cap in plane is slipping
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First, I’m not sure if it’s the right name for the offending part, but I’ll try to explain.
On my planes, I experience that the clamping piece, with either a screw or a lever, used to clamp down the blade and chip breaker assembly, slips during use. I insert everything according to instructions, making sure the screw is fully seated in the keyhole before I clamp it tight. I usually go adjust it so I am able to adjust my plane with two fingers while holding it. But after a (not too long) while, it slips out of the keyhole, and everything gets loose. Then I need to unclamp it, and get it back together. Not too bad, but this also means I have to realign the blade to the sole, which I was hoping would only be necessary after resharpening.
Anyone??
Best regards,
Kjell12 November 2015 at 5:51 pm #132315My guess is that the “lever cap” is not tight enough. I adjust the screw (the screw that the lever cap “keyhole” fits over) so that it is fairly hard to depress the lever. But I should still be able to depress it with one thumb.
It could also be that your blade is set too deep. With a deep set (cutting large shavings) there would be a lot of backward pressure on the blade and ship breaker, as well as the lever cap. Just a thought.
You’ll probably need to experiment with the tightness to see what works for you.
12 November 2015 at 5:52 pm #132316Hi Kjell,
It’s commonly called the Lever Cap.
You can search “Hand plane Parts” to find annotated images showing the common name of each part.I am a hobby woodworker so I probably do not have the hand and finger strength of a Craftsman. I set the lever cap screw so I can adjust the plane with ‘a little effort’ with just 2 fingers. – I remember Paul said in one of his videos “The Cap Lever should close with a bit of a snap”.
Secondly, You can decrease the friction between the blade and the frog (the slope that the blade rests on in the body of the plane). The milling of the frog can sometimes be a bit rough so a bit of work with some “Wet&Dry” sandpaper (on a flat surface) will allow the blade to slide up and down easier. — A little work on the flats where the frog and the plane body meet is also of benefit 9but is a little more difficult)
Don’t forget to lubricate the meeting surfaces of the plane body and frog and the blade and frog.
Paul has videos on his YouTube channel showing how to set up a plane.
I hope this helps,
Steve12 November 2015 at 7:12 pm #132321Hello Kjell,
First of all I should explain that I’m a bricklayer of half a century and as everyone knows a bricklayer is just a carpenter with his brain removed. So treat my advice with a certain amount of scepticism.However, this next piece can be treated as gospel. Mainly because I have an original pamphlet next to me entitled You And Your Record Plane.
Firstly, there is no such part on any bench plane called a chipbreaker. It is a complete misnomer as the actual name implies. Anyone getting chips from their plane has got serious issues. Unfortunately there are one or two people living 3.5 to 5.5k west of us who for whatever reason are unable to remember actual names of things and therefore invent their own. In fact they have been doing so for at least two hundred years. The original given name for what some erroneously call a chipbreaker is in fact a Cap Iron. It even refers to a Cap Iron in my 45 year old Record pamphlet.
1. Lateral Alignment Lever: This a long, thin piece of metal that extends back close to the handle that operates a rectangluar metal ‘button’. The function of the LAL is to adjust the cutting edge of the blade left or right to either give finite adjustment for square or set it askew if you so desire. Before you fit the paired Irons make sure the LAL moves back and forth easily.
2. Cap Iron and Cutting Iron: Are bolted together out of the plane with the Cap Iron approximately 1.5 to 2mm from the actual cutting edge and as square as your eyes will allow. Then carefully fit them into the plane body ensuring the top rectangular slot fits over the LAL ‘button’. At this stage you can move the LAL back and forth, a) to check it is seated and working okay and b) square up the cutting edge to the mouth.
3. Lever Cap: This the final piece to replace and it is the chunk of metal with the flappy hinge-like thing on the end. The flappy thing is called a Cam Lever and needs to be in a vertical position prior to refitting. Then slip the Lever Cap over the main screw and slide it down the keyhole until the Cutting Iron edge is flush with the mouth. Then gently nip the screw up until the head is just touching the Lever Cap then try locking the Cam Lever down. The Cam Lever should only require a moderate amount of pressure to lock down and you adjust to this pressure by either by tightening or loosening the screw accordingly.
That’s me done Kjell, hopefully you’ll get sorted out soon as and no doubt someone will be along shortly who actually knows what his talking about And put me straight too.
Hasta luego sénor
Scott
Thanks for all the answers, but unfortunately very helpful, except I now know what that part is called (for the record, English is not my native language). My lever cap is not of the lever operated kind, but the kind which has a screw on top as well. That should not matter much, but I cannot feel for the “snap”.
Anyway, I did do my homework before asking this, and all of the advices for tuning and setting up the plane is followed to the best of my ability. I have done a fair bit of metalwork, so I now how to do this kind of stuff.
My machined surfaces are quite good, so friction is not really the issue. My main concern with tightening the cap too much is that the plain will distort.
I’ll try to set it tighter, and if it works, I’ll just have to flatten the sole again with this tighter setting.
Thanks,
Kjell12 November 2015 at 10:51 pm #132329Kjell,
The simple answer is that you do not have the cap screw tight enough.‘Tuning’ the plane in the way described is so that the blade adjustment will work smoothly with a tighter cap screw.
I really can not see how a plane sole can be distorted by a small increase in cap screw tension.
There would be some small increase in force between the blade assembly and frog, but this would not transfer (as seen by using any Normal measurement method) to the sole of the plane.I think you are safe to adequately tighten the cap screw without having to re-flatten your sole.
Also try to think less(Worry less) about small changes to tolerance values as a woodworker (Leave your ‘Engineering Head’ in the metal shop 😉 ). I think that the ‘Government Standard’ tolerance for sole flatness is .005″ (.127mm) — the manufacturers try and keep it below .002″ You are not going to distort your sole so that you can actually see a difference in the shaving whatever you do to the Set-UP of your plane — A typical ‘working’ shaving is 005″ or more anyway so and tiny discrepancy will be lost in that anyway.
I heard Paul say to the effect that the showy thousandth of an inch shaving has no meaning to the working Craftsman – who is going to spend the time taking 62.5 passes with the plane to take off a 1/16th of an inch of wood?stevewales,
the solution was indeed to tighten the screw. When I first got the plane, I could not adjust it when it was so tight, but since then I cleaned up the bed, but forgot to see how it worked with a tight screw. When I try it now it is easy to adjust even if I tighten it as hard as I can using fingers only.To comment on the flatness of the sole, I don’t agree that this may be an issue. When I got the plane, it was way out of tolerance, which is something I expected given how it is manufactured. I don’t think they can provide that kind of flatness unless you pay for the premium planes. They may have been flat right after grinding, but not when I get my hands on them.
My plane was close to impossible to plane end grain with before I flattened the sole. After, it was a breeze. Now, after tightening the screw, end grain planing was not good, so I checked it with my precision machinist square, and there was a marked hollow in the sole right in front of the mouth. Releasing the tension a bit made the hollow disappear. You’d be amazed to see how much even chunky pieces of metal will bend under tension.
Anyway, thanks for all the suggestions, the solution was right in front of me, I just couldn’t see it.
Kjell
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