A little maintenance and proper setup makes wonders

[Sergio Escudero]

I’ve spent a good part of the last two days removing rust marks from all my planes below 5 1/2 size, adjusting the frogs to achieve a perfectly parallel 1 mm mouth opening, and flattening the soles. It turns out my Juuma 5 1/2 was in slightly worse shape than I expected. Here’s a photo after half an hour on a 300-grit diamond stone — you can see the sides, heel, and toe were high. Fortunately, there’s now only a small hollow left at the back of the mouth.

Now I can take shavings so thin that even on beech it stops being a smooth, continuous, transparent shaving and becomes practically a mesh of cell fibers. If I go any finer, I’m basically producing dust. Most of the material comes from the medullary rays, while the rest are just four strands of fibers and voids.

I still have work to do on a Record 5; it needs a thorough restoration and tune-up.

[fcschoenthal]

Congrats on getting it where you like it. I've taken a plane that I wanted to restore onto 120 grit sandpaper before. The trick is to get a large sheet (I used two) on an extremely flat surface. I got a 12"x24" floor tile for this because it was only a couple of dollars. I used a marker to show progress. When all of the marks are gone, you're through with that grit. Once you finish one grit, move up to the next higher to remove the scratches. I think I went up to 400, but it's not necessary to go that far. Also, always make sure that you have the blade in the plane (but retracted) when sanding, so that the pressure will be the same as when in use.

[gee-dub]

Beautiful.  When I use a tool that was a bit of a pain to setup . . . all the pain disappears in the wonderful result of the tool in use.

[Sergio Escudero]

On 10/14/2025 at 9:56 PM, fcschoenthal said:

Congrats on getting it where you like it. I've taken a plane that I wanted to restore onto 120 grit sandpaper before. The trick is to get a large sheet (I used two) on an extremely flat surface. I got a 12"x24" floor tile for this because it was only a couple of dollars. I used a marker to show progress. When all of the marks are gone, you're through with that grit. Once you finish one grit, move up to the next higher to remove the scratches. I think I went up to 400, but it's not necessary to go that far. Also, always make sure that you have the blade in the plane (but retracted) when sanding, so that the pressure will be the same as when in use.

If I had something really flat, I would have done it your way, but the times I've sanded the sole of planes with sandpaper, I haven't liked it because it worns out quickly. With my diamond plate, I go slowly, but it should be super flat and doesn't wear out. I'd like to have a longer one with a 120 grain size; it would help me with these tasks.