Struggling with squaring small pieces of sapele
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- This topic has 5 replies, 5 voices, and was last updated 7 years, 5 months ago by Dave C.
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I’m currently having a go at Paul’s dovetail caddy project, and found some thin (just over 3/8″) sapele to make it from.
The boards I got were slightly cupped, so I cut the pieces to a bit above the rough dimensions I’d need first, to lessen the cup I needed to remove.
I’m really struggling with two things though:
1) the sapele seems to tearout no matter which direction I plane it in, even though the grain looks straight (it’s quarter sawn from what I can tell). I’m reasonably sure my plane (a no.4) is sharp, as I get really nice thin shavings from some scrap cherry/pine I have lying around without any issues.
2) squaring such a small piece seems almost very hard – one of the pieces is around 3″x5″ or so, seems like there isn’t much room to register the plane on before hitting an edge, and very hard to take off wood in just the right place.
Any advice on this? I worry that maybe I should have tried to square the board before cutting to rough dimensions, but then I thought that I’d end up with too thin a piece due to taking out the cup on both sides across the whole board width (given that the starting board was only 3/8″ or so).
I’m also wondering if planing is the best option for such a small piece – should I try sanding it flat instead? Or use a card scraper?
This is only the 3rd time I’ve tried squaring stock from scratch, the other times went great (thanks to Paul’s videos), but were on much larger pieces of ash and pine.
- This topic was modified 7 years, 5 months ago by Dave C.
Hi Dave,
I really enjoyed making this box; they’re very useful around the shop.
On small thin stock you could use a shooting board to square up the long sides. Remember you only need to square the bottom edges because you will glue the bottom on. The top ones don’t really matter.
As for planing. I guess I have been lucky planing sapele so far. If all else fails you can scrape it. Hopefully someone else can give you better advise.
Wesley
23 November 2016 at 10:41 pm #142653For stock that thin you don’t need to remove the cupping. A board can be smooth but cupped. If you watch the joiners toolbox build, the stock he uses is noticeably cupped and he uses the dovetails to flatten it, so long as your joints are tight.
So scraping will definitely be a safer, albeit slower, option to smooth the edge of your stock. They are tricky to sharpen but its a straight forward process. Sanding is always the fall back, and has its place in every shop.
My advice is to keep on struggling with it. The no. 4, or any smoother, is the single most important tool in my shop and has really defined my current level of work. You are definitely right, squaring thin stock by hand is very hard. Almost impossible at first but your body will learn what it needs.
Also, I learned the hard way that a blade can be sharp but still not produce a cut. The issue comes from accidentally putting a steep micro-camber on the blade. Make sure the area near the cutting egde is flat. Flat blades make flat boards.
For edge planing, you have to rely on your left hand for registration, and use Paul’s trick of just planing half the surface at a time. Thin stock is especially hard but use a very shallow set and you will start to get the feel.
For edge grain, I would suggest learning freehand. I won’t say I’m the best but I have yet to make a shooting board because I want to really develop my muscle control. I’m sure a lot of people would say a shooting board is necessary for fine projects and economy of motion but hand skills require constant practice to develop, so take every opportunity when you’re starting out.
Also, invest in a no. 80 if you have the means. It’s a real work horse.
That’s all from me. Good luck and I’m sure you will be getting things squared away in no time.
24 November 2016 at 5:23 am #142661Paul has the same issue with I believe the same wood in the tool chest video series. He goes through several methods to get the surface planed. One fix was a different way to sharpen the plane iron. I won’t even try to explain it but it’s worth looking into.
I am currently having the same issue with some birch I’m using to build another clock. It tears out in both directions. I had to plane it across the grain and refine it with a #80 cabinet scraper.
If you come up with a good solution I’d sure like to know 🙂
Kevin
You could try closing up the mouth of the plane and moving the chip breaker forward so it’s very close to the edge of the blade. When planing, skewing the cut sometimes helps avoid tearout.
As others have said, sometimes certain boards can’t be planed and scraping/sandpaper is the only choice.
Thanks for the tips, looks like I’ll try tuning the plane a bit more, and skewing, and if that doesn’t help, then look into a scraper (I’ve not used one before, but maybe this is time to get started).
Also good to know that I can live with some slight cupping to the piece of wood too.
This has been a good learning project so far anyway, so I can live with a slightly messy first attempt as long as I learn some things to make the 2nd one better 🙂
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