If not planing end grain, then what?
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Have tried planing the end grain of laminated pieces of knotty pine with a shooting board and without, both with disappointing results as shown. It was smoother with less tear out before I tried to plane it.
Is there something else that can be done with hand tools to the end grain to make it smooth? Or are more practice, sharper irons, skewed angle, chamfered edges the only solutions?
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You must be logged in to view attached files.30 July 2014 at 9:42 pm #59908Hi there,
It looks like your plane could do with sharpening. You need a razor sharp iron and very little set on your plane when working end grain.
I also noticed a fracture on the right hand side of the board in the photo, which may have come from planing the whole way across the board. On end grain, you need to stop just before the end, then come from the opposite side.
Hope this helps. Sharp tools is the most important thing in hand tool work!
George.
30 July 2014 at 10:53 pm #59912cory i dont know why you are getting such poor results with your end grain planing apart from the reasons george has already spoken of but what i did want to say was please cut those metal threaded rods off the front of your vice as they will make a mess of your knuckles before you know it
Thanks George for the tips. Thanks Craig I’ve checked and the iron is bevel down. Wasn’t an intentional joke, but I agree that photo doesn’t look like the other planed end grain photos I’ve seen either. Thanks edfly I know from experience what you mean. Will get on that.
So, looks like it is back to the sharpening papers and maybe I’ll get a strop and some chromium oxide.
31 July 2014 at 3:22 am #59924Like has been said above, sharp tools and shallow cuts working from each end towards the middle. Start with the blade retracted and taking no shaving. Advance the blade a little at a time until it just barely touches the wood. Leave it set that way. Plane the end grain until it’s smooth. It will take much longer this way but is the best way I know of for getting a feel for planing end grain. As you get more comfortable, start taking deeper cuts. End grain shavings should never be more than just wispy thin. Hope that helps in some way.
3 August 2014 at 7:41 pm #60055Although I will use a No 4, 4 1/2 or No 5 for end grain when using a shooting board I find I get better results on planing end grain using my block plane.
As it has been stated above it is important to have very sharp blades
3 August 2014 at 9:36 pm #60063David has got the right Idea a knife line right around board.
Also sharpness of plane iron is the key.
On end grain work from each end of board and stop planing before you reach other end. Like Greg said.
Sometimes on end grain it helps to skew the plane so instead of plane being square to board. Plane is at an angle this angle helps slice through the fibres of the wood a little easier.
If new to woodworking its hard to gauge what really sharp is.
You should be able to cut hair on your arm be carful do not want any injury’s. Also you can place edge of iron on your thumb nail. If iron catches on nail it is sharp if it runs across nail it will still need honing.
There is a bit of a saying in woodworking less is more as you will find take a little at a time and you will get better results.
Also did I mention tools have to be sharp. 😉
Let us know how you get on we are all here to help.I have started to plane the end grain of the legs for the workbench and wasn’t finding it very pleasant.
Sharpened up the iron and it was a considerable difference. It was still a lot of work to plane a 1/4 or 1/8 down to the knife line but at least the progress was steady.
Also, the plane would make an awful screeching noise on the smooth end grain. Remembered Paul’s little tin with an oiled rag stuffed in it. I used camellia oil and spritzed it on to a rag, then ran the plane backwards over it a couple of times. Wow, smooth as silk and it seemed to last quite a while before getting dry again.
Chamfering to the knife line also helped a lot, so that the tear out, or spelching, was non-existant. Makes it very clear where you need to work on leveling the surface.
Codexmas, just so I am clear – are you saying you were trying to plane end grain 1/8 or 1/4″ down to the knife wall line? If so,(and if it were me, which it isn’t, and I know nobody asked but..) I would try to set up your saw so that the cut/ kerf rides just outside of your knife line, then you would only have a fraction of that to plane away. Please excuse if I misunderstood. And yes, that lil oil can trick is a wonder isnt it?
Brian, indeed I was planing down quite a lot. This was due to my poor attempt on one of the legs at sawing it before striking knife lines. Had to revise my bench height by 1/4 of an inch…
I choose to plane it down so that I could really get the hang of it, and some of the legs only needed just a bit as the glue ups were not great. The laminated 2×4’s on one end or another were offset a little, so sawing through meant not having very much more wood than kerf for half of the thickness.
All in all good times, learned a lot about planing end grain for the first time.
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