19 Comments

  1. When using a no 80 to remove torn grain do you have to worry about removing too much material and leaving a noticeable low spot, or is it removing such thin shavings it isn’t noticeable over the length of a board?

    1. I asked Paul and this was his reply:

      “It’s about the thinnest shaving you can get and as I have written and explained in other places. The fault is not the low spot the fault is the surrounding area. Focus mainly on the surrounding area and this will make you lower and you will only need a few swipes in the remaining section.”

  2. Thanks Paul for your comments on the cross grain rebates and the tool. I had struggled to get good cross rebates with the tool. You gave several great tips on how to make the cross rebates that I will for sure incorporate into my woodworking. I had come to dislike this cross grain rebate tool so much that I had stopped using it and had just used the hand router plane. That works but it can be a bit slow on longer rebates. If you were looking for a YouTube video on another tool to share more detail, what you outlined here would make a great basis for that video on the cross rebate tool. I haven’t seen anyone talk as thoroughly and succinctly about it elsewhere (and I have looked).

  3. I enjoy the larger dovetail cabinet projects, looking forward to see this through.

    Just wondered about the marking out of dovetails, as I have seen Paul in the past mark the first face and then transfer these across to other pieces, instead of measuring and marking each tail on every side.

  4. Paul, I’ve noticed from your projects that you do not create “sprung” edge joints. I’ve read a number of woodworking books and watched some videos and occasionally read and saw makers advocate for sprung edge joints. What, if any, utility and necessity is there for “sprung” edge joints?

  5. I really loved the long silent section at the beginning, and seeing Paul think through the design process. BBC4 had an hour-long film of a woodworker with no music and no dialogue (proving that there iS demand for this kind of thing), but it wasn’t as good as Paul’s version, because one didn’t learn much from the BBC4 woodworker.

  6. I find that as long as a video doesn’t purport to teach you something, if the video is just watching a woodworker work wood, that muting the audio is also a good way to focus on what is being done, rather than what is coming out of the speakers. Search youtube for ‘Båtbyggeri’ and watch the video by Åke Palm, or the ‘Just another dovetail video’ from Fine Woodworking.
    Maybe we should have a thread for speech and music free videos here….

  7. The nicker never does exactly what I expect it to on my Stanley rebate plane. And I have to watch that the fence doesn’t inadvertently change – tightening every 3 or 4 passes is definitely required!

  8. It seems to be a good practice to pare down the outcut surface slightly with a chisel when cutting cross-grain rebates so that the rebate plane doesn’t break off the edge. I have found the same things occur with my Woden 78 as you have experienced: the shavings jam in the throat, the depth shoe and the fence creep out of position, and the nicker isn’t very good at scoring the wood fibres. Also, you have to clean out the corner of the rebate by other means because you don’t get a sharp square corner from the plane. Keep a box of plasters nearby, too.

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