Trying to learn the Art of Hand-Planing, Got a few questions

[amateur77]

Hello everyone, long time lurker, first time poster.
I'm planing to make a few items which require a worktop (sideboard and a table) ,however I do not have a Planer/thickneser ( I used to have but I don't have anywhere where to put one now + want to keep the noise down due to neighbors)

I have a No4 old Record marples plane which I bought on ebay few years ago, but I would be open to idea of buying a larger no 6-7 jointer plane as well as I understand it's necessary if you want to properly do larger pieces.

I will be making the tops from rather good quality Pine CLS
Being CLS it comes with eased-up edges which I just ran through a P/T in past to get everything nice and square , but now I'm a bit stuck since I do not have a P/T and need a way to remove some stock off so its with square edges and the boards can be joined/glued together to form a top.

So my questions are:
1-What kind of size plane I would need (would be the best) If I wanted to square up and finish off for example a board that is 20cm wide and 150cm long?

2- With a proper sharp plane how long do you think such task would take if the board would have minimal cupping/twisting (but still always there is some..)? - I guess It takes me about 10-15minutes to square up 2sides with planer and than run it through a thicknesser the normal way.

3-In past after I fed it through a P/T I was left with a finish that needed a lot of sanding to remove all planer marks and other imperfections behind, do you think there would be less marks left if you were to do it with a razor sharp hand plane? I have heard that in some cases you don't even need sanding after planing with handplanes? It took me about 60-80 minutes to properly sand a small 40x100cm worktop in past and still I was left with some sanding marks and the finish wasn't really that perfect, that's A LOT of effort/dust and noise pollution.

4- Can you suggest an easy to learn/not expensive system on how to properly sharpen handplane blades? I have tried to sharpen mine in past with just some regular dry sandpaper as I didn't had anything else but the results weren't really good and I wasn't really sure what I'm doing, I want to try to learn how to sharpen one so it's properly razor sharp - I have seen some articles where they suggest some crazy expensive £50 stones and you need few of them..there's gotta be a cheaper way to do that but without involving sandpaper? I have seen some cheap £10 honing guides/stone kits they sell but from the reviews those doesn't seem very good?

6- What make/model plane/s would you suggest to do such task? I have a budget of maybe £50-£70 (used) to get a larger jointer plane, however I'm not sure what's the best stuff you could get for such budget? Under no circumstances I want to buy cheap and buy twice, I want good quality stuff that would last a lifetime and be a pleasure to use - However my budget probably doesn't stretches to get something like lie nielsen planes as they cost like £400 new and I'm not sure what's the used market for them.

7- Let's be realistic , Is it possible to get rid of an super noisy P/T along with even noisier chip collector which takes up HUGE amounts of space in total and go do it the old-school way with just a handplane and get good results in reasonable time? There's gotta be an easier way than keeping a large/noisy/expensive Planer thickneser & chip extractor combo to use it only for maybe 1hour a month.

That's a lot of questions... If someone would have the time to chime in that would be really helpful for a total beginner in hand-planes like myself.
Thanks in advance.

[Tom King]

The planes were cheap because I bought them a long time ago.   Sharpening was done with hundreds of dollars worth of stones, but I do this for a living, so get to deduct cost of tools.   Sorry, but I can offer no cheap, and easy way to do it.  Some people do get by with sandpaper, but the type of sandpaper is not cheap either over time because the sandpaper doesn't last long.

Straightening the edges of boards for joining is not the first skill to learn with handplanes.  It comes after basic skills are mastered.

Good luck.

[lewisc]

I've recently started using a Stanley No 7 to clean up the edge of boards to be joined. It's made big difference to the quality of boards to be joined. 

I got it from my dad who had it for a few decades. The same with his old Stanley No 5 that I'm using. Both planes are probably 30years old or more but work very nicely. If you can find an older plane in that doesn't need much work, they are worth it tuning up. 

[wtnhighlander]

I think the requirement to mill by hand in a "reasonable" amount of time is the problem. Even Shannon Rogers, and all those Japanese hand tool guys you see on YouTube, have a planer (thicknesser) in the shop.

My observation is that the larger (15+ inches) floor model thicknessers, especially those with helical or spiral cutters, are much quieter than their portable counterparts. However, the larger footprint is the trade-off.

 

You can certainly produce flat, smooth, straight material with only a few hand planes, but you must be very patient. In the days before electrical power, that's what apprentices were for.

 

Regarding techniques for sharpening, there are so many ways to it, it isn't even funny. Sandpaper is a fine way to start out, but you need higher grits, 400-2000, at least, to produce a well polished bevel. You should be using it wet, and on a flat substrate. A thick piece of plate glass, or a marble floor tile, can work well.

I suggest using a guide to hold the cutter at a consistent angle, as doing so by hand requires quite a bit of practice. Eclipse brand guides, or their clones, are quite inexpensive.

 

I won't go into details on sharpening technique, as a simple search will return more discussions here, than you are likely to read. In general, you must flatten the back of the blade (on time), then hone the bevel until a burr forms, then remove the burr. Repeat on progressively finer grits to produce the edge you want. I find that a final stropping with green compound on a flat piece of softwood, mdf, or leather, produces a longer lasting edge.

[ClassAct]

For me, two books on sharpening are indispensible: Ron Hock's The Perfect Edge: The Ultimate Guide To Sharpening For Woodworkers and Leonard Lee's The Complete Guide To Sharpening. Start with those, then experiment to find out which method feels the best for you. I've tried the sandpaper method, waterstones, and a Tormek. I want to try Shapton ceramics and then the DMT diamond plates (not the grids). So far, waterstones "feel" the best. Others swear by the Tormek. YMMV.

[Ronn W]

I get great edges on both 01 and A2 steel with my Norton water stones.  I take it up to 8000 grit. I am a relative begineer with hand planes.  I have a #4, a low angle jack plane with a 25 degree blade and a 35 degree blade and I have a cabinet scraper for funky grain.   I can always get different planes as the need arises but those tend to cover most of my situations.  Unless you really enjoy planing I would save up for a DeWalt 735 planar first and a jointer second.

[G S Haydon]

If you're time poor and low on experience this process could put you off.

Typically if you want to prepare wood by hand you'd want a jack plane, think No.5, for roughing it down to close to the mark. Trying plane, think No.7, for accurate levelling. Smoothing plane, think No.4 for final finish. If doing it by hand, wooden planes make work much easier for the first two steps of that process.

If you're learning it will take a while, a good barometer would be to watch a coupe of YT Vids of this process

You can make just as much mess of wood with a hand plane as you can a power planer.

A good value and proven stone is the Norton India. I'd recommend learning freehand methods if you can.

I think a DeWalt style bench top planer is a useful tool. I don't have one as I work in a joinery workshop. If I just had a garage workshop I think I'd get one. If you like traditional work both a planer and a decent bandsaw can be very useful. Going without power is more a "way of life". It's an art that requires quite a bit of effort. If you're time poor I'd keep the planer.

. 

[jjongsma]

I do all of my milling by hand. I've been doing it for about 2 years now so I'm still a long ways from being called an expert. I'm a lot faster than I used to be, but it's still a fairly slow (though mostly enjoyable) way to work. The time it will take is highly dependant on how skilled you are with a plane. From the sounds of things, you're very inexperienced with hand planes so you can probably expect it to take a good long while and the results may not be as good as you hoped. I highly recommend getting some experience milling lumber by hand, since it's a good skill to have. But I don't think you'll be happy with the approach if you're just trying to save time and/or money. You probably only want to go this route if this is how you like to work.

[amateur77]

Oh I already have a good machine, this is my machine metabo hc260 but it's stored away and I would have to transport it to my location.

I'm not trying to save time or money, but I want to save Noise, I currently live in a shitty UK house where I have a neighbor and when I turn on my Metabo it sounds like a Jet is about to take off   + my  neighbor is a bit of a twat who likes to complain about things and I understand him as the machines (specially the Planer) creates Insane noise.

 (not my picture- I'm doing my woodworking in spare livingroom )

 

 

[Bob Rozaieski]

On 6/3/2017 at 10:20 AM, amateur77 said:

1-What kind of size plane I would need (would be the best) If I wanted to square up and finish off for example a board that is 20cm wide and 150cm long?

2- With a proper sharp plane how long do you think such task would take if the board would have minimal cupping/twisting (but still always there is some..)? - I guess It takes me about 10-15minutes to square up 2sides with planer and than run it through a thicknesser the normal way.

3-In past after I fed it through a P/T I was left with a finish that needed a lot of sanding to remove all planer marks and other imperfections behind, do you think there would be less marks left if you were to do it with a razor sharp hand plane? I have heard that in some cases you don't even need sanding after planing with handplanes? It took me about 60-80 minutes to properly sand a small 40x100cm worktop in past and still I was left with some sanding marks and the finish wasn't really that perfect, that's A LOT of effort/dust and noise pollution.

4- Can you suggest an easy to learn/not expensive system on how to properly sharpen handplane blades? I have tried to sharpen mine in past with just some regular dry sandpaper as I didn't had anything else but the results weren't really good and I wasn't really sure what I'm doing, I want to try to learn how to sharpen one so it's properly razor sharp - I have seen some articles where they suggest some crazy expensive £50 stones and you need few of them..there's gotta be a cheaper way to do that but without involving sandpaper? I have seen some cheap £10 honing guides/stone kits they sell but from the reviews those doesn't seem very good?

6- What make/model plane/s would you suggest to do such task? I have a budget of maybe £50-£70 (used) to get a larger jointer plane, however I'm not sure what's the best stuff you could get for such budget? Under no circumstances I want to buy cheap and buy twice, I want good quality stuff that would last a lifetime and be a pleasure to use - However my budget probably doesn't stretches to get something like lie nielsen planes as they cost like £400 new and I'm not sure what's the used market for them.

7- Let's be realistic , Is it possible to get rid of an super noisy P/T along with even noisier chip collector which takes up HUGE amounts of space in total and go do it the old-school way with just a handplane and get good results in reasonable time? There's gotta be an easier way than keeping a large/noisy/expensive Planer thickneser & chip extractor combo to use it only for maybe 1hour a month.

OK. Let's take this one question at a time.

1. Your current #4 sized plane will work just fine. With a bit of checking. But for such a long board, a jointer will be quite helpful. Something in a #7 or #8 size. For your budget, I'd say look for a used plane from a reputable dealer.  There are several in the UK that I've bought from. A quick Google search will turn them up.
2. This depends upon experience. I've done 3' boards in 5 minutes with hand planes.  But by hand it takes some dedication and time to learn to do well. If you have little to no experience doing so, it will take you longer.See this video I did in 2010.
   
3. Yes. The board will be flatter and smoother. If you sharpen well and ease the corners of the iron, the board COULD be finish ready. But again, this depends upon your experience and skill. Again, doing it by hand takes some dedication and time to learn to do well. If you have little to no experience doing so, it will take you longer and you may still need to sand a bit when you are done. But it won't take near as much sanding.
4. The $10 side clamp honing guides work fine. Stones don't have to cost a lot, but can. The newer the technology, the more expensive the stones. The Norton combination stones are a decent bargain and good quality stones. The King stones are also decent and fairly inexpensive. You can get a 1000 grit and 6000 grit King for about $30 US each. Add the honing guide and be in business for about $75. You can flatten the stones with 220 grit sandpaper stuck to just about any flat surface. If you want more modern technology (stones that will cut faster and not wear as quickly, like Sigmas and Shaptons), you will have to spend more money. I personally have Kings and Sigmas. I mostly use the Sigmas now, but the Kings still work just fine. Deneb from LN shows a good method. 
5. You don't have a Q#5 :-)
6. See response #1. Look for a used #7 or #8 from a reputable dealer. Sharpen it well (see video above) and you'll be set.
7. Yes it's possible, if you are willing to put in the time and effort to learn the skills to do so. I own no machines for stock prep. I do it all with hand planes. And it doesn't take me forever. But I wasn't born with the skill to do so. It took some practice and it took me longer than the video above when I first started doing it with hand planes instead of machines. But with some practice I learned to do it and now I can do it quickly, and without giving the process much thought. You just have to be willing to put in the time to learn.

[Chud]

21 hours ago, amateur77 said:

I'm doing my woodworking in spare livingroom

I think Paul Seller's YouTube channel is going to be your friend - he seems to do most stuff without power tools (where feasible)!