Bevel Angle for Scrubbing

[Steve B Anderson]

I have this old bench plane that I inherited from my Father. I believe it’s a #4 bench plane, bevel down and the iton set at around 54 degrees. I have a table top that I need to scrub and was wondering what bevel angle should I put on the iron? This is the only other plane that I have except for a low angle block so I have to make this work of just about everything. From reading here on the forum it seems to be common to round the iron off for scrubbing. I’m sure that’s the best thing to do but I only have one iron so I would rather not round it off if all possible.

[Tom King]

Find another cheap iron.  ebay should have some.   It really does need to be rounded, or you will have all sorts of terrible tearout along the edges, plus it will be really hard to make deep cuts.   Here are some pictures of my Scrub plane that I already have stored here.   I would say some radius less than 8", which is the typical radius for a Jack plane.   For a 4, the frog will need to be moved back to enlarge the throat as much as possible.  The shavings are thick.  That's not a shadow in the first picture.  It's wear.

For bevel angle, I would say 35 degrees since it will be subjected to more abuse than any other plane iron.  You take hard strokes, and throw shavings  into the air.

 

[Steve B Anderson]

6 minutes ago, Tom King said:

Find another cheap iron.  ebay should have some.   It really does need to be rounded, or you will have all sorts of terrible tearout along the edges, plus it will be really hard to make deep cuts.   Here are some pictures of my Scrub plane that I already have stored here.   I would say some radius less than 8", which is the typical radius for a Jack plane.   For a 4, the frog will need to be moved back to enlarge the throat as much as possible.  The shavings are thick.  That's not a shadow in the first picture.  It's wear.

For bevel angle, I would say 35 degrees since it will be subjected to more abuse than any other plane iron.  You take hard strokes, and throw shavings  into the air.

 

Tom - I should have mentioned that this top will only require “light” Scrubbing. One of the boards moved about 1/16” during glue up. It is 38” long so I wanted to use the plane to reduce the sanding time. The more I think about, I see this situation coming up more and more as I try to advance my skills. I will grind this iron to a scrubber and buy another for general use.

Thanks for reply, your advise is always highly respected.

[Steve B Anderson]

Maybe I should advance my skills in board prep and glue up, then scrubbing may not be required 

[Tom King]

If all it needs is a sixteenth, I wouldn't even put a Jack plane on that.  Another iron with a bit more camber than for use as a smoother would take care of that, without worrying about moving the frog even.  I keep a couple of no. 6's with different cambers that would make quick work out of that top.  I think one takes about 8 thou, and the other not quite twice that.

[Steve B Anderson]

3 hours ago, Tom King said:

If all it needs is a sixteenth, I wouldn't even put a Jack plane on that.  Another iron with a bit more camber than for use as a smoother would take care of that, without worrying about moving the frog even.  I keep a couple of no. 6's with different cambers that would make quick work out of that top.  I think one takes about 8 thou, and the other not quite twice that.

I’m glad I picked up my phone and read your reply. I was just dragging the grinder out of the corner. I don’t use hand planes for everything but I am finding them very useful the more I learn to use them. It’s kind of funny, a year ago, a hand plane was an alien object to me. Now I can’t seem to work without one. 

I think I’ll put a good sharp 30 degree bevel and just round off the corners. Adjust the depth of cut as I go and see what happens.

Thanks again Tom