jpdorn Posted June 10, 2011 Report Share Posted June 10, 2011 ok, i lied. it's not really the plane i need help with. got a sweet japanese dovetail plane and after letting it acclimate to my shop for a month or two i set it up. opened the mouth a bit, honed up the iron.. cuts like a dream.. what i need help with is a guide block for cutting the female half of the sliding dovetail. i have no idea what angle the plane cuts at so the best i've come up with is use a bevel gauge to educate a guess cut the block cut a test joint tweak the block angle repeat as necessary.. anyone have a better idea? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rmac Posted June 10, 2011 Report Share Posted June 10, 2011 Just thinking out loud here, could you somehow use the dovetail plane itself to cut (or at least tweak the angle on) the guide block? -- Russ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flairwoodworks Posted June 10, 2011 Report Share Posted June 10, 2011 Perhaps yours is different, but most of the dovetail planes I've seen incorporate the dovetail angle in the sole's profile. Do you have a picture? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jpdorn Posted June 10, 2011 Author Report Share Posted June 10, 2011 rmac - i can't imagine how i could.. if the angle's stamped on the plane i'm gonna feel pretty stupid. honestly, didn't think to look for it. i'll check, soon as i get home. thanks guys. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jpdorn Posted June 11, 2011 Author Report Share Posted June 11, 2011 ok. well, the good news is the plane may be stamped with the angle. the bad news is it's in japanese .. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wilburpan Posted June 11, 2011 Report Share Posted June 11, 2011 Cut the male part of the dovetail joint with the plane, then use the angle of the male part to set your bevel gauge to figure out the angle for your guide block. For what it's worth, I get better results by using saws/chisels to get rid of most of the waste on the male or female part of the dovetail, and then using the plane to clean up, instead of trying to plane away all the waste. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jpdorn Posted June 12, 2011 Author Report Share Posted June 12, 2011 thanks wilbur! yeah, that's pretty much what i think i'm gonna do. just not really much reference surface to set the gauge with. of course, it's not really that hard to tweak the block's angle if i'm off a bit either. thank you all. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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