# Hand planing figured maple



## ChuckBarnett (Jan 5, 2013)

Okay I'm not much of a woodworker, but I am trying to do something and want to do it right. I am building a tenor ukulele. I have stock that I have resawn into two matching pieces that I intend to join together with glue for the back. I put the two boards one on top of each other on a shooting board. I have a low angle Lee Nielsen jack plane and am wondering if I should be using something else for this. Or perhaps there might be a better way to do this. Here are pictures. And thank you, for any help you might have!


----------



## epicfail48 (Mar 27, 2014)

Low angles and figured wood don't get along well, the low angle has a habit of digging into the great at the figured parts and causing some wicked readout. What you want is actually a higher angle, if memory serves the term is a York bedded plane, with an effective edge angle of 50-55 degrees. I think. It's been a while. You can get the higher angle effect with a low angle bevel up plane by making the bevel on the iron more obtuse. 

For example, if your iron is presently sharpened with a 25 degree bevel and is bedded at 12 degrees, the effective angle of the edge is 37 degrees. To get that to a better range for figured woods, the iron could instead be sharpened at 40 degrees, for an effective angle of 52 degrees, better for his kind of work


----------



## Terry Q (Jul 28, 2016)

The lie-Nielsen no 62 low angle bench plane is a perfect plane to own for this type of planning. Invest in an extra iron and grind it like epicfail said. Lie-Nielsen encourages you to buy extra blades for the no 62 for just this purpose. 


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk


----------



## m.n.j.chell (May 12, 2016)

You stated, "I'm not much of a woodworker ..."

You are gluing together two thin pieces of wood. The edge needs to be perfect. Hand planing these edges will not be your best option unless you are using the right plane. Even with a perfectly level blade, too short a base can give you parabolic edge. (people tend to push a little harder at one point through the stroke, etc.)

If you take the time, practice your stroke on some scrap, and have a truly sharp blade, you can get the straight edge you're looking for.

Or you can run the boards by a router bit on a table. Set up correctly, you can get a really good edge that way.

Or you can set up a sanding block to get a perfect edge, too. 

I'm just suggesting there are other options for what you're trying to achieve.


----------



## amckenzie4 (Apr 29, 2010)

A ukulele is pretty small, so I'm assuming the boards aren't much more than 18-20" long. It should be fairly possible to joint them with a jack plane: the usual rule I've heard is that it's (relatively) easy to joint a board up to double the length of your plane. If you have a long-grain shooting board, it should be easier. 

I'd use a relatively high angle jack plane, and make sure to clamp the boards to the shooting board, closed like a book: meaning, lay them out as you want them, then "hinge" them face to face. That way, if your plane is a little bit off of vertical, you'll still get a clean joint. (If you intentionally angle the joint, it provides more surface and is called a scarf joint.) So shoot the long grain of the joint with the boards pressed face to face. Then un-fold them, so the edges are touching. If you can't see light, you're good. If you can, the inaccuracy is HALF the size of the gap.


Edge jointing boards by hand is challenging, but doable.


----------



## ChuckBarnett (Jan 5, 2013)

amckenzie4 said:


> A ukulele is pretty small, so I'm assuming the boards aren't much more than 18-20" long. It should be fairly possible to joint them with a jack plane: the usual rule I've heard is that it's (relatively) easy to joint a board up to double the length of your plane. If you have a long-grain shooting board, it should be easier.
> 
> I'd use a relatively high angle jack plane, and make sure to clamp the boards to the shooting board, closed like a book: meaning, lay them out as you want them, then "hinge" them face to face. That way, if your plane is a little bit off of vertical, you'll still get a clean joint. (If you intentionally angle the joint, it provides more surface and is called a scarf joint.) So shoot the long grain of the joint with the boards pressed face to face. Then un-fold them, so the edges are touching. If you can't see light, you're good. If you can, the inaccuracy is HALF the size of the gap.
> 
> ...


Thank you. Yes the back of this is about 12 inches long. So these boards are about 13 to 14 inches long. I may be putting a strip of Koa in the middle. That doesn't really change the fact that I need a clean joint. I practiced and successfully joined a couple pieces softwood. Somebody mentioned using a higher angle plane iron. I have the Lee Nielsen number 62 low angle jack plane and could spend $40 for an iron for it and grind it to the right angle. Or someone else talked about using sandpaper. I think sandpaper is the way I will do this although it's not as clean a joint. It seems like it does work however.

Sent from my SM-G930V using Tapatalk


----------



## amckenzie4 (Apr 29, 2010)

Sandpaper will work fine, I'd just rather use a plane where I can, since I'd rather clean up shavings than dust. As others have said, low angle is not probably a great way to go with figured wood. In the long run you'll probably want a second iron ground to a high angle, but in the short term a sanding block will work fine.

Actually, now that I stop to think about it, even a smoothing plane might work with a shooting board. So if you have a regular smoothing plane with a small mouth and a really sharp iron, you could try that if you wanted.


----------



## ChuckBarnett (Jan 5, 2013)

amckenzie4 said:


> Sandpaper will work fine, I'd just rather use a plane where I can, since I'd rather clean up shavings than dust. As others have said, low angle is not probably a great way to go with figured wood. In the long run you'll probably want a second iron ground to a high angle, but in the short term a sanding block will work fine.
> 
> Actually, now that I stop to think about it, even a smoothing plane might work with a shooting board. So if you have a regular smoothing plane with a small mouth and a really sharp iron, you could try that if you wanted.


Two or three years ago I experimented with a shooting board and a used plane that I had. I began questioning the result and put a square onto the edge of a board to find out that it was not 90 degrees. Scratching my head about that I discovered that the sides of the plane or not perpendicular to the sole. That was incredibly disappointing to me as a newbie because nobody said anything about confirming that the sides of your plane are at the proper angle with the sole. So I kind of gave up until I bought this nicer plane. Suffice it to say all planes are not created equal.

Sent from my SM-G930V using Tapatalk


----------



## amckenzie4 (Apr 29, 2010)

ChuckBarnett said:


> Two or three years ago I experimented with a shooting board and a used plane that I had. I began questioning the result and put a square onto the edge of a board to find out that it was not 90 degrees. Scratching my head about that I discovered that the sides of the plane or not perpendicular to the sole. That was incredibly disappointing to me as a newbie because nobody said anything about confirming that the sides of your plane are at the proper angle with the sole. So I kind of gave up until I bought this nicer plane. Suffice it to say all planes are not created equal.
> 
> Sent from my SM-G930V using Tapatalk


Yeah, that can be frustrating. I have two planes that I've used with a shooting board: one is square, which is nice, but is too long for the shooting board I have. The other one is something like half a degree off, so I use it normally until the last pass, then press harder at the top to lean it into the cut a little. It took me a while to figure that out, though, and it drove me crazy until I did.


----------



## ChuckBarnett (Jan 5, 2013)

So, I think I might have a plan. I see where Veritas has a sanding board and sanding plane. But I'm not prepared to lay out the kind of cash they want for that for the needs that I have. But I wonder if I couldn't just use some spray-on adhesive, stick the sandpaper onto the bottom of that 14 inch plane and use the shooting board I have?? Start with 100 grit and work up to 320?

Sent from my SM-G930V using Tapatalk


----------



## Rodrat (Aug 31, 2016)

Provided its glued on flat I don't see why it wouldn't work?


----------



## amckenzie4 (Apr 29, 2010)

I'd be hesitant to glue anything to the bottom of the plane, but I don't see a problem other than that.

I haven't tried it, but I'd guess 120 is adequate for a glue joint. I've certainly sanded pieces to 120 and stopped if they weren't going to be finished, and they came out plenty smooth.


----------

