I've been doing a lot of learning about hand planes recently, and was
interested to see the differences between metal bodied and wooden
planes.
Then I read about infill planes. They look really nice, but can anyone
tell me if there is a functional advantage of having the wooden infil
vs. a regular metal bodied plane?
On Mon, 24 Apr 2006 23:44:45 -0400, alexy <[email protected]> wrote:
>Andy Dingley <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>>On Mon, 24 Apr 2006 08:01:47 -0400, alexy <[email protected]> wrote:
>>If you buy a new kit for one, most are cast
>>bronze.
>Any suggestions for sources. Now that Shepherd is out of business, I
>might be looking elsewhere for one at some point.
Bristol Designs used to do them and I think Charles still has some
castings, but I know that he can't source adjusters (Norris style) to
offer any them more.
You can always make your own. It's not hard to get bronze castings made
from a pattern, and it's not even a hard pattern to make. I'm tempted to
cast my own (I've been doing a lot of bronze and silver casting lately),
but I've no real need or time for one. I've got castings for an iron
smoother (A5 style) and 1" shoulder plane that have been sitting here
for the last 2 years already!
>>For narrow shoulder planes, corian makes a nice infill (but a poor
>>wedge, as it's inelastic)
>How is its mass compared to a heavy wood?
Corian is about 1.6 specific gravity, AFAIR. Comparable to dense-ish
wood. Neither really matters anyway, a cast sole easily outweighs them.
Andy Dingley <[email protected]> wrote:
>On Mon, 24 Apr 2006 08:01:47 -0400, alexy <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>>AS far as I know, both old and new infills are made from steel plate,
>>with sides (usually of thinner plate) dovetailed to the base.
>
>I've got cast iron, ductile iron, cast bronze, steel plate and a mixture
>of steel and brass plate.
Interesting. Shows I don't know my vintage tools too well!
>If you buy a new kit for one, most are cast
>bronze.
Any suggestions for sources. Now that Shepherd is out of business, I
might be looking elsewhere for one at some point.
> Most of the low-volume bijou makers today are dovetailing. For
>thumb planes, chariots and the like, then cast bronze has always been
>the common method.
>For narrow shoulder planes, corian makes a nice infill (but a poor
>wedge, as it's inelastic)
How is its mass compared to a heavy wood?
>
>If you make your own by dovetailing, go for the steel and brass route.
>It's easier to dovetail, easier to file the dovetail gap flush, and you
>can still see the join afterwards.
Did that on a shoulder.
> It must be really galing to go to the
>trouble of dovetailing steel into steel, working hard to get an invisble
>join, then having something where only a plane duffer can appreciate the
>quality!
Oh, I don't know. I'm building a steel sided smoother (Spiers inspired
plane from Shepherd), and like having the dovetails disappear unless
you get them in just the right light. <g>
--
Alex -- Replace "nospam" with "mail" to reply by email. Checked infrequently.
wilbur wrote:
> I've been doing a lot of learning about hand planes recently, and was
> interested to see the differences between metal bodied and wooden
> planes.
>
> Then I read about infill planes. They look really nice, but can anyone
> tell me if there is a functional advantage of having the wooden infil
> vs. a regular metal bodied plane?
It's how it's made that's the major advantage. Infills start out as
flat plates and are machined prior to assembly, as opposed to starting
out as a casting. Castings shrink as they cool and it can be a fair
amount of work to get the sole dead flat. Infills start out that way.
The weight is another advantage. There's also more hand work involved
in making an infill, so each one is closer to a custom creation.
R
RicodJour wrote:
> wilbur wrote:
> > I've been doing a lot of learning about hand planes recently, and was
> > interested to see the differences between metal bodied and wooden
> > planes.
> >
> > Then I read about infill planes. They look really nice, but can anyone
> > tell me if there is a functional advantage of having the wooden infil
> > vs. a regular metal bodied plane?
>
> It's how it's made that's the major advantage. Infills start out as
> flat plates and are machined prior to assembly, as opposed to starting
> out as a casting. Castings shrink as they cool and it can be a fair
> amount of work to get the sole dead flat.
OTOH, that work should be done at the factory making it
a non-issue for the buyer/user, unless--see below.
> Infills start out that way.
> The weight is another advantage. There's also more hand work involved
> in making an infill, so each one is closer to a custom creation.
>
If the plate stock used to make the infill was properly annealed
then it will probably be more stable than a cast sole, even if
the casting was also annealed. Grey cast iron is also brittle,
a cast plane can break in half if dropped, the worse that would
likely happen to an infill would be a broken tote and chipped cutter.
Lee Valley makes their iron planes from ductile cast iron---it
is not brittle like the old grey-cast iron. One of the woowdorking
shows on PBS visitied the factory and showed the sole for a
#7 being made. They flattened the sole by running it through
a machine resembling a panel sander (linishing?) befor even
taking it out of the mold. Very cool.
Note that a #78 broken at the mouth makes a dandy bull-nosed
chisel plane.
--
FF
[email protected] wrote:
> RicodJour wrote:
> > wilbur wrote:
> > > I've been doing a lot of learning about hand planes recently, and was
> > > interested to see the differences between metal bodied and wooden
> > > planes.
> > >
> > > Then I read about infill planes. They look really nice, but can anyone
> > > tell me if there is a functional advantage of having the wooden infil
> > > vs. a regular metal bodied plane?
> >
> > It's how it's made that's the major advantage. Infills start out as
> > flat plates and are machined prior to assembly, as opposed to starting
> > out as a casting. Castings shrink as they cool and it can be a fair
> > amount of work to get the sole dead flat.
>
> OTOH, that work should be done at the factory making it
> a non-issue for the buyer/user, unless--see below.
Should be the operative word. I shouldn't know what lapping was if the
work was done at the factory.
> > Infills start out that way.
> > The weight is another advantage. There's also more hand work involved
> > in making an infill, so each one is closer to a custom creation.
> >
>
> If the plate stock used to make the infill was properly annealed
> then it will probably be more stable than a cast sole, even if
> the casting was also annealed. Grey cast iron is also brittle,
> a cast plane can break in half if dropped, the worse that would
> likely happen to an infill would be a broken tote and chipped cutter.
I hadn't thought about repairability, but that's a good point.
> Lee Valley makes their iron planes from ductile cast iron---it
> is not brittle like the old grey-cast iron. One of the woowdorking
> shows on PBS visitied the factory and showed the sole for a
> #7 being made. They flattened the sole by running it through
> a machine resembling a panel sander (linishing?) befor even
> taking it out of the mold. Very cool.
Compare the cost of even a high quality wood or cast plane to that of
an infill. The infill is roughly twice the price at least. Ten or
twenty bucks would cover the difference in materials, so the rest is
the labor involved, which is substantially greater. As in most things,
you get what you pay for.
R
CW wrote:
> <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
> >
> >>
> > If the plate stock used to make the infill was properly annealed
> > then it will probably be more stable than a cast sole, even if
> > the casting was also annealed.
>
> Not true.
Which part is untrue, the part about the plate being stable or
the part about the casting being unsable?
--
FF
alexy wrote:
> "CW" <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> >Cast iron is very stable and better wearing than steel.
>
> Not a metallurgist here, but I thought CI was softer than most steels,
> and more subject to wear by abrasion?
>
It is. Not sure that 'better wearing' is meant to imply
resistance though.
Castings also are notorious for warping due to residual
stresses left when the thicker parts cooled slower than
the thinner parts. Cold-rolled plate will have residual
stresses too, but hot-rolled and annealed should minimize
them.
--
FF
CW wrote:
> If that were the case, machine tools would be made primarily from steel.
> They aren't. As for the hardness of cast iron, true it is softer than steel
> but it's high carbon (graphite) content tends to make it somewhat self
> lubricating were steel will gall much easier. This is, of course, metal to
> metal contact so really wouldn't apply here. Should have said that in the
> first place. As far as stability. No steel will outdo cast iron if properly
> stress relieved.
>
> "alexy" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
> > Steel generally wears better than iron.
> > --
> > Alex -- Replace "nospam" with "mail" to reply by email. Checked
> infrequently.
If _what_ were true?
Large beds for metalworking machines are typically made
from cast iron for a number of reasons. The primary reason
is that it is possible to cast the large parts from cast iron.
While there are cast steels, they don't cast as well as iron.
For an appreciable number of units, casting is almost always
the cheapest way to make them
Secondly, cast iron machines easier that steels due in part
to the lubricity provided by the graphite inclusions mentioned
above, and partly because it is softer than steel.
Cast Iron is just as stiff as steel but has better dampening,
again due to the graphite inclusions.
It's good stuff.
But it is not harder or more stable than annealed steel.
--
GG
Many people have mentioned weight as being an advantage for an infill
plane. As best I can tell, rosewood species (this seems to be a common
wood for infill planes) have a specific gravity of somewhere between
0.8 and 1.2. Cast iron has a specific gravity in the 7-8 range, which
would make it much denser than rosewood.
So does an infill plane really weigh more than a similarly sized cast
iron plane?
<[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>
>>
> If the plate stock used to make the infill was properly annealed
> then it will probably be more stable than a cast sole, even if
> the casting was also annealed.
Not true.
On Tue, 25 Apr 2006 23:41:32 -0400, wilbur <[email protected]>
wrote:
>So does an infill plane really weigh more than a similarly sized cast
>iron plane?
Yes - but because there's more metal in there, not because of the wood.
Cast infills are notably heavier than dovetailed sheet. A "Plane o Ayr"
is a real lightweight in comprison to anything, including a #4, because
of the thin base and the minimal sides.
Remember that the infill pre-dates the Bailey pattern. They were
heavyweight in comparison to woodies. The Bailey pattern was a way of
giving the iron base and mass of the infill, with modern production
methods and without all the expensive labour of fitting the infills.
Infills still worked better though and so the myth grew up that even
more mass had to be a good thing, just because one of their properties
was extra mass.
Patrick is just _wrong_ when he claims this for the #4 1/2
"I have this half-baked, semi-baked, even fully-baked theory that
Stanley offered this plane as competition for the heavier infill planes,
being produced in England."
http://supertool.com/StanleyBG/stan1.htm#num4.5
<[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>
>
> But it is not harder
That has been established.
or more stable than annealed steel. If we keep this thread going long
enough, you will do a complete 180. You stand at about 140 now. I've been
machining this stuff for 20 years now. Using machines to make machines. I
have a pretty good idea what works and what doesn't. Did some Stellite
today. Want to know some tough Sh*t.
>
> --
>
> GG
>
wilbur wrote:
> Many people have mentioned weight as being an advantage for an infill
> plane. As best I can tell, rosewood species (this seems to be a common
> wood for infill planes) have a specific gravity of somewhere between 0.8
> and 1.2. Cast iron has a specific gravity in the 7-8 range, which would
> make it much denser than rosewood.
>
> So does an infill plane really weigh more than a similarly sized cast
> iron plane?
If you filled a cast iron plane in with wood, you'd have a (heavier)
infill. I imagine if someone were to fill a plane with cast iron you
could still call it an infill, and it'd still be heavy.
:)
er
--
email not valid
If that were the case, machine tools would be made primarily from steel.
They aren't. As for the hardness of cast iron, true it is softer than steel
but it's high carbon (graphite) content tends to make it somewhat self
lubricating were steel will gall much easier. This is, of course, metal to
metal contact so really wouldn't apply here. Should have said that in the
first place. As far as stability. No steel will outdo cast iron if properly
stress relieved.
"alexy" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> Steel generally wears better than iron.
> --
> Alex -- Replace "nospam" with "mail" to reply by email. Checked
infrequently.
wilbur wrote:
> I've been doing a lot of learning about hand planes recently, and was
> interested to see the differences between metal bodied and wooden planes.
>
> Then I read about infill planes. They look really nice, but can anyone
> tell me if there is a functional advantage of having the wooden infil
> vs. a regular metal bodied plane?
Bling. And weight.
er
--
email not valid
Infills have heft,tight mouths,easy to adjust,and a pleasure to use,stanley
came out with the 4 1/2 to compete with the infills more heft,all in all the
4 1/2 is a very popular plane but really not comparable with an infill.if
your really into planes you must have a smoothing infill.
"wilbur" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:2006042206465016807-wilburpan@hotmailcom...
> I've been doing a lot of learning about hand planes recently, and was
> interested to see the differences between metal bodied and wooden
> planes.
>
> Then I read about infill planes. They look really nice, but can anyone
> tell me if there is a functional advantage of having the wooden infil
> vs. a regular metal bodied plane?
>
Newly manufactured infills are probably machined from the solid as the low
volume would make it more economical. Old ones, when they were in
production, were cast same as any metal body plane. If you start out with a
piece of metal thick enough to make an infill and machine it to shape, it
WILL warp. It can, of course be stress relieved and machined strait. Cast
iron will warp, unless stress relieved and machined strait. Cast iron, when
treated correctly, is extremely stable. The bedways of precision machine
tools are now, and always have been, made of cast iron.
"RicodJour" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>
> It's how it's made that's the major advantage. Infills start out as
> flat plates and are machined prior to assembly, as opposed to starting
> out as a casting. Castings shrink as they cool and it can be a fair
> amount of work to get the sole dead flat. Infills start out that way.
> The weight is another advantage. There's also more hand work involved
> in making an infill, so each one is closer to a custom creation.
>
> R
>
May be true. I can't really say that I have sen a lot of the old ones but
the couple I have were cast.
"alexy" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> "CW" <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> >Newly manufactured infills are probably machined from the solid as the
low
> >volume would make it more economical. Old ones, when they were in
> >production, were cast same as any metal body plane.
>
> AS far as I know, both old and new infills are made from steel plate,
> with sides (usually of thinner plate) dovetailed to the base.
>
>
> --
> Alex -- Replace "nospam" with "mail" to reply by email. Checked
infrequently.
On Mon, 24 Apr 2006 08:01:47 -0400, alexy <[email protected]> wrote:
>AS far as I know, both old and new infills are made from steel plate,
>with sides (usually of thinner plate) dovetailed to the base.
I've got cast iron, ductile iron, cast bronze, steel plate and a mixture
of steel and brass plate. If you buy a new kit for one, most are cast
bronze. Most of the low-volume bijou makers today are dovetailing. For
thumb planes, chariots and the like, then cast bronze has always been
the common method.
For narrow shoulder planes, corian makes a nice infill (but a poor
wedge, as it's inelastic)
If you make your own by dovetailing, go for the steel and brass route.
It's easier to dovetail, easier to file the dovetail gap flush, and you
can still see the join afterwards. It must be really galing to go to the
trouble of dovetailing steel into steel, working hard to get an invisble
join, then having something where only a plane duffer can appreciate the
quality!
wilbur <[email protected]> wrote:
>I've been doing a lot of learning about hand planes recently, and was
>interested to see the differences between metal bodied and wooden
>planes.
>
>Then I read about infill planes. They look really nice, but can anyone
>tell me if there is a functional advantage of having the wooden infil
>vs. a regular metal bodied plane?
Steel generally wears better than iron.
--
Alex -- Replace "nospam" with "mail" to reply by email. Checked infrequently.
wilbur <[email protected]> wrote:
: I've been doing a lot of learning about hand planes recently, and was
: interested to see the differences between metal bodied and wooden
: planes.
: Then I read about infill planes. They look really nice, but can anyone
: tell me if there is a functional advantage of having the wooden infil
: vs. a regular metal bodied plane?
They have (or should have) very tight mouths, and the blade is
supported all the way down to the mouth. The former you can
get with a metal plane by moving the
frog forward, but this results in less support for the blade.
-- Andy Barss
On Tue, 25 Apr 2006 19:52:47 -0400, alexy <[email protected]> wrote:
>Or if you don't want to use a casting, here's a great photo
>documentation of Gary Kramer's building of a box mitre plane:
>http://www.picturetrail.com/gallery/view?p=999&gid=6915920&uid=1093670
I quite fancy a mitre plane like that and I would like to make a
dovetailed one (brass sides).
I'm also just off the phone from someone trying to sell me a Bridgeport
vertical mill for £600.....
"CW" <[email protected]> wrote:
>May be true. I can't really say that I have sen a lot of the old ones but
>the couple I have were cast.
Interesting. Do you know the origin of these planes? By "the couple I
have", do you mean the couple you own or the couple you have seen? If
the former, can you post some details and a pic or two? What metal was
the casting?
I think the better known makers, such as Norris, Spiers, and
Mathieson, made their planes primarily from steel, with the bodies
dovetailed together.
--
Alex -- Replace "nospam" with "mail" to reply by email. Checked infrequently.
"CW" <[email protected]> wrote:
>Newly manufactured infills are probably machined from the solid as the low
>volume would make it more economical. Old ones, when they were in
>production, were cast same as any metal body plane.
AS far as I know, both old and new infills are made from steel plate,
with sides (usually of thinner plate) dovetailed to the base.
--
Alex -- Replace "nospam" with "mail" to reply by email. Checked infrequently.
On Mon, 24 Apr 2006 21:00:13 GMT, "CW" <[email protected]> wrote:
>Cast iron is very stable and better wearing than steel.
Old cast iron is stable. New cast iron is anything but, unless it has
been normalised (heat treated).
Andy Dingley <[email protected]> wrote:
>You can always make your own. It's not hard to get bronze castings made
>from a pattern, and it's not even a hard pattern to make.
Or if you don't want to use a casting, here's a great photo
documentation of Gary Kramer's building of a box mitre plane:
http://www.picturetrail.com/gallery/view?p=999&gid=6915920&uid=1093670
--
Alex -- Replace "nospam" with "mail" to reply by email. Checked infrequently.
On Sat, 22 Apr 2006 06:46:50 -0400, wilbur <[email protected]>
wrote:
>Then I read about infill planes. They look really nice, but can anyone
>tell me if there is a functional advantage of having the wooden infil
>vs. a regular metal bodied plane?
Infills really can be better.
First of all, they're intended to be better. They're just made for it -
better fit, tighter tolerances, a design intended specifically for fine
smoothing in awkward timber.
In practice, as far as my Norrises are concerned, it's the zero-backlash
adjuster that makes the difference. It's the best design of adjuster
I've yet found (I prefer the differential screw version) although it's
notably copied onto modern Veritas planes.
As to weight, then I don;t find their extra weight to be an advantage.
Weight is good, but by the time you've got to an iron plane, a lot extra
isn't much extra help. The point of the rest of an infill's behaviour is
that you don't have to use inertia as a hammer - it's _sharp_.
As to the blades, then mine have Sheffield laminated and tapered irons
from a variety of makers. These are all good irons and chatter proof
owing to the enormous thickness of both them and their cap irons.
They're not as hard as Japanese laminated irons though, and they don't
have anything like the eternal edge holding of A2.
I like my infills, but I wouldn't pay insane collector prices for them.
You can get the same performance from Veritas, or for less weight and
wedge adjustment, one of Steve Knight's.
"CW" <[email protected]> wrote:
>Cast iron is very stable and better wearing than steel.
Not a metallurgist here, but I thought CI was softer than most steels,
and more subject to wear by abrasion?
--
Alex -- Replace "nospam" with "mail" to reply by email. Checked infrequently.
On 24 Apr 2006 21:10:24 -0700, [email protected] wrote:
>Large beds for metalworking machines are typically made
>from cast iron for a number of reasons.
What's a "bed" though? Something like a milling table is typically cast
iron, but slideways on a lathe bed will be steel. Often these are steel
strips attached to a cast iron bed, then machined. The iron is cheap to
form and gives a stable bed, but it's worth using steel for the wear
surfaces.
>While there are cast steels, they don't cast as well as iron.
They cast fine (in terms of end results), it just costs more owing to
the higher temperatures needed. Also most "cast steel" isn't cast (in
this sense) it's just a label for a crucible steel that has been melted.
Inconsequential these days, but that used to be a mark of quality over
shear steels.
BTW - If anyone isn't familiar with the history of machine tools, then
reading a copy of LTC Rolt's "Tools for the Job" is highly recommended.
"CW" <[email protected]> wrote:
>If that were the case, machine tools would be made primarily from steel.
Well, I have to defer to you there; I know nothing about machine
tools. But might there be other reasons for using CI, even if it were
not as resistant to abrasion as steel?
>They aren't. As for the hardness of cast iron, true it is softer than steel
>but it's high carbon (graphite) content tends to make it somewhat self
>lubricating were steel will gall much easier. This is, of course, metal to
>metal contact so really wouldn't apply here. Should have said that in the
>first place. As far as stability. No steel will outdo cast iron if properly
>stress relieved.
>
>"alexy" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>news:[email protected]...
>> Steel generally wears better than iron.
>> --
>> Alex -- Replace "nospam" with "mail" to reply by email. Checked
>infrequently.
>
--
Alex -- Replace "nospam" with "mail" to reply by email. Checked infrequently.
Cast iron is very stable and better wearing than steel.
<[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>
> CW wrote:
> > <[email protected]> wrote in message
> > news:[email protected]...
> > >
> > >>
> > > If the plate stock used to make the infill was properly annealed
> > > then it will probably be more stable than a cast sole, even if
> > > the casting was also annealed.
> >
> > Not true.
>
> Which part is untrue, the part about the plate being stable or
> the part about the casting being unsable?
>
> --
>
> FF
>