel. That's the stress inside the wood letting go. Not a surprise in this timber, but now I know it, and I know to expect movement in that cheek.
After the first cheek
Give the cheek a very light pass to clean the face. Light — ekki has reversing grain and standard jointer knives will tear it out if you push. Slow feed, shallow cut, more passes if you need them. A little pencil mark left behind is fine.
Then back to the saw for the second cut: the center block.
The second cheek came out thin at one corner on this build. That's fine — that corner gets cut away when the plane is shaped. You can only make that call if you already know the outline you're heading for, which is why the video starts with the overview.
Now the cheeks go and wait
Sticker them, leave air around them, and set them aside for a week or two.
They are going to move. Thin pieces respond to released stress far more than thick ones — that's exactly why I can bring the center block to thickness today and not the cheeks. If you machine them flat now, they will not be flat when you glue up, and there's no fixing that later.
Let them finish saying what they have to say.
The center block — same day
The center block didn't warp, and I wasn't expecting it to at that thickness. So it goes straight on the thickness planer. Mine has a helical head, which makes a real difference in wood like this.
Very small adjustments. Take too much at once and the block is too thin, and the whole plan is gone.
Raise the bed slowly until the cutter just starts to touch — you'll hear it take the wood before it starts cutting
Watch the bandsaw marks disappear a little at a time
Keep laying the iron against the block as you get close
Stop at about 1.5 mm wider than the iron
If the bandsaw cut was good there's almost nothing to remove — one light pass took nearly all my saw marks off.
A note on hand work
This is a hybrid build — machines and hand tools working together — and the resaw is one of the places where I'd want the machine. Resawing a thick blank of hard exotic accurately by hand is possible, but it's a great deal of work and an error here costs you the whole board.
Where the hand tools come in on this stage: cleaning the sawn face. A jointer plane will do that job perfectly well if you'd rather, and on wood this difficult a sharp, finely-set plane taking light passes may give you a better surface than jointer knives will.
Your action steps
Watch the overview section at least twice — know the whole build before you cut
Source your blank: hardest exotic you can get, flatsawn, dry, thick enough
Get your iron in hand and measure it
Plane the blank: one face flat, opposite face parallel
Add up your material budget on paper and confirm the board is wide enough
Cabinetmaker's mark
Mark cheek one at ~9 mm, set the fence, take a 1 mm test cut, check, then resaw
Light pass to clean the cheek face
Second cut: center block, checked against your iron, 2–2.5 mm over at the saw
Sticker both cheeks and leave them for 1–2 weeks
Thickness the center block to ~1.5 mm over the iron
Before you cut: photo of the marked-out blank with the iron sitting on it, end grain visible so I can see how it's sawn. This is the one moment where I can still save your board.
After you cut: the three pieces with the mark showing. Tell us what the wood did — did the kerf run true, or did it open up on you? did the parts immediately warp?
The cheeks now rest. work can continue on the center block.
Where we are
Your cheeks are resting. The center block is at thickness. Today we prepare its surfaces and cut the two ramps that shape the whole inside of the plane.
The forward ramp is the bed — the surface your iron sits on. Everything in this build has been serving that surface. Today we make it.
What's in this one
Why the block gets sanded now, while it's still one piece
Using a flat slab and a pencil grid to see what you're actually doing
Keeping the slab clean — adhesive residue, and why it matters
Reading the machine marks on your stock — and what each one is telling you to fix
Laying out the ramps — where to start, and why not in the middle
45° forward, 60° back, and what happens if you choose differently
The magic block
A bandsaw trick: cutting a surface deliberately concave so it won't fight you later
Why the back ramp is curved instead of straight
Flat, square, and how to check both without guessing
Sand it now, while it's one piece
The block has to stay parallel side to side. It's about to receive glued-on cheeks and a cross pin, and if it's gone even slightly wedge-shaped nothing will sit right at assembly.
So sand the surfaces before you cut the ramps.
If you cut first and then sand the two resulting pieces separately, you'll end up with different final thicknesses on them — and that's a worse problem than the one you were trying to solve, because now the two halves of your center block don't match.
Remove the minimum you can get away with. You are not reshaping this block. You are cleaning it up.
Why sanding and not planing
You may be about to ask why I'm not just planing this surface. Fair question, and I'll answer it honestly: hand planing this wood would not be an enjoyable process, and I'm not looking for extra work.
But it's more than my preference. This is a rowed, interlocked-grain timber, and Krenov addressed exactly this situation in The Fine Art of Cabinetmaking. Writing about difficult woods of this kind, his prescription was to use the machines as much as possible, then take the surfaces and shapes as far as you can with cutting tools, then be willing to labour with a cabinet scraper and perhaps files — and finally, to do some sanding.
That's not a fallback. On this material it's the method, and it comes from the same place everything else in this course does. You'll notice it's also the ninety-and-ten principle applied one level down: machines first, cutting tools next, abrasives last, and each one used where it's genuinely the right tool.
Take a plane to a piece of ekki end grain once and you'll stop arguing with it.
The slab and the grid
Stick abrasive down to a surface you trust — granite, cast iron, tempered glass, or a board you're confident in.
Adhesive residue — and how to avoid it
This came up in the comments on the video, and it's a good question. Any residue left behind will sit under the next sheet you stick down and ruin the flatness you're relying on.
The best answer is prevention. Clean the dust off the paper as soon as you've finished with it, take it off the surface, and store it rolled up in a closed container. Done that way I get no residue at all, and I can reuse the same sheet several times. Quality matters here too — I use 3M, and it comes off far more cleanly than cheap paper does.
The rule underneath it: the longer paper stays stuck down, the harder it is to remove cleanly.
On my granite slab I do sometimes leave a sheet on until it's worn out, depending what I'm using it for. In that case, once it's off, wipe the surface down with acetone. It's remarkably effective — like magic.
Either way, make sure you've got every last spot of adhesive off before you stick fresh paper down. A single speck under the new sheet is a high spot, and you'll be sanding against it without knowing.
Then draw thick pencil marks, or a grid, across the face of the workpiece.
This is the whole feedback system. Sanded areas turn pale from the dust. Anything still dark hasn't touched the paper yet — that's a low spot. You can see exactly where you are at every moment instead of guessing.
On the first pass here I was touching maybe 90% of the surface. That's a good start, and it means the milling was decent.
Reading the marks
As the pencil disappears you're not just seeing where the low spots are — you're seeing a record of what your machines did to this piece. Worth learning to read, because each mark tells you something different.
Waves across the surface — that's the jointer. The face I did with the helical head doesn't leave that pattern at all. If the waves are large, your feed rate on the jointer was too fast; slow it down next time and they'll be much finer.
Snipe from the thickness planer, at the ends of the board. Normal enough, and acceptable — you'll sand it out.
A step part way along a face means either your technique on the jointer slipped, or the machine isn't set up correctly. Worth chasing down, because it'll happen on every piece until you do.
Tearout is a different order of problem. Sanding might get rid of it if it isn't too deep — but remember what we're doing here. We don't want to sand this surface much at all, and chasing tearout is exactly how the removal gets out of control and the block ends up thinner or out of parallel.
Better to fix the cause. Consider changing your planing direction on the machine — you may simply have been going against the grain. A helical cutterhead deals with tearout far better than straight knives, which is one of the real arguments for one in wood like this.
Bright, rough patches running side to side are bandsaw marks you haven't got rid of yet. Keep going.
Learning to tell these apart tells you which machine did what, where you still have work, and — more usefully — what to change next time before the marks appear at all.
Dust
Some exotics cause allergic reactions — ipe is a known one, and it's otherwise an excellent plane wood. Don't brush the dust off; that just puts it in the air. Wipe it with your hand for light work, and bring the shop vac over when the abrasive clogs or you're removing real material.
Grit
Start at 180. If the surface is rough or you're fighting bandsaw marks, drop to 80 to get the material off, then come back to 180 for the final surface.
SituationUseLight irregularities, refining180Persistent bump or bandsaw marks80Final surface after coarse work180Abrasive cloggingStop and vacuum
Laying out the ramps
The start point sits somewhere between a third and the middle of the block — but not the middle. You want the back part of the sole longer than the front. That's simply how the plane is used; the weight and the pressure sit behind the iron.
From that point:
Forward ramp: 45°. This is the bed. 45° is the sweet spot and the standard for a high-angle plane.
Back ramp: 60°, cut with a slight curve.
Other bed angles
45° is right for almost everything, but it isn't the only choice. I made a 60° bed plane once — that's effectively a semi-scraper. The shaving comes off completely differently and it's harder to work with, but it has saved me a few times on difficult, wildly figured wood. You can go to 90°, or even negative, if you want to build a scraping plane.
Build this one at 45°. Then build another when you know what you want.
The magic block
I have a small reference block that carries the 45° and 60° angles. Its height and thickness also determine where the cross-pin hole gets drilled — so it isn't just an angle gauge. It ties several dimensions of the plane together in one object.
This is the original one Robert gave me when I was studying at Inside Passage.
I've used it on every plane I've made since. Which is, I think, the most Krenovian thing in this entire course: a small piece of wood that carries the proportions of a tool, handed from one maker to the next.
📥 So I've drawn it up for you. There's a printable template attached to this lesson — actual size, so you can lay your stock straight on it and mark from the drawing.
The dimensions
Thickness11 mm (7/16")Height33 mm (1 5/16")Length~120 mm (4¾") — not critical, make it whatever suits your handEndsone bevelled at 45°, one at 60°
The thickness and the height are the numbers that matter, because those are the ones doing the cross-pin work later. The length is yours.
Make it from something hard and stable. Offcuts from your plane blank are ideal — you'll have some, and it means the block is made of the same stuff as the plane it measures.
Mark your 45 and your 60 clearly on the faces, straight away, before you set it down. The two ends don't look that different at a glance, and using the wrong one on a centre block is not a mistake you can sand out.
Make it before you lay out your ramps. Then it's yours, and it'll be on your bench for the next plane and the one after that.
The bandsaw trick: cut it concave on purpose
Normally when you cut to a line, you keep the line. Get as close as you can, but don't cut it away — once you're into the line you start wobbling and the cut goes off.
For the forward ramp, break that rule deliberately.
Start just beside the line, on the waste side
Creep gently toward it — take maybe half the line
Come back out to beside the line
That leaves the sawn face very slightly concave.
Why: a concave surface sits stable on the abrasive. A convex one — a surface with a bump in the middle — rocks and wobbles the whole time you're trying to flatten it, whether you're sanding or using a block plane. Half a minute of intention at the bandsaw saves you a fight later.
Don't overdo it. I went a little further than I meant to on this one, and flat would have been better. A hint of concave is all you want.
The surface doesn't need to be smooth or exact off the saw. Sanding establishes the final surface. You're just leaving a shape that will cooperate.
Why the back ramp curves
The back ramp isn't a straight 60° cut. Here's the reasoning, because it's a good example of three requirements settling against each other:
Why 60° and not less: this is a wooden plane and it needs structural integrity. Cut that ramp shallower and the piece gets thin — you'd have to make the whole body longer to get the strength back. So you keep it steep and keep the wood.
But 60° creates a problem: there's now very little space between the ramp and the cross pin for shavings to get out.
So you curve it. A slight curve — do it by eye, and go a little more than you think — opens up the passage for the shavings. It also just looks better, which is not nothing.
Beaver marks
That curved surface is where the beaver marks go: small scooped cuts with a rounded chisel, the traditional touch on a plane made this way. We'll do those later, and they're always fun.
Fair warning — on exotic end grain your chisel needs to be genuinely sharp. It'll be fine if it is.
At the saw: a wide blade makes the curve awkward. You may need to force it slightly through the turn. Go slowly.
Sanding the ramps: this is the one that matters
The plane iron bears directly on this surface. Get it right.
Flat. Or very slightly concave. Never convex.
Any bump — in either direction, along the ramp or side to side — introduces rocking in the iron. Rocking means chatter, and chatter means a plane that doesn't work, no matter what else you did well.
Checking flatness: put a light behind your square blade and look for the gap. Check edge to edge, and start to finish. You'll see light through a low spot immediately.
Checking square: to both sides of the block. Not one.
Correcting an angle: if you're out of square, you can shift your pressure slightly left or right. But be careful. Too much pressure on one side creates a bump or a drop on the other, and then you're sanding more to fix that, and you've entered a loop that's hard to get out of.
This is the one place where sanding is genuinely worse than planing. With a block plane you can take partial passes and walk an angle back into square. On the abrasive you can't be that precise, so even pressure is safer than correction. Don't let a small error grow into one you have to chase.
On the angle itself: you might be wondering how I know it's still exactly 45° after all that sanding. I don't, and it doesn't matter. 44½°, 45½° — no meaningful difference to how the plane works. Whatever it is, it is. The flatness and the squareness are what you protect.
When it's done
No bandsaw marks visible
Flat edge to edge and side to side, checked against light
Square from both sides
Still parallel — the block is not a wedge
A tiny bandsaw mark that doesn't affect the mechanics can technically stay. But you'll be holding this plane for the rest of your life, so I'd rather it were clean.
Don't compromise on this step.
Your action steps
Make your magic block from the drawing before you lay anything out
Stick abrasive to your flat surface
Grid the block in pencil and sand the surfaces — minimum removal, even pressure
Vacuum when it clogs; mind the dust
Mark your ramp start point: between a third and centre, rear sole longer
Lay out 45° forward and 60° back using the magic block
Bandsaw the forward ramp with a deliberate slight concavity
Bandsaw the back ramp on a curve, going a little further than feels necessary
Sand the ramps: 180, drop to 80 if needed, finish at 180
Check flat with backlight, square from both sides, and confirm the block is still parallel
Post your bed. A photo of the forward ramp with your square held against it and a light behind — the same check you just did. That backlit gap is the single most useful thing you can show me at this stage, and it's far easier to fix now than after glue-up.
Also: show us your magic block. First plane, and already your first tool made for making planes.
Where we are
Your cheeks are still resting. The center block has its ramps cut and sanded. Today we finish the inside of it: carve the curved back ramp, deal with any cracks that have shown up, and shoot the two chamfers that decide how tight your mouth will be for the life of this plane.
That last one deserves your attention. The chamfer work in this film is what stands between you and a plane that opens up and stops smoothing after its first winter.
What's in this one
Sharpening a gouge — genuinely different from a straight chisel, and worth learning properly
Carving the beaver marks: position, direction, and reading the surface as you go
What honest work means, and where the line sits
Two chamfers, two different reference surfaces, two different reasons
Why the back chamfer decides whether this stays a smoothing plane
Shooting accurately with a shooting board
Using the iron itself as the final geometric check
⏱️ TIMESTAMPS0:00 Introduction & choosing the gouge 1:25 Gouge sharpening 6:54 Carving the beaver marks on the back ramp 11:25 Why carve instead of sand or scrape 16:33 Final check & gluing up a crack 18:26 What a chamfer is and why it's needed 21:49 Shooting the chamfer on the shooting board 29:30 Checking both chamfers with the blade 30:10 Wrap-up & next steps
Sharpening the gouge
Before anything else, the gouge gets sharpened. I'll be using a small one — smaller diameter means more work, but I like the personality it leaves. The surface is distinct without being obvious, and it's lovely under the hand.
First, make yourself a strop. Carve a small block of wood to match the curve of your gouge, and put a bit of honing compound on it. That's what removes the burr afterwards. It takes two minutes and you'll use it every time from now on.
On the 1,000 stone. Much the same as a straight chisel, except you turn the tool as you go — a rocking motion so the curved edge contacts the stone across its full width. It takes a bit of getting the hang of, but it isn't complicated.
Two things to watch:
Don't dig in. A gouge is rougher on a stone than a flat bevel and will leave little trenches, especially in the 1,000. Some of that is unavoidable.
Don't creep the angle up. This is freehand, so it's easy to raise it without noticing. Around 30° is where you want to be.
What you're looking for is contact on the leading edge across the whole width, and a burr. The burr can be hard to feel on a curved edge — take your time and be sure.
On the 8,000. Here's the thing people get wrong: a nice shiny bevel is not the goal. You can have a beautiful polished surface and still not have your leading edge in contact. The leading edge is what you're checking. If it still looks a bit bright and grey from the 1,000, keep going.
Clean towards the edge — not sideways, and definitely not backwards off it. You don't want to break the burr off yet.
Stropping. On the compound block, pull backwards. If you push forward even slightly, unlike on a stone, the edge digs into the wood.
A note on strops: I use compound on a flat piece of wood rather than leather. Leather compresses under the tool, which rounds the edge slightly — it changes your attack angle without you deciding to. Flat wood doesn't.
The beaver marks
That's what Robert called them, and it's what I've called them ever since. Small overlapping gouge cuts across the curved back ramp, replacing the bandsaw texture with something deliberate.
Position first
Clamp the piece where the gouge can enter comfortably. This sounds like a small thing and it isn't. If the work sits too low or at an awkward angle, you'll find yourself making strange wrist motions just to start each cut — and you'll fight the tool for the whole surface.
Adjust the height and angle as you go, too. The grain changes along the curve; some stretches feel harder, some easier, and a small change in setup makes a real difference.
A tail vice is lovely for this. Any vice will do.
Cutting
Start slightly inside the edge, not right at it. Starting from the very edge is awkward, and you don't need to — that whole edge gets cut away later when the plane is shaped.
Work side to side, in rows. You can make them short, like little dimples, or longer for a more flowing pattern. Whatever you prefer, but keep it reasonably consistent rather than chaotic.
They won't be perfect. That's the point — this is meant to look organic, not machined. I'm not chasing symmetry.
Rest your hand on the workpiece. It stabilises where each cut begins and it's most of the control you have.
What you're actually watching for
Bandsaw marks. If you skip spots, you'll see them as brighter, paler patches — that's rough sawn surface still showing through. What you want is a consistently darker, textured surface all the way across, cut by the gouge.
Keep looking for those bright spots as you go. And check against the light at the end.
At the end grain — careful
Coming to the edges, you're in end grain. A straight, careless motion here will lever a piece right off, and you won't just lose it — you'll see the breakout after glue-up, sitting there permanently.
Tilt the gouge slightly toward the safe direction as you approach the edges. Otherwise cut straight, and cut with the grain. You'll find out very quickly if you're going against it.
On honest work
You could skip all of this. Scrape the curved area, or sand it, and move on. You could even leave it bandsawn — the plane would work.
And that would be fine, as long as it's an honest choice.
Here's the distinction I'd ask you to hold onto. Choosing a simpler finish because you've considered it and that's what you want is a decision. Choosing it because you don't feel like sharpening, or because you're not confident with the tool and would rather not find out — that's something else, and only you will ever know which one you did.
If it's the confidence, practise on some scrap first. That's the honest route through.
I'll tell you what you get for the work. The surface has far more character. It feels good when you put your hand in there to clear shavings. And every time I use this plane, I remember the afternoon I carved that ramp.
That's what you're buying with the extra hour.
Repairing a crack
A crack turned up in this ramp that I'm fairly sure wasn't there when I cut the piece. That happens; the wood is still settling, and it will keep telling you things for a while yet.
Use thin CA, not wood glue. The point is penetration — you need it to travel the full depth of a narrow crack, and ordinary wood glue is far too viscous to get in there. Thin CA wicks straight through; on this one it came out the other side almost immediately, which told me it was all the way in.
You don't need much. Then clamp it — a vice is fine — for real pressure across the crack while it cures.
The two chamfers
Both ramps get a chamfer. They are referenced differently and they exist for different reasons, so take them one at a time.
Forward chamfer: square to the ramp
Not square to the sole — square to the ramp.
The reason is simple. Without it you're left with a thin edge at the front of the mouth, and a thin edge bends and catches on things. The chamfer removes it.
The exact size isn't critical. What matters is that after you've removed material from the sole and got the iron projecting properly, there's still a significant chamfer left there — so the end of it isn't thin and flexible.
Don't overdo it either, or you lose support for the front of the iron.
Back chamfer: square to the sole, 3–4 mm, and this one is critical
Here's the whole reasoning, because it's the most important thing in this film.
This is going to be a smoothing plane, which means you want a tight mouth. After glue-up you'll carefully remove material from the sole until the iron projects exactly right, and that gives you your tight opening.
But a wooden plane moves. It can take a whole year for one to properly stabilise to your workshop, and during that time it'll warp a little and you'll need to flatten the sole again.
Think of the chamfer as a little vertical wall. That wall is what holds the mouth relatively tight. As long as it's there, flattening the sole costs you very little. But once the wall is gone, you're back to that shallow angled surface — and from then on the mouth opens up fast, every single time you flatten.
So the wall has to be tall enough to survive years of flattening. And it can't be too tall, because a high wall means shavings jamming in that tight space between the iron and the wood, and a plane that clogs.
The numbers: start at about 3 to 3½ mm. What you're aiming for is a final wall — after all the flattening that gets the blade properly protruding — of around a millimetre and a half. That's the sweet spot: enough to last a long time, not enough to jam.
Look at a plane that's been in use for years and you'll still see a bit of chamfer there. That's the wall, still doing its job.
Shooting the chamfers
A shooting board does this work — and don't forget what you're planing here. This is end grain, which is why the setup matters as much as the technique.
Mine has a fence that adjusts both for square and sideways. Bringing it in close gives near-zero clearance right where the cut exits, and on end grain that's the difference between a clean chamfer and blowing a chunk off the far corner.
Sharpen your iron to a higher angle before you start. On ekki it'll take some edge damage regardless, but a higher angle survives it.
Check square against a light. I thought I was square, held it up, and could see light on the right-hand side. Checked from the other side — same story.
When that happens, adjust the fence, don't keep planing. A small tap sideways with a hammer shifts where the material comes off. Trying to correct by planing harder on one side just makes a worse angle.
Pressure goes exactly at the corner you're cutting. Push too much one way and you change the chamfer angle; too much the other way and you change it differently. It's about finding the right amount, and it's the part that takes practice.
Go slow at first. Be careful, and check repeatedly that you're still square — stopping to look costs you seconds, and a chamfer planed out of square costs you the piece. Once you've done this a few times and your technique with the shooting board settles, things will speed up on their own. Let that happen rather than pushing for it.
Take lighter passes as you get close to your number. I went slightly past 3 mm on purpose — a little over is where I want to be.
The final check — use the iron
Don't trust the measurement. Simulate the assembly.
Take the iron out of its chipbreaker, lay something straight along the bottom to stand in for the sole, and set your two parts in position as they'll actually sit once the cheeks are on.
The edge of the blade should meet roughly the middle of the chamfer.
Too low and you've got an excessive gap at the mouth. Fixable with an insert later, but that's not what we're aiming for — we want it right from the start.
Too high and by the time you've removed all the material you need to, there'll be no chamfer left at all.
Middle. Then mark your line and plane to it.
Second part of the check: the base of the sharpening bevel should still have wood underneath it. Mine's at about 27° at the moment — and if I later sharpen at 30°, there's still support there. That margin is what you're confirming.
Your action steps
Sharpen your gouge — 1,000, then 8,000, then strop backwards on a shaped compound block
Clamp the work at a comfortable height and angle
Carve the beaver marks side to side, starting inside the edge, tilting at the end grain
Check against the light for missed bandsaw marks; go back over any bright patches
Inspect for cracks — repair with thin CA and clamp before chamfering
Shoot the forward chamfer square to the ramp
Shoot the back chamfer square to the sole, 3–3½ mm
Check square against light; adjust the fence if it's out
Simulate the assembly with the iron and confirm it meets the middle of the chamfer
Confirm there's wood supporting the base of the sharpening bevel
What I'm using in this film
These are the things I actually reach for. The links are Amazon affiliate links — they cost you nothing extra and they help support the work.
Norton sharpening stones. Nothing like them, and the two grits in this film are the two I use for almost everything.
CA glue, various viscosities — you want the thin one for cracks like the one in this video: https://amzn.to/4w8wcVb
You'll also need: a small gouge, a shooting board with an adjustable fence, honing compound, and a scrap of wood to carve into a strop block.
Show us your beaver marks. Photograph the back ramp with a light raking across it — that's how you see the texture, and how you spot the bright patches you missed.
And post your iron check. The blade in position against the chamfer, so we can see where it lands. This one is worth getting a second opinion on before glue-up, because the mouth you end up with for the next thirty years is decided right here.
The screw that connects the blade to the chip breaker runs in a slot in the center block. The slot has to be wide enough for lateral adjustment, deep enough to clear the screw head, and long enough for the blade to protrude through the sole.
I once cut this slot without enough length. When I started working with the plane, the screw head bumped into the end of the slot and I couldn't move the blade any further.
It's one cut on the router table, but it's three separate setups — depth, centering, and stopping point — and each one gets checked before the real piece goes near the bit.
What you'll do in this film:
Calculate exactly how far forward the slot needs to run, from the blade's intended projection — not by guessing
Set the bit height for real screw-head clearance, including the wear that shows up years later
Center a ¾" slot in the block using test cuts, and understand why every fence adjustment counts double
Mark and control a stopped cut you can't see
Check the finished slot with the blade, breaker and screw assembled
1. What the slot is actually for
The slot carries the screw that joins the blade to the chip breaker. Two jobs:
Lateral adjustment. The slot must be meaningfully wider than the screw — not a close fit. That side clearance is what lets you shift the blade sideways to square the edge to the mouth. A slot sized to the screw locks the blade in one position.
Head clearance. The slot must be deeper than the screw head is thick, so the head never touches bottom or scrapes as the assembly slides.
This is why a ¾" bit for a screw a fraction of that size isn't sloppiness. It's the design.
The cut is made on a flat, straight, unwarped face — you checked and prepared that surface earlier in the build. Everything below assumes it.
2. A word on the word "deep"
In the shop I use "deep" for two different things, and it's worth separating them here so the notes stay clear:
Depth = how far down the slot is cut. Set by bit height. Governs screw-head clearance.
Length / travel = how far forward the slot runs into the block. Set by where you stop the cut. Governs how far the blade can project.
If the slot isn't deep enough, the screw head scrapes the top of the slot, or gets pushed up by it. That pressure lifts the assembly and the blade no longer sits snugly on the ramp — which is the whole point of the bedding. So be sure the slot is cut deep enough. Keep the two ideas separate in your head and both setups get simpler.
3. Depth — bit height
Rule: screw-head thickness + about 1.5 mm.
Why the extra 1.5 mm rather than a tight fit:
Screws get abused. Overtighten one, let the driver slip, and you tear a small burr up out of the head. The head is now effectively taller and will scrape the top of the slot.
If the head touches, it gets pushed up — and the blade lifts off the ramp with it. The blade has to sit snugly on the bed; nothing else in the assembly should be holding it off.
Verify, don't eyeball. Set the height by measurement, then run a piece of scrap and measure the actual cut. The height scale on a router lift is a starting point, not a result.
4. Length — calculating where the slot stops
This is the part people guess at. Don't guess — derive it.
Decide where the blade edge sits when projecting. Aim for roughly the midpoint of the chamfer on the center block. That chamfer is about 3.5 mm, so the blade edge should read at about half of it when you sight from the side.
Assemble at maximum forward position. Blade and chip breaker screwed together with the breaker almost touching the blade edge, screw run fully forward. This is the closest the screw will ever be to the front of the plane.
Transfer that position to the block. Hold a square against the assembly, mark a pencil line on the block at the screw's forward-most position.
Add clearance. About 3 mm (⅛") past that line. That's your stopping point.
Erase the first line so you only have one mark to work to.
Why not just add a generous 20 mm and stop worrying?
Because the flat material beside and in front of the slot is structural. The blade beds on the ramp; the chip breaker and wedge press down on the blade and drive it against the ramp. That pressure needs a solid, flat reference area to push against. Running the slot too far forward removes the reference and weakens the block exactly where the load is.
Put the pencil mark on the face you'll be able to see while feeding — you will not see the bit during the cut.
5. The bit
¾" spiral solid carbide, upcut. (The one I use — affiliate link.)
Spiral solid carbide cuts cleanly enough to take this in one pass, even in a hardwood like ekki.
Upcut vs downcut — worth getting straight, because it flips when the router is inverted. An upcut spiral ejects chips toward the shank. Handheld, the shank is up, so chips come up out of the cut. Mounted upside down in a table, the shank is down — so an upcut bit pulls the chips down through the table toward the router and dust collection, instead of throwing them up into your work and your face. That's what you want here.
Condition matters as much as type. Clean resin off an older bit before use. A worn bit means more vibration, burning, and a less controlled cut — which is a safety issue, not just a finish issue. Straight carbide bits wear noticeably faster than spirals. New spiral bits are cheap enough now that there's no good reason to fight a dull one.
Listen to the tool. Sound and feed resistance tell you what's happening long before the burn marks do.
6. Centering the slot
The slot should sit roughly centered across the block. Not laboratory-centered — but centered.
Process:
Set the fence by eye.
Take a light test cut in an area that will later be removed during the shaping of the plane. No reason to test on a surface that survives.
Set a square to the distance from the slot edge to one side, lock it, check against the other side.
Adjust the fence and repeat.
The doubling rule — this is the one that catches people:
Moving the fence changes both sides at once. Take 1 mm off one side and you add 1 mm to the other. The visible imbalance changes by twice your fence movement.
So when your square tells you you're ⅛" out, move the fence half of that. And expect to overshoot at least once anyway — I did, on camera. It happens faster than your hands expect.
Also expect to go the wrong way once. These adjustments are genuinely confusing in the moment. Make a small move, take a shallow test cut, read it, and if it got worse you now know the direction. Two or three iterations is normal.
Go deeper by only a couple of millimeters per test cut. Just enough to get a readable edge. If the previous test cut is in the way of reading the new one, going slightly deeper wipes it out and gives you a fresh reference.
Lock the fence. Then check it's locked. Then check again.
7. Controlling the stopped cut
You can't see the bit. So bring the reference up to where you can see it — the table surface.
Marking the stop line on the table:
Take any piece you know is square.
Slide it up against the bit and rotate the bit clockwise by hand until it just pushes the piece away.
That piece now represents the maximum cutting position on the right side of the bit. Mark the line on the table.
Add a small arrow so it reads instantly at a glance. Sharpie is fine.
Ways to stop the cut:
MethodNotesPhysical stop, 45° faceMost dependable. Use an offcut from your center block. Lower the bit first, position the stop against the exact cutting location, then raise the bit. The angled face gives a much better contact and reference than a square stop, which tends to feel vague as you reach it.Visual stop at the table lineWhat I do here. Watch carefully, stop when the marks meet, travel back out.Stop and switch offReach the mark, kill the router, wait for the bit to come to a complete stop, then withdraw.
On withdrawing: travel back out, don't lift.
Lifting the workpiece vertically off a spinning bit is sketchy for no gain. If you don't clear the cutter completely on the way up, you tear the piece. Pull straight back the way you came, with pressure held against the fence.
8. Safety, before you switch on
Safety glasses and hearing protection at the table before the router runs, not after.
Clear the table. Nothing on the surface except the workpiece — no squares, no pencils, no offcuts.
Confirm the fence is locked.
Confirm the stop mark is where you think it is.
9. Final check
Assemble the blade, chip breaker and screw and offer them into the slot. You're confirming three things:
The screw has side clearance — room to move laterally without the head touching the slot walls
The slot runs far enough forward that the blade reaches its intended projection point at the middle of the chamfer, with room to spare
Enough flat material remains beside and in front of the slot to bed and load the blade
If all three read right, you're done shaping these parts. Ramps, chamfers and slot are complete.
Common mistakes
MistakeConsequenceFixSlot too narrow / close to screw diameterNo lateral adjustment; blade can't be squared to the mouthUse the ¾" bit as specifiedSlot not deep enough (height)Screw head scrapes or gets pushed up, lifting the blade off the rampScrew-head thickness + 1.5 mm, verified on scrapSlot too short (length)Blade can't project — plane won't work. The mistake I made.Derive the endpoint from blade position, add 3 mmSlot too longWeakened block, lost bedding reference under the wedgeStop at the derived point + 3 mm, not moreCorrecting the fence by the full errorOvershoot past center, repeatedlyMove half the error; every move counts doubleTesting on a finished surfacePermanent test cut on a face that survives shapingTest in waste that comes off during shapingLifting the piece off a running bitTorn workpieceTravel back out, or stop the router firstDull or resinous bitVibration, burning, less controlClean it or replace it — spirals are cheap now
Checklist
Before the router table
[ ] Reference face confirmed flat, straight, unwarped
[ ] Blade projection point identified at mid-chamfer (~half of 3.5 mm)
[ ] Forward-most screw position transferred to block with a square
[ ] +3 mm (⅛") clearance added, first line erased
[ ] Stop mark drawn on the face visible during feeding
Setup
[ ] ¾" spiral solid carbide bit installed, clean and sharp
[ ] Bit height = screw-head thickness + 1.5 mm
[ ] Height verified with a scrap test cut and measured
[ ] Fence centered via test cuts in waste area
[ ] Both side distances checked with a square and matching
[ ] Fence locked, double-checked
[ ] Stop line marked on the router table with arrow
[ ] Stop block installed (optional, 45° face, bit lowered when setting)
Cut
[ ] Eye and ear protection on
[ ] Table clear of everything but the workpiece
[ ] Feed to the mark, travel back out — no lifting
Verify
[ ] Screw has lateral clearance in the slot
[ ] Blade reaches intended projection with room to spare
[ ] Adequate flat material remains beside and forward of the slot
Where this sits in the course
Previously: ramps, chamfers and the center-block geometry (Films 2–3), while the resawn cheeks rested.
After this film: the center block is finished. Ramps, chamfers and slot are all complete — no further shaping needed on these parts.
Next: preparing the cheeks, assembly, and drilling for the cross pin.
Post a photo of your slot with the blade, breaker and screw assembled in it — and tell us how far past your calculated point you stopped. Did you find yourself wanting to add "just a bit more" insurance? Where did you draw the line, and why?
A good follow-up thread: what's a mistake in your own work you only discovered once you started using the piece?
Where we are
The cheeks have been resting since the resaw. In this film they come back to the bench, get milled flat and thin, and then the plane's most important hole gets located and drilled.
Everything so far has been the centre block: the ramps, the beaver marks, the chamfers, the screw slot. That work was deliberately scheduled while the cheeks sat and finished moving.
By the end of this film the three pieces are pinned together in their final positions, and the cross-pin hole is drilled through both cheeks in alignment.
What this film covers
Stabilising cracks that opened up during resawing
Getting the warp out: hand plane, then jointer, then thickness planer
Bringing both cheeks to a common final thickness
Sanding the glue faces for an invisible glue line
Locator dowels — locking the ramp block in its final position
Laying out the cross-pin hole from the ramp angle, the blade stack and the magic block
Drilling the cross-pin holes on the drill press, one cheek at a time
What You'll Need
Machines: jointer, thickness planer, drill press Hand tools: a plane you trust in this wood, hand drill, flush-cut saw, chisel, file, square, sliding bevel, marking point Bits: 6 mm for the dowels, 8 mm for the cross pin Consumables: penetrating superglue (maybe), paraffin wax, sticky back sandpaper on a flat surface (180 grit, here's my amazon link: https://amzn.to/4n33VuZ), 6 mm dowels (or rod you can cut) From earlier films: the magic block (11 mm × 33 mm, 45° and 60° bevels), the blade and chip breaker, push blocks, clamps, zero clearance inset \ board for the bandsaw
The Thinking Behind the Work
Stability comes before flatness
Many people don't know this. When a blank is warped, the instinct is to take it straight to the jointer and let the machine sort it out. But a warped board rocks, and a rocking board gives the cutterhead nothing stable to reference.
So the first job is flattening — but very selectively. You're taking material off two specific corners and nowhere else. Neither a jointer nor a sanding board can do that: both reference the whole surface. They will flatten it eventually — but the blank tips onto one of its low corners, and the machine keeps cutting until the entire face has come down to meet that corner. You get a flat surface by removing far more material than the warp actually required. On a piece that's heading for 8 mm, that can be the difference between a usable cheek and one that's too thin. A hand plane is the only tool here that lets you choose exactly where material comes off.
Find the diagonal it rocks on, hand plane the two high corners down, and stop as soon as it stops rocking. Half a millimetre of lift is fine. You're not trying to finish the surface here — you're making it stable enough for the machine to do its job properly.
Nothing at this stage has to be perfect, because the rest of the sequence completes what the hand plane starts. The hand planing is what does the initial flattening. The jointer then cleans that face up enough to reference from, and the thickness planer takes care of the other side.
This is the school philosophy in miniature: the machine takes the work ninety percent of the way, and the hands do the ten percent the machine can't. Here the order is inverted — the hands go first — but the principle is the same. Each tool does the part it's actually good at.
Why not just sand the corners down?
Rounding is a real risk with a sanding block, but not with good sticky-back paper stuck down to a flat surface — that stays flat. The problem is the one above: a flat abrasive is still referencing the whole face, so it brings the piece down to its lowest corner instead of taking off the two high ones.
The other reason is residue. Sanding leaves abrasive grit sitting in the pores of the wood, and that then goes across your jointer knives.
Thin cheeks
I take these down to just under 8 mm, and I go as thin as the hardness of the wood will allow. This is not about weight or looks. Thin cheeks let you feel where the blade is while you're planing. Thick cheeks put a wall between your hand and the cutting edge, and you lose that feedback.
That's a design decision, not a rule. But it's the kind of decision that only shows up years later, in use.
The glue line
The machined faces are already good. I still sand them, by hand, on a flat surface — because the goal isn't a strong joint, it's a joint you can't see. On a finished plane, a visible glue line down the side is the thing your eye keeps returning to.
The discipline here is stopping. Every extra pass is a chance to put a new warp or a taper into the thickness, and then you've traded a cosmetic problem for a structural one. If a low spot sits in an area the shaping will cut away, leave it alone.
The cross-pin hole
The cross-pin hole needs to sit in the right place relative to the blade, and in the same place in both cheeks.
That's why it goes to the drill press rather than being drilled by hand, and why the two cheeks get drilled separately rather than stacked and drilled through.
The magic block
Mine came from Robert at Inside Passage, and it does two jobs in this build. The two bevelled ends carry the angles — 45° at one end, 60° at the other — so the ramps can be marked off it directly. And its thickness and height are what set the cross-pin position: 11 mm thick and just over 33 mm high, or roughly 7/16" by 1 5/16". Length is about 12 cm, which doesn't matter much — it just needs to be comfortable to hold against a line.
The height is the part doing the quiet work. It already accounts for the 1.5–2 mm you'll lose off the sole later, so when you add it to your layout you end up with the right gap between cross pin and blade once the plane is finished, not just as it sits now.
If you don't have one, make one. It's a small offcut of stable hardwood, thicknessed accurately and with the two bevels cut on the ends. Once you've made it, the layout in this film becomes a matter of stacking references rather than measuring.
Working from real references, not assumed ones
Notice how much of the layout is copied rather than measured. The ramp angle gets read off the ramp you actually built, not set to 45° from a drawing. The blade position gets set by eye to the middle of the chamfer. The cross-pin height comes from the magic block, which already carries the blade stack, the wedge clearance and the 1.5–2 mm you'll lose off the sole later.
Every one of those is a reference taken from the object in front of you. That's what keeps the finished plane consistent with itself, rather than consistent with a number you wrote down three films ago.
Common Mistakes
A cross-pin hole that's too small. I've drilled 7 mm in the past. The pin takes too much stress over years of use and eventually breaks — and then you're drilling it out and fitting a brass rod. That's why I recommend 8 mm.
Drilling the cross pin by hand. Don't.
Drilling straight through the assembled sandwich. With both cheeks pinned to the centre block on the locator dowels, there's nothing underneath the upper cheek where the bit comes out — so it blows out on the inside face. You can fit a backing piece in there, but it's a hassle to make, it puts extra stress on the bit, and it does nothing about the bit flexing on the way through. That's why the first cheek gets drilled on its own, the assembly goes back together so the drill can locate the second cheek with the machine off, and then it comes apart again to drill that one separately.
Siting the locator dowels badly. Too far in and they land inside the finished shape. Too close to the edge and the corner breaks out during assembly and disassembly. If you're unsure where your shape will fall, sketch it on now and drill outside the line.
Assuming the pin clearance doesn't matter. Too close to the blade and there's no room for a wedge at all. Too far and the wedge becomes so thick the action between pin and blade goes soft.
Two things worth sharing under this lesson:
What did your cheeks come out at, and in what wood? Thickness is a judgement call that depends on how hard your stock is. Seeing what other people settled on is useful.
Need confirmation on your location for the cross pin holes? Send a photo of your layout lines before you drill if you want a second pair of eyes on it. This is the one hole worth checking twice.
Where we are
The centre block is shaped and the cheeks are drilled. Now we make the cross-pin: the small bar the wedge presses against. It takes the stress every time you tap the wedge home, so it's worth making carefully.
By the end of this film you have a pin with two round tenons that fit an 8 mm hole, plus a spare or two. The final fit in the plane, the shaping and the glue-up come in the next film.
What this film covers
Milling a 15 × 15 mm strip from an offcut of the same wood
Choosing the grain for strength
Cutting the pins to length and cutting the shoulders on the table saw, taking the sizes straight off the plane
The alternative: cutting the tenon cheeks on the bandsaw
Rounding the tenons with a file, from square to chamfers to round
Reading burnishing marks to find the high spots
What You'll Need
Machines: jointer, bandsaw, thickness planer, table saw with a small sled and a stop Hand tools: a file with one safe edge, one coarser and one finer (mine are a Habilis no. 0 and a no. 1), a narrow chisel, square, sharp pencil, a good lamp you can move From earlier films: the centre block and cheeks, clamped up, to take measurements from Also: an offcut of the same hard wood with several 8 mm test holes drilled in it
The Thinking Behind the Work
Arrive at the planer close to size
I joint a face and an edge, then bandsaw the strip to about 17 mm, and only then go to the thickness planer for the last 2 mm down to 15.
The reason is tension. If you take a 20 mm piece down to 15 in the planer, you release a lot of wood, and a piece that's prone to moving will warp as you go. You don't see it happen. You reach your final thickness and the piece is bent. So cut close on the bandsaw, check for warp, joint again if it moved, and leave the planer very little to do.
Grain
You want straight grain along the pin, as straight as you can find. Avoid grain that runs out diagonally, because the tenon is small and it will be weak there. Stay away from cracks. And make spares: I cut three or four blanks and start my test cuts on the worst one, so my mistakes land on the piece I don't mind losing.
Take the sizes from the plane, not from a ruler
Two measurements matter, and both come straight off the clamped-up plane.
The full length of the pin is the full width of the plane. Later the ends get a small pillow, which leaves them slightly recessed. You want that: the plane can lie on its side for shooting, and nothing catches your fingers.
The distance between the shoulders is the space between the cheeks. I mark it with a sharp pencil, set the stop a millimetre outside the line, and creep up on it, two cuts at a time, nudging the stop with a tap from a block.
The shoulder fit
The pin should slide in between the cheeks easily, with almost no rocking.
Too tight, and the pin can't turn to seat itself against the wedge. Too loose, and you get a visible gap, and worse, the shoulders no longer support the tenons. The shoulder sitting right up against the cheek is what protects the tenon. I've seen pins with short shoulders nearly break.
Leave the tenon a hair over 8 mm
Off the saw I want the square tenon just over 8 mm, a hairline more. If you leave 8.5 or 9, you have a lot of filing to do, and long filing is how tenons end up skewed or conical. Remember there are two tenons, and they have to line up with each other.
I use a rip blade for this. It leaves a flat, clean surface and clean inside corners, where a crosscut blade leaves small V-shaped grooves.
Chamfers first, then round
Don't try to round the tenon from the start. First make a small relief cut at the shoulder with a narrow chisel. Then file four chamfers, and look at each one: it should be the same width at the tip and at the shoulder. If it's wider at one end, you're filing on an angle, so put a little more pressure on the other end next time.
Then take off the eight new corners, and by then you nearly have a circle. Keep the safe edge of the file against the shoulder. Move your lamp around; the shape shows up very differently as the light changes.
Burnishing marks
Test the fit in the holes in your offcut, never in the cheeks, because every test opens the hole a little. For the same reason, move to a fresh test hole near the end.
Push the tenon in gently, square to the face, and give it a twist. Where it rubs, it leaves dark, shiny marks. Those are the high spots. File only there, and leave the rest alone. As the tenon gets rounder you'll see the marks spread more evenly.
Don't force it in to compress it. That tends to bend the tenon off line. And be patient near the end. You can't bring back wood that has turned to dust.
The inside corners
Clean the corner where the tenon meets the shoulder until nothing is left there. A tiny bit of material in that corner will make the pin feel stuck later, and you'll blame the tenon for it.
Common Mistakes
Testing in the real holes. Keep the holes in the cheeks untouched until the final fit.
Rounding too early. It gives you a cone. Chamfers first.
A loose tenon glued in anyway. The wedge then presses on one side with air on the other, and over the years the tenon gives way. If you overshoot, use a spare.
Tapping the chisel with a hammer while the pin is in the vice. It can split the piece.
Two things I'd like to see at this stage:
Your pin next to the plane. A photograph of the shoulders sitting between the cheeks, so I can see the fit.
A tenon after a test fit. Get close, in good light, so the burnishing marks show. If you're not sure where to file next, I'll tell you.
Where we are
The pin has two round tenons. In this film it gets its final fit inside the plane and its shape, and then the three parts of the plane are glued together for good.
This is the point of no return, so most of the film is preparation. The glue-up itself takes a few minutes.
What this film covers
Fitting the cross-pin in the clamped-up plane, and finding out what is really making it tight
Shaping the pin so shavings and fingers have room
Pillowing the ends of the pin and chamfering the holes
The dry run
Acetone, wax in the corners, and scoring the glue faces
The glue-up, and keeping everything flush while the clamps go on
What You'll Need
Hand tools: the two files, a narrow chisel, block planes (I use a 102 for the heavier cuts and a 65 for the light ones), a sharp ¼" chisel, a carving knife, a cheap coarse saw For the glue-up: clamps, two flat blocks to spread the pressure, Titebond III, a small cup and a brush, acetone and a clean cloth, paraffin wax and a small brush for the corners Also: your flat surface with 180 grit, and a flat, clean bench top to glue up on
The Thinking Behind the Work
A straight tenon closes all the way round
Push a tenon into a test hole until the shoulder touches. If the shoulder closes evenly all the way round, with a snug fit, the tenon is straight. If one side touches and the other shows a gap, it's on a skew.
Find the real problem before you remove anything
In the plane itself the pin will feel tighter than it did in the test holes, because those holes have opened up with use. Clamp the plane together with the clamp over the centre blocks, not over the open throat, and try to turn the pin.
If it won't turn freely, there are three possible causes: the tenons, the inside corners, or shoulders that are too far apart for the space. Don't just keep filing the tenons. If the problem is somewhere else, you only make them thin and weak.
Take it apart and read the burnishing marks, on the tenons and around the holes. File only where it's dark. Check the corners with a chisel. Only when you're sure it's the shoulders should you pare them, and then go round with the chisel and stop before the edge, coming in from the other side so the grain doesn't break out.
What you're after: as tight as you can get it, and still turning easily, and turning the same when the clamp is on.
The shape of the pin
I shape the top of the pin into a curved triangle, a kind of Gothic arch. It isn't decoration. It leaves room to clear shavings with your fingers, and it does that without thinning the pin where it needs its strength. Just softening the corners isn't enough; that leaves a corner your fingers can't get into.
The method is the same as for the tenons. Draw a centre line, plane two big flat chamfers up to your lines, then take off the high spots. Watch that each chamfer stays the same width along its length.
If the surface comes out whitish instead of deep in colour, you're planing against the grain. Turn the piece round. I leave these surfaces straight from the plane, with their small facets, and I don't sand them.
The flat face, and parallel to the ramp
The flat underside of the pin is the face the wedge bears on. Before finishing it, put the plane together dry and sight along it: that face should be parallel to the front ramp. A small error can be taken up in the wedge later, but this is your last chance to correct a big one. Then take off the machine marks on sandpaper on a flat surface. I don't plane this face, because I don't want to risk tear-out.
Ends and holes
I give the ends of the pin a small pillow with a sharp chisel: a chamfer all round first, then a lower angle to take off the ridge. Don't overdo it, because the end of the tenon is bearing surface. Make sure the ends finish slightly below the sides of the plane.
The holes get a small chamfer with a knife. Think of the hole in four quarters and cut each one with the grain. Where you feel resistance, stop and come from the other side. Practise on a test hole first.
The dry run
Clamp everything exactly as you will with glue. Check that no dowel sticks out, that the pin is in and turning, and above all that the bottoms of the centre blocks are flush with the cheeks. If a block sits at an angle, the iron won't bed where you planned.
Three things before the glue
Acetone. Oily exotic woods don't always glue well. Wipe the glue faces with acetone until the cloth comes away clean, and do it just before gluing, because the oils come back to the surface.
Wax in the corners. I learned this from Robert. With the plane clamped dry, brush a very little wax into the inside corners. Squeeze-out can't stick there and pops off clean when it's dry, so you never have to smear wet glue over the inside faces. I also wax the whole cross-pin and the ramps, in case glue gets to them.
Score the glue faces lightly with a coarse saw, staying clear of the waxed areas. It gives the glue a little more to hold.
The glue-up
Clear the bench. Put glue on both faces with a brush from a small cup, in a layer you can still just see the wood through. Flat surfaces don't need more than that.
Put the clamps on lightly at first, over the blocks and never over the open throat. Each clamp can make the parts slide, so check with your finger that everything is still flush after each one. When the glue has started to grab and nothing is moving, give the final squeeze. Check that the pin still turns.
Then leave it overnight, at least. The next steps put real stress on these joints.
Common Mistakes
Forgetting the cross-pin. Say it out loud before you close the second cheek.
Starting with full clamp pressure. That's when the parts slide.
Too much wax. It spreads onto the glue faces. A thin film in the corners is all you need.
Taking it out of the clamps after half an hour because you're eager to see it. Don't.
Before you glue, show me:
Your dry run. A photograph of the plane clamped up, from the side and from underneath, so I can check that everything is flush.
The pin in place. If it turns but feels wrong, a short film of you turning it tells me a lot.
And after the glue-up, show me the plane in its clamps. You've earned it.
Where we are
The plane is out of the clamps and it is one piece. In this film the glue comes out of the corners, the block gets its rough shape on the bandsaw, and the first chamfers go on by hand.
It still can't take a shaving. That needs a wedge and a mouth, and those are the next three films.
What this film covers
The order of the remaining work, and why it runs in that order
Clearing squeeze-out from the ramps without marking them
Choosing a shape, and checking it against the iron
Cutting the profile and the first chamfers on the bandsaw
Shaping by hand in a wood with reversing grain
What You'll Need
Machines: bandsaw, with a zero-clearance insert or a thin board taped to the table Hand tools: a sharp chisel, a hooked scraper for the concave ramp (mine is an old dentist's tool with an edge ground on it), scrapers, a carving knife, files and rasps Also: the iron and chip breaker, a good lamp, a pencil and an eraser
The Thinking Behind the Work
Why this order
The sole is not flattened to its final place until the iron is in the plane, held tight by its wedge. Tightening a wedge bends a plane very slightly. That's true of any plane, wooden ones most of all. So the last of the material comes off the sole with the iron in and under tension.
That means we need the wedge first. And before the wedge, the rough shape, because cutting away that much wood lets the block move again. Shape it, let it move, then make it flat.
The glue in the corners
On the front ramp, where the iron beds, every trace of squeeze-out has to go, especially at the bottom near the mouth. The iron must not rock on a crumb of glue.
This is where the wax pays off: the glue lifts away with very little pressure. Work with a chisel, gently, in good light, and don't scratch the ramp or dig into it. The curved back ramp matters less for how the plane works, but clean it too. Squeeze-out on the sole can come off quickly, because that surface is about to be removed anyway.
Choosing a shape
The shape most people make first, and the one I made at Inside Passage, is a low smoother with a comfortable place for the palm, softened corners, and small carved facets left from the chisel. Mine has changed over the years: a corner eased here, a recess for the thumb there.
For this plane I'm trying a shape from one of Krenov's planes in A Cabinetmaker's Notebook: tall at the back, nearly the height of the iron, sweeping down sharply and then running almost flat to the front. I drew it and rubbed it out about ten times before I liked it. Do the same. It's your plane.
Check the shape with the iron in
Before you get attached to a shape, put the iron in and look at the room around it. You need to reach the sides of the iron to tap it left and right. With my tall back I found I didn't have that room, and I had to go back to the bandsaw and cut deeper behind the iron. Find this out now.
On the bandsaw
Two rules. The block always has contact with the table directly under the cut. And respect what your blade can turn: with a wide resaw blade, cut a tight curve in two or three passes from different directions. Don't force it round.
The chamfers can be sawn too. If you're not at home on the bandsaw, tilt the table to 45° and keep the block flat on it. I do them freehand, but only because I've done it many times. Practise on a scrap first, and start with small cuts.
Close the gap around the blade. In this film a small offcut jammed in the open insert, and getting it out cost me some skin. A thin board stuck to the table with double-sided tape solves it.
By hand, in difficult grain
This wood has grain running in every direction, so I reach for scrapers before a spokeshave. A scraper hardly minds which way it's going.
With a knife or a chisel, cut downhill, and when you feel the fibres start to lift, stop and come from the other side. You'll learn the feeling quickly.
You also get to decide what stays as it came from the saw and what gets carved. Those marks are your fingerprints on the tool, like the beaver marks inside.
Don't finish it today
Take the shape far enough that the plane is comfortable to hold for the work ahead, and stop. The rest comes with use. Some of the best shaping on my planes happened years later, on a day when a corner annoyed me.
Common Mistakes
Leaving glue on the bedding ramp. Check it again with the lamp low and from the side.
Forcing a tight curve with a wide blade.
Sawing with the block unsupported under the cut. It can be snatched out of your hands.
Shaping everything smooth. You can always take more off later. You can't put it back.
Two moments when I'd like to see it:
Your shape, drawn on the block, before you cut. Tell me what you're going for and I'll tell you what I see.
After the rough shaping, with the iron resting in place, from the side.
Where we are
The plane has its rough shape. Now the sole starts coming down toward the iron. This is a short film about getting close, and about knowing when to stop.
What this film covers
How much there is to remove, and how to see it
Planing the sole of a very hard wood
A higher bevel when the wood destroys your edge
Keeping the sole parallel as you go
Stopping early, and why
What You'll Need
Hand tools: a plane you trust, freshly sharpened, your sharpening stones, paraffin wax Also: the iron and chip breaker to check with, and a good lamp
The Thinking Behind the Work
What we're aiming at
Look at the plane from underneath. The back ramp ends in the small chamfer you made in film 3, about 4 mm high, and the iron meets it roughly in the middle. We remove material from the sole until the edge of the iron is just about to come through.
Take off too much and the mouth opens up, and this plane is a smoother: it wants a tight mouth. So this goes slowly.
Two stages
In this film I only get close, with nothing in the plane. The last part is done after the wedge is made, with the iron in and under tension, on sandpaper.
Why not the jointer
I was taught to do this step over the jointer, and you can. But I've watched people take one pass too many and see the iron drop straight through. A tight mouth is gone in a second that way. I'd rather do it by hand.
When the wood eats your edge
On this Ekki my plane stopped cutting almost at once. The edge was full of tiny white fractures. That's common with very hard and exotic woods, and the answer is a steeper edge: I put on a small secondary bevel at about 35°, perhaps a little more.
The shavings are rough, and that's fine. I'm removing material here, not making a surface. A little wax on the sole of the plane helps a lot.
Check with the iron, often
Every few passes, rest the iron in place and look at how much chamfer is left: a millimetre and a half, then a millimetre.
Look at both sides. If the chamfer is narrower on one side than the other, your sole is no longer parallel to the edge of the iron, and you need to take more off the other side.
Stop early
When I started getting heavy tear-out near the back, I stopped, with a little under a millimetre to go. Normally I like to get closer than that before sanding, but there was no reason to take the risk. The rest will come off on 80 grit and then 180, once there's a wedge.
Common Mistakes
Going on with a dull edge. In wood like this, resharpen as soon as the plane starts to skate.
Planing a taper into the sole by not checking both sides.
Chasing the last half millimetre now. It belongs to the next stage.
If you're unsure how close you are, show me:
The mouth from underneath, with the iron resting in place, in good light, so I can see how much chamfer is left on each side.
Where we are
The sole is within about a millimetre of the iron. Before we can go further, the iron has to be held in the plane under tension, and for that we need the wedge.
A good wedge holds the iron with an ordinary tap, presses evenly across the cross-pin, and stays out of the way of the shavings.
What this film covers
Protecting the small chamfer at the mouth while you work
Three marks that give you the wedge's shape, taken from your own iron and breaker
Cutting the wedge from the centre-block offcut
Flattening it, and fitting it to the cross-pin by reading the marks
Bringing it to final thickness
What You'll Need
Machines: bandsaw Hand tools: square, pencil, plane-adjusting hammer, chisel Also: your flat surface with 80 and 180 grit, the iron and chip breaker screwed together, the centre-block offcut, and any old wedge to hold the iron while you mark out
The Thinking Behind the Work
Mind the chamfer
The chamfer at the mouth is thin now. If the edge of the iron is resting against it when you push a wedge in, it can break off, and with it goes the clean, tight mouth we've been working toward.
So every time the wedge goes in, the iron is pulled back first. Look for light at the mouth before you tap.
For this work I also set the chip breaker back from the edge. If it sits close, it can catch on the chamfer and make you think the iron is not coming through.
The angle hardly matters; the thickness does
My wedges are about 4°. A little more or less makes no difference, because the cross-pin turns to meet whatever angle you give it. What matters is thickness: thick enough to tighten before it runs out of travel, thin enough to go in to the right depth.
Three marks
Put the iron and breaker in the plane, hold them with a spare wedge, and mark your new one from what you see.
Where it ends at the front. A Hock chip breaker has a slight bend in it; you can see it as a fine line across the breaker. Beyond that line the breaker lifts away from the iron, so a wedge pressing there does nothing, and shavings jam under it. The wedge should stop at that line or a little before it. Wedges compress with use and creep forward, so I stop short.
The flat under the cross-pin. The pin needs a flat, smooth surface to press on. Mark where the pin sits, and continue the flat about a centimetre further back, again because the wedge will travel forward over the years.
The rise. Behind the flat, let the wedge get thicker quite quickly. That gives you something solid to tap on. I have an old plane whose wedge has no rise at all, and adjusting it is awkward every single time.
Finish the front end with a small chamfer or a curve so shavings and fingers pass easily.
Cutting it out
The centre-block offcut is ideal: same wood, and already the width of the throat. Check that it's square and clean first.
Draw the wedge so there's room for a second one beside it. The first one often goes wrong, usually by ending up too thin.
Saw it while it is still part of the block, and stay a little outside your line. The piece can move when it's cut free, and you need material left to flatten it.
Flat, then fitted
Flatten the underside on sandpaper with light, even pressure. Mine came off the saw slightly hollow.
For the flat on top, let the thick end hang over the edge of your sanding surface, so only the flat touches the paper. Take off just enough to make it clean. All the thinning after this is done from the underside. It's easier there, and it doesn't leave a step on top.
Reading the wedge
Push the wedge in gently, with the iron held back, and take it out again. The sanded surface is dull and pale, and wherever the pin pressed on it you'll see dark burnished marks.
At first mine showed a mark at one corner only. You can see the same thing from above, as a shadow line between wedge and pin that is wider on one side. That means the wedge is thicker on the side that's marked.
Correct it by sanding the underside with more pressure on the thick side. Keep the surface flat; don't rock it into a bevel. Check, and repeat, until the marks run across the whole width. Catch this early. Once the wedge is nearly at depth, there's no thickness left to correct with.
Final thickness
When the contact is even, thin the whole wedge until an ordinary tap with the adjusting hammer brings its front edge to the mark near the breaker's bend. Use 80 grit for the bulk and 180 to finish, and check often. Then ease the sharp corners so it's pleasant to handle.
If you do go too thin, glue a piece of veneer to the underside. I do that anyway when an old wedge has compressed.
Common Mistakes
Tapping the wedge with the iron forward. That's how the chamfer breaks.
Thinning from the top. You get a step, and you lose your flat.
Noticing uneven contact too late. Read the marks from the very first trial.
A wedge that reaches past the breaker's bend. Shavings will lodge under it.
Worth showing me here:
The top of your wedge after a trial fit, close up and in good light, so the burnished marks show. I'll tell you which side to work on.
The wedge seated in the plane, from above, so I can see where its front edge lands on the breaker.
Where we are
There's a wedge, and about a millimetre of sole left between you and a working plane. This film takes that millimetre off and opens the mouth.
It's slow, dusty work on sandpaper, and it's the step that decides how fine a shaving this plane will take.
What this film covers
Sanding the sole down on a flat surface
When to bring in the iron and wedge
Checking by touch for the edge coming through
How to know the mouth is open enough
What You'll Need
Your flat surface with fresh 80 grit, and fresh 180 for the end The iron, chip breaker and wedge A vacuum for the dust, and acetone if old adhesive is left on the surface
The Thinking Behind the Work
Without the iron first, then with it
I start with nothing in the plane, just to get closer, and I put a little more pressure on whichever side still shows more chamfer.
When about half a millimetre of chamfer is left, and it looks even from side to side, the iron and wedge go in, and they stay in for the rest. The iron is pulled well back, so its edge is nowhere near the chamfer when you tap the wedge.
From here on you are flattening the sole in the state it will be in when the plane is working, with the wedge tight.
Fresh paper, and no dust under you
Use a new piece of sandpaper and make sure it's stuck down flat right to its edges. If an edge lifts, dust has got under it, and it will round your sole. Clear the dust often. Once you feel the plane riding on dust, you are no longer sanding flat.
Even pressure, long strokes. Half a millimetre of this wood is still real work.
Feel for the edge
To check: loosen the wedge, turn the plane over, and with your fingers on the iron bring it forward very slowly toward the mouth.
You're feeling for two things. Whether the edge comes through at all. And whether it rubs on one side as it does. If it catches at one corner, the mouth isn't open there yet.
Near the end I change to 180 grit, so the sole finishes smooth.
When to stop
Stop when the edge comes through freely across its whole width. If you sight along the sole at that point, you should hardly be able to see an opening.
That's usually enough. For smoothing we are talking about very thin shavings. The real test is in the next film: sharpen, set a light cut, and plane. If the shaving jams in the mouth straight away, come back and take off a little more.
It's all right to go a touch past the moment the edge appears. It's not all right to keep going because you're on a roll.
Common Mistakes
Tapping the wedge with the iron against the chamfer. One tap can break it.
Sanding on worn or lifting paper.
Opening the mouth "to be safe". You can always open it more after the first shavings. You can't close it.
The one photograph that tells me most:
The mouth, from underneath, with the iron just showing, taken close and square on. If you're not sure whether to stop, send it before you go further.
Where we are
The mouth is open. Sharpen the iron, set it, and take a shaving. This is the film where a block of wood becomes a plane.
What this film covers
Sharpening and setting the chip breaker
Setting the iron by touch
Reading the shaving on each side, and adjusting with taps
What the tight mouth and the breaker do for you
Shaping that carries on in use
What You'll Need
Your sharpening stones A plane-adjusting hammer A test board with one face planed flat. I used rosewood, to give the plane something difficult. For shaping: rasps and round files, a small gouge
The Thinking Behind the Work
The iron
My iron was already prepared: the back lapped flat, which matters a great deal, and the bevel hollow ground, which makes sharpening by hand easy. It still gets a fresh edge now, because by this stage it has touched things, and mine had a small nick.
Then the chip breaker goes on, as close to the edge as I can see.
Setting it
I hold the iron up with two fingers so the edge stays inside the plane, put the wedge in, and look at the opening. Then small taps on the iron, feeling the sole with my fingertips each time, until I can just feel the edge, the same on both sides.
Reading each side
Take a shaving using the right side of the iron, then one using the left, with the plane fully on the board both times. If one side cuts and the other gives dust, tap the side of the iron to bring it across, and try again.
A tap on the iron takes a heavier cut. If it's too heavy, back the iron off and creep forward again with lighter taps. Every plane responds slightly differently, and you learn yours.
If the shaving splits down the middle, there's still a nick in the edge.
What you've built
My test board had tear-out from the plane I'd used before. This one cleaned it up, going against the grain, in rosewood. That is the tight mouth, the close chip breaker, a sharp edge and a light cut working together, and it's why we spent three films getting the mouth right.
The shape goes on
Now that it cuts, use it, and let your hand tell you what to change. In the film I start a deep recess for the base of my finger, with a round file and rasps, and a small patch of gouge cuts where my thumb rests. I don't mark those out. I go by feel, and I like them a little rough.
I don't put any finish on my planes. They take on their character from use.
The violin
Krenov called the plane the cabinetmaker's violin. In an orchestra, everyone tunes to the violin. In this kind of work, everything is tuned to the plane.
You've made yours. Put it to work.
If it doesn't work first time
The shaving jams in the mouth at once. The mouth is still too tight. Go back to the 180 grit, with the iron in and backed off, and take a little more.
It cuts on one side only, whatever you do. Check the wedge is pressing evenly, and that there's no glue left on the ramp.
The iron won't hold its setting. The wedge is too thin, or not seated on its flat.
And if you can't tell which it is, show me.
This is the one I most want to see:
Your plane, and your first shaving. A photograph is good. A short film of it cutting is better.
Tell me the wood, the iron, and how long it took you.
If it isn't cutting the way you hoped, send it anyway and tell me what it's doing. We'll get it there.