One of the world's biggest tool collectors is bringing his brand-new traveling tool museum to Northern Kentucky on Oct. 1-2 to show it off to the public at the Woodworking in America event at the Northern Kentucky Convention Center.

John Sindelar of Edwardsburg, Mich., has spent his entire adult life amassing some of the world's rarest, most expensive and beautiful tools. And this year Sindelar built a traveling tool museum that will travel the country to share some of the highlights of his collection at festivals and fairs.

Even if you got shut out of the classes at Woodworking in America this year, the Marketplace itself is well worth the trip (and it's only $7 for two days).

Sindelar's traveling collection includes more than 500 items (valued at $300,000) from all the trades, from woodworking to blacksmithing to household tools. Visitors can see one of the first axes ever made in the New World, according to archaeologists (it's copper!), specialized plow planes made entirely of ivory, antique levels from Asia and much more.

"You name it, we have it," Sindelar says. "From the beginning of time to the present day."

The traveling collection is housed in a custom-built trailer that Sindelar's woodworking business outfitted to look like the inside of a vintage luxury locomotive car. The interior is constructed entirely with antiqued frame-and-panel in cherry – and features a tool in the center of each panel.

The 30'-long, 220-square-foot traveling museum is Sindelar's effort to build support for a permanent tool museum for his enormous tool collection now housed in his shop in Michigan.

The traveling tool museum will be parked on the floor of the Marketplace at Woodworking in America at the Northern Kentucky Convention Center. Admission to the Marketplace (just $7) gets you in to see the traveling tool museum, plus more than 70 woodworking vendors and demonstrators showing off all aspects of woodworking with both hand and power tools.

— Christopher Schwarz

P.S. I'll have photos of the traveling tool museum later this week.

More Links to Obscenely Gorgeous Tools

• For more information on Sindelar's collection, visit his web site at: sindelartoolmuseum.com

• Read (for free) a story I wrote where I test-drove some of the world's most expensive planes.

• "Tools Rare and Ingenious" by Sandor Nagyszalanczy has some serious brass and steel.

• My book, "Handplane Essentials," has a lot of stories about modern makers, including Konrad Sauer, Ron Brese, Karl Holtey, Bill Carter, Wayne Anderson, D.L. Barrett & Sons and more. It's available from our bookstore.

• View a free slideshow of my trip to Sindelar's tool museum a few years ago.

I wrote a short review of Karl Holtey's No. 982 smoothing plane for the October 2010 issue of Popular Woodworking Magazine (which is mailing now to subscribers). And you don't write a review of a tool that costs $10,500 without bracing yourself for some comments from readers.

Overall, I quite liked the tool, which was on loan to us for several months from its owner. For me, the experience was like driving the BMW 700-series sedan that belonged to a friend of my mom. At first it was terrifying, and I handled the tool like an injured wombat. After a few weeks of babying it, however, I started to explore its limits.

Over the weekend, I received the following letter from reader Dave Makarewicz, which asked a lot of good questions.

Earlier this afternoon I read your Tool Test article about the Karl Holtey 982 smoothing plane. While I've heard the Holtey name in the past I've never really investigated Karl or his work. One item that caught my attention was the price quoted in British pounds, so I did the math and realized that we're talking about the "upper stratosphere" of hand tools. OK now you've really got my interest cranked up! I spent some time on Karl's web site to see what I could learn and it's obvious Karl is a superb craftsman, dedicated to achieving near perfection.

So now all day long I can't get this review out of my head, and I have a few questions. Can you shed some light as to who uses a tool of this caliber? Realizing that Karl's planes are one-off commission pieces, how much better can this tool be as compared to say a Lie-Nielsen plane? At that level I'm thinking this thing jumps out of the box and starts planing all by itself. And lastly your comment about the tote attachment coming loose really floored me, You're telling me that my $10,000 handplane is going to have problems? That's like the salesman at the Bentley dealership telling me that the knobs on the dashboard have a tendency to fall off!

If I'm shelling out that kind of dough Karl himself had better be coming over to tweak the tote attachment and he's going to have to bring doughnuts too!

I think you are a truly lucky fellow to be able to get hold of stuff like this and try it out. I also think it's important that us commoners get to see that these things really exist, and I believe that men like Karl raise the bar for everyone.

Here are some answers.

1. Who uses a Karl Holtey plane?

I know that some of Holtey's planes never go to work in a shop, and that's typical among the customers of all the custom toolmakers. But I do know that Garrett Hack has a Holtey No. 98 that sees a fair amount of use. I saw Hack's Holtey at a show about five years ago and it was worn and well-patinated. And Hack had only praise for the tool. David Charlesworth also has a couple of Holtey's planes that get put to the wood. And I know a few home woodworkers who both collect and use the planes from Holtey and other markers.

It's my hope that every well-made tool gets to see some action.

2. How much better is a Holtey plane compared to other premium tools?

This point gets debated all the time on the woodworking forums. The argument goes something like this: People who dislike the tool say there's no way that a $10,500 tool planes a piece of wood 26.25 times better than a $400 plane. And they're right. People who like the tool say that's like comparing a Honda Accord to a Ferrari Enzo. And they are right, as well.

At a certain price point, all tools do a tremendous job, just like all chairs hold you off the floor in relative comfort. But it's up to you as to whether you want a chair from Ikea or Sam Maloof.

3. About that tote coming loose.

The tote of the plane did come loose, but I wouldn't make too much of it. The totes on all my planes come loose from using them (even a Ferrari needs new brakes and an oil change on occasion). I asked Holtey about it via e-mail and here's his response:

"The metal stem inside the handle is only anchored at the top end. This is to allow some movement due to shrinkage; otherwise the handle would crack. With this shrinkage you may notice the loosening on the handle screw and it just needs a little more tightening.

"Another solution to shrinkage is to use a polymer but for some reason it hasn’t caught on."

And that's exactly right. Tightening up the handle fixed it. I mentioned it (briefly) in the review only to point out that this is a real tool.

I'll add one more question to this list, even though Dave didn't ask.

4. Why review a tool that is out of reach of most subscribers?

Once a year we publish plans in our magazine for what could best be termed a "fantasy" project – a piece of work that most woodworkers would like to build but is out of their league at this point. We do this because we want to inspire our readers to become better woodworkers. And we want to show them what good design and good craftsmanship looks like.

And that's why I chose to write about Holtey's plane in our pages. If given the chance, wouldn't you want to pore over a cabinet by James Krenov? Sit in a chair made by Sam Maloof? Use a plane by Karl Holtey?

— Christopher Schwarz

Other Resources on Custom Plane Makers

• Visit Karl Holtey's web site and be sure to read his blog. His level of craftsmanship is tremendous. holteyplanes.com.

• Konrad Sauer of Sauer & Steiner also writes a blog that details the construction of his custom infill planes. sauerandsteiner.com.

• Wayne Anderson is also one of my favorite makers. I own a few of his planes. Each one is unique. andersonplanes.com.

• I discuss a lot of the custom planemakers (and compare their tools to James Krenov's) in my book "Handplane Essentials." This sizable book is a compilation of my best writing on handplanes during the last 10 years.

Learning to sharpen has little to do with your sharpening stones. It has a lot more to do with being able to see your progress and knowing when to stop.

Showing a class of woodworkers what a sharp blade looks like in the flesh (a real poor choice of words) has proven to be tricky for me. So I've resorted at times to line drawings, which helps.

Today a reader sent me some great photos he made using a scanning electron microscope, usually called an SEM in the business. Want to read about how the microscopes work? Brace yourself for some scary images of pollen.

The reader is a mechanical engineer working in research for a medical device company, so these are legit. What you are going to see here are images of a Veritas spokeshave blade. The images of the dull blade show what it looks like with the factory edge on it after being used to build four benches. The blade still feels pretty sharp, the reader reports.

The images of the sharp blade show the same tool in the same position after being sharpened with #1,000- and #8,000-grit Shapton stones.

All of the images were taken from the same angle – 12° off of vertical looking directly at the edge. As a result, you can see both the flat face, the secondary bevel and the primary bevel all in the same image. The primary bevel is at the top of each image. The secondary bevel is the stripe in the middle. The flat face (some people call it the "back") is the bottom part of the image.

So let's kick this off with photos of the dull and sharp blade at 30x magnification, which is about what I can see with my jeweler's loupe.

30x Dull and Sharp

You can see the factory scratches in the bevel on the dull blade, and you can see them disappearing on the sharp blade. This is about all our naked eye gets to see in the shop. As we zoom in, it gets more interesting.

500x Dull and Sharp

At 500x the differences between the two blades becomes quite evident. The scratches in the dull blade stand out like canyons, and you can see them and how they fade on the sharp blade.

1,000x Dull and Sharp

On the dull image you can see a torn bit of metal right on the edge, which the reader reports as being typical of this edge. On the sharp edge, the little light-colored spots are debris, not metal. The dark spots on the right of the photo are also likely debris, not the wire edge of the blade.

2,000x Dull and Sharp

At 2,000x you can really see the rolled-over edge in the middle of the frame. That, I suspect, is what reflects light when you look at an edge and see a glint right at the tip.

The photo of the sharp blade at 2,000 power also has a dark line at the edge. This could be debris or it could be the "wire edge" remaining after sharpening. It would take more testing to determine exactly what we're seeing here.

So what do I conclude? Seeing is indeed everything. And is there an SEM section on Craigslist.com? How many kidneys would it cost?

— Christopher Schwarz

Sharpening Stuff for Other Sharpening Nuts

• Ron Hock wrote the book on sharpening, and I think it's worth buying. "The Perfect Edge."

• Brent Beach wrote the web site on sharpening, and I think it's worth exploring. Be wary. It is a vacuum. http://www3.telus.net/BrentBeach/

• You know you are a sharpening nerd if you've been to this page. It's the rec.woodworking post that kicked off the latest sandpaper sharpening craze. Note, I found an old Boy Scout reference to sharpening your pocketknife with sandpaper.

My first Stanley shoulder plane (a No. 93) was the worst plane I ever bought. The sole was more than 1/8" out of alignment, and it took me a couple hours on a belt sander to even get the tool working.

That dog of a tool was built during the sunset days of Stanley's U.K. plane production, and I've always imagined that my plane had been made by someone who was drunk, hungover or having a stroke.

So when the new Stanley Sweet Heart No. 92 showed up on my desk last week, I was skeptical. (Note: This tool is a loaner, so it will go back to Stanley after it has had a workout at Woodworking in America.) I took the tool out of its sealed box and checked the sole with a machinist square.

Ah-ha! The sole was out of truth. Probably by a couple thousandths of an inch. Maybe more.

This morning I decided to look at all the shoulder planes in our shop, and compare them to the Stanley. And here's the funny thing: Almost all of them have some problems with their soles. (The exception was the Veritas Large Shoulder, which was dead square. I didn't get to check my Lie-Nielsen 073 because it's at home.)

Most of these planes have performed fairly well, but they all have problems when you try to do persnickety work. You have to massage the position of the cutter to get the results you want. (The exceptions being the Veritas, which is always dead on, and my Lie-Nielsen at home, which is also always bang-on.)

So I decided to true up the soles of several shoulder planes today and see if it improved their performance. I'm sure there are better ways to true up a sole than what I am about to describe, but this following procedure works.

I took a 2x4 and trued it up on the jointer. Then I stuck a piece of 40-micron sharpening sandpaper to the face of the 2x4 and secured this to my benchtop with holdfasts.

Next I took a piece of plywood and set it on my bench in front of the sandpaper. I rested the shoulder plane on the plywood, hung its sole off the edge and stroked it back and forth over the sandpaper. After about a minute of work I checked my result. The sole was improving. About three minutes later, the sole read dead flat to my square.

Then I sharpened up the A2 iron. The unbeveled face of the iron was dead flat, which is always a nice surprise to see. It polished up quickly. Perhaps too quickly for A2 – I'll have to get this iron tested to see how soft it is. In any case, I'm not complaining.

I checked the plane for bed errors (it had none) and put it to work.

I quite like the tool, but I like rhino-horn-style shoulder planes (the horn is the proboscis at its toe). Megan Fitzpatrick reported that the plane had too many sharp arrises. I agreed and knocked them down with some sandpaper. Robert Lang didn't like the way the tool fit his hand when he pulled the plane toward him – the horn dug right into his palm.

He also wished that the rear curve on the top of the plane was 1/4" shorter. And actually, after looking at photos of the original No. 92 and 93, the rear curve used to be shorter.

I hold my shoulder planes differently – I didn't have a problem and found it comfortable.

So here's the bottom line: I'm going to make this plane my primary user until I have to give it back to Stanley. It's worthy of a hard workout.

Shoulder planes are difficult tools to make (ask any toolmaker), so the fact that Stanley's is so close is a good sign about what I might find as I set up the rest of the tools in the line.

The No. 92 is available from a wide variety of retailers for about $110 to 120, including Woodcraft and Amazon (which has the right model number but an outdated photo).

Other Shoulder Plane Resourses

• Read (for free) the article I wrote about premium shoulder planes for the Fine Tool Journal. It's now available on WKFineTools.com. When you are really bored, check out all my articles on WKFineTools.com here.

• I wrote a good deal about shoulder planes in my book "Handplane Essentials," which is available in our store. It's a nice, big, made-in-the-USA trip into the world of planes.

• David Charlesworth knows more about setting up shoulder planes than anyone I know. His Lie-Nielsen DVD "Furniture Making Techniques: Five Topics" contains an excellent section on shoulder planes.

I don't relish handing out bad reviews of tools. But as someone who gets stoned occasionally by an angry mob, I know that a critical review can help improve the quality of my work in the future.

During the last year I reviewed new premium planes by both Wood River (Woodcraft's line) and Stanley. I had problems with both brands. The Wood River planes had irons that were too soft, the lateral-adjust levers were flimsy and some of the block planes had fatal bed errors.

Stanley's new Sweet Heart line of planes also had some rough patches. Both versions of the No. 62 low-angle jack plane had fatal bed errors, rendering the planes worthless. Some of the adjustable mouths wouldn't close up. And the overall fit and finish of the tools was lacking.

During the last month, both companies have released new or improved versions of their tools and I am in the beginning stages of testing them here for a follow-up review.

It's obvious that both companies listened to complaints from customers.

The Stanley planes look about 100 times better. The wood is nicely finished. The paint on the base casting has changed and – most of all – there are no bed errors in the examples I've examined. I still have one quibble with the line as a whole: The lever caps are too lightweight.

The Wood River planes also made a big leap forward. The lateral-adjust levers are now robust and made using two pieces, like the old Bed Rocks. The depth-adjustment knob is bigger and easier to turn. And the overall fit and finish of the tools has improved.

I'm going to set these tools up and send the irons out for testing in the coming weeks. So I haven't drawn any conclusions other than it looks like the quality is improving.

Stay tuned for a review in the next few weeks. I really am focused on building stuff right now. So the prospect of setting up nine more plane irons isn't appealing.

— Christopher Schwarz

Other Stories on Stanley & Wood River

• My original review of the Stanley No. 62

• News on the new line of Stanley chisels (I still need to get a set).

• Read other reviews of premium planes in my book "Handplane Essentials." It's big (312 pages), printed in the United States and chock-full of the drivel you've come to begrudgingly endure on this blog. You can order it directly from our store.

Router planes are the Starsky. Handsaws are the Hutch.

These two tools work together all the time in my shop. In fact, all the sawing classes I teach are actually classes on the router plane in disguise. So I have seen a lot of woodworkers struggle with sharpening the router plane's L-shaped iron.

Some woodworkers use slipstones, little pieces of sandpaper stuck to blocks of wood, emery boards or even buffing wheels. ("Ya just jam the edge into the wheel and go," they told me. I forgot to mention that this was preceded by: "Hold my beer for a second while I sharpen this.")

Here's how I do it: I sharpen the entire bevel to make it easier to maintain the correct angle. First I prop up my sharpening stone on a 2x4 so I can hang the iron's post off the stone. I press the bevel to the stone, angle the iron and drag it toward me. Then I angle it the other way and push it away.

This morning we shot this short video that shows how to deal with the bevel. It's better than words.

Once I pull up a slight burr on the bevel I flip the iron over and sharpen the flat area on the stone, too. This is a key part of the procedure, and I do it on both my shaping stone (#1,000) and my polishing stone (#4,000). Here's why: It's hard to remove metal on the bevel without a lot of strokes. By sharpening the flat area of the iron on my shaping stone, I can more easily chew away the dull steel and get a fresh edge.

Once I am happy with the sharpness of the iron at #1,000 grit, I switch to #4,000 grit and repeat both procedures.

Once last piece of advice: Keep your router plane's irons sharp and touch them up often. You don't want to grind the iron unless you absolutely have to because that's a difficult operation. And that's another great reason to sharpen the entire bevel on this tool instead of using a micro-bevel.

— Christopher Schwarz

Other Resources on Handplanes and Sharpening

• We have two good books in our store that should set you straight on the tricky topics of handplanes and sharpening. "The Perfect Edge" by Ron Hock is a great text that really explains the sometimes-confusing world of sharp and dull. Also, my book, "Handplane Essentials," talks quite a bit about router planes and other joinery planes.

• Have you visited Ron Hock's Sharpening Blog? You should. It always has some good stuff for beginners and experts.

• Another excellent sharpener is David Charlesworth. His DVD on sharpening plane irons changed the way that thousands of woodworkers prepare their plane irons.

So we shot two 25-minute episodes of "The Woodwright's Shop" today. So you are probably wondering what the heck I did with the other 23 hours of my day.

Manicure? Pedicure? Facial? Crystal Meth bender?

Nyet.

I woke up this morning at 6 a.m. at Roy's place – he lives in an old mill, and the guest bedroom sits right on the water. We slugged down some coffee. Roy sat in a rocking chair and quietly looked out over the dam next to his mill. I was poring over one of his books on Virginia shore furniture (I could spend a month here just browsing this man's library).

Then we headed off to the UNC-TV PBS station, which is an awesome facility as far as PBS stations go. Then it was a few hours of getting our microphones attached (they bored holes through my pants), rehearsing and working out all the camera moves for the first episode.

We started actually shooting the first episode (on sawing) sometime before noon and we botched the beginning over and over and over again. After four or five false starts, Roy and I finally got loopy enough to make it through the episode. But I have to say that the 25 minutes of tape felt like a lifetime.
Then we shot a couple short promotional spots for that episode (when you see them please do not make fun of my sawing – it's a long story). Then it was time for fried chicken.

Ask my co-workers – I usually eat an apple for lunch. But when someone dangles the promise of fried chicken and biscuits before my Southern-fried eyeballs, I cannot resist. And sweet tea. Dear me, I miss sweet tea.

The fried chicken, however, turned out to be a technical gastro-intestinal error.

The deliciously greasy fried chicken made Roy and me burp like an overheated Louisiana swamp. As we rehearsed the second episode after lunch, our belches and intestinal discomfort grew.

We burped our way through the second episode, which is about the toolkit of a typical 1839 joiner in England. It's interesting stuff, if you can ignore the occasional eruction from us.

We finished up sometime about 6:30 p.m. (I think). Roy and I are both so tired from the whole day that we drive back to his mill in near silence, with just a few comments about ecology, old cars and our days ahead together.

When we arrived back at the mill, Roy's wife, Jane, was out on the edge of the mill's dam. She's sweeping the duckweed over the edge and into the stream bed below. Roy and I perch ourselves on the edge of the dam and drink some Eagle Rare bourbon I've brought along. We watch Jane work, we breath slowly, and we let the humidity of the North Carolina night soak into our skin.

Jane has made an incredible meal of fried chicken, corn pudding, chicken gravy, broccoli and fresh bread. It's ready for us. So we finish our bourbon in the proper manner (very slowly), stand up and head to the house for a beautiful meal.

Oh, in case you were wondering – yes, I have the best job in the world.

— Christopher Schwarz

All photos are courtesy of Mike Oniffrey

I'm packing up all the tools I'll need in North Carolina for the coming week, and I was a bit shocked this morning as I went through my checklist.

One of the "Woodwright's Shop" television programs Roy Underhill and I are shooting this weekend will deal with the typical toolkit of a joiner circa 1839. I compiled my list based on an old book, "The Joiner & Cabinet Maker," which detailed the fictional life of a young apprentice.

During the book, the apprentice builds three projects – a packing box, a dovetailed schoolbox and a full-scale chest of drawers. Last year I built all three of these projects using only hand tools (the school box was featured in the Autumn 2009 issue of Woodworking Magazine).

Today I made up a list of the 41 tools mentioned in the construction of the three projects in the book. This includes everything from pencils to chalk and plow planes to bowsaws. What was surprising was how few tools there were. I fit them all easily on my 20"-wide x 6'-long workbench. To be sure, there would be several tools that I would have liked to have had in that toolkit, such as a sliding bevel square, but they are all tools of convenience instead of necessity.

Here's the list (and yes, I know that some people think a dozen chisels are not one item. I do. Just ask my wife. If I have 100 cans of tomato soup I'll go through the express lane at the grocery store and say: It's one item. So there).

2' rule
Try square
Chalk
Chalk line
Handsaw
Ripsaw
Bench brush
Two sawbenches
Pencil
Striking knife (a joiner's marker)
Jack plane
Trying plane
Smoothing plane
Rubstone
Wooden straightedge
Marking gauge
Panel gauge
Brad awl
Hammer
Piece of iron or steel for clenching/straightening nails
Nail set
Broad chisel, dullish (for scraping glue)
Sash saw
Shooting board
Bench hook
Dovetail saw
Chisels (a dozen, 1/16" up to 1"; then two or three wider than that)
Rattail file
Turnscrews
Brace
Countersink
Rasp
File
Sandpaper
Mallet
Name stamp
Rebate plane
Plow plane
Mortise chisel
Mortise gauge
Frame saw (bowsaw)

— Christopher Schwarz

Want More on Early Tools and Technology?

• Visit Gary Roberts's excellent Toolemera.com. No, I'm not sure how to pronounce it, either. It combines "tool" with "ephemera." In any case, Gary's site is chock full of catalogs and early books that you can download or order.

• Jeff Gorman's web site is back up! Neanderthals rejoice. www.amgron.clara.net. There is lots of good stuff there on traditional technique from a British perspective.

• The Evenfall Woodworks Library is another free repository of great old books. Stop in when you have some bandwidth you want to suck up with some great downloads.

Isshi Yamada never said much to me when I was dating his daughter in college. To us Western students who studied Eastern religions, he was an enigmatic Zen Buddhism professor who was famous for giving exams that bordered on the surreal.

Most of my memories of Dr. Yamada put him sitting at his dining room table in a worn Irish fisherman's sweater – drinking a little sake and watching the affairs of the household.

One day, however, Dr. Yamada became quite animated on the topic of human perception. And his short lecture sticks with me to this day.

"What is the one thing the eye cannot see?" Dr. Yamada asked.

Bob Baker, a furniture and tool restorer and excellent planemaker, died unexpectedly last week.

I had the pleasure of meeting Bob in February of 2006 when we hosted a gathering in Cincinnati for many of the best planemakers and gave each of them the opportunity to present their work to one another, and to talk about planes, planemaking and toolmaking in general. Bob was high on that list of "best planemakers." In the picture at left, he's presenting two of his planes to the rest of the group.

I met him only that one day, but as I look back through the pictures of the event, I remember a kind and genuine man who had a grin on his face almost the entire time. Kari Hultman, who knew him better than did I, has written more about Bob on her blog, The Village Carpenter, and there are some touching comments below her post that I hope you'll take the time to read.

Chris wrote a story about about our "planemakers'" event for the August 2006 issue, which features some of Bob's work. You can link to it here. 

— Megan Fitzpatrick

Thanks to the steady stream of tools that flow in and out of our shop, I do a lot of sharpening. I set up more tools from scratch than I care to admit. And I wear out sharpening stones.

Last week I noticed that my #1,000-grit Shapton Glasstone was getting wafer thin. This is the second #1,000-grit Glasstone I've burned through in the last few years, and it brings up something that has irked me about some brands of sharpening stones sold in North America.

Here is my gripe: Why would anyone sell stones that are all the same thickness? Perhaps I'm missing something, but I think that's odd.

Your coarse stones, such as #1,000, wear away quickly. I've probably burned through five since 1993. These stones should be thick. Give me at least an 1" of thickness, and I'll be your best friend. I know some manufacturers are smart about this, but not all are.

The finer stones should be thinner. I've used up only two #4,000-grit stones since 1993. Make one that is 1/2" to 5/8" thick, and I bet most woodworkers would have a lifetime stone.

The finest polishing stones can be wafer thin – 1/8" mounted on some kind of plastic base or glass would be fine with me. I have yet to use up an #8,000-grit stone. So giving me less of this abrasive is fine by me.

I think this approach works on the money side of things, as well. The coarse stones are the least expensive. The finer stones are the most expensive.

That's all the bile I have this week. I'm off on vacation as of .... now. I won't be able to monitor my e-mail or this blog, so if you have any problems, you'll be better off contacting the other staff members.

— Christopher Schwarz

Want instruction on how to wear out your sharpening stones? That's easy – sharpen a lot of tools. Here are a couple stories I've written on sharpening methods, and a link to Rob Hock's excellent new book on sharpening just about any kind of tool.

• "A Better Way to Sharpen Scrapers"

• "Understand Honing Guides"

• "The Perfect Edge," by Ron Hock – This book will change the way you think about "sharp."

When I worked at a liquor bottling plant one summer, the bosses found out I was in college and decided to put me in charge of the robots.

I had to summon the robots from the warehouse, pick up an entire pallet of coffee liquor with a giant robot arm and load it on the little scurrying buggers.

Oh, I also forgot to mention something: I know nothing about robots.

You know where this is going. Almost immediately I dropped eight cases of Tia Maria on a robot, destroying all the liquor and making the robot – no lie – weave like a drunken hobo the rest of the summer.

I'm more cautious now. And I always like to practice new techniques before I dive in, chisels blazing, on the most visible face of a real workpiece. This caution is one of the few benefits of getting old (at least until I qualify for senior discounts on Grand Slam breakfasts).

So I'm about to start cutting stop-chamfers on the stretchers of my workbench, a detail I have been too busy to add. I've cut plenty of stop chamfers with a router or a drawknife, but I wanted something different. I wanted each stopped 3/8" x 3/8" chamfer to terminate in an ogee.

So I made a pattern and began practicing on some 2 x 4 scraps. First by removing all the material with a chisel, which is slow. Then by wasting away most of the wood with my Stanley No. 65 chamfer shave. Don't get one. They stink. Sure they leave a beautiful and consistent surface, but you don't want one. Yes, they are easy to sharpen and use, but your spouse says you don't need one.

After three chamfers and six ogees (cut freehand with a chisel) I'm ready to tackle the bench itself.

I love practicing. And robots like it when you practice, too.

— Christopher Schwarz

Tool Resources You Should NEVER Use

• Don't sign up for Patrick Leach's newsletter here. In fact I think you should simply block that site and all his e-mails. You do want to stay married, don't you?

• Also, in the interests of continued co-habitation, avoid JimBodeTools.com. Avoid his daily newsletter – the sign-up box for that is on the right side, so tape your right eye shut or something.

• However, your spouse gives you permission to purchase the book "Handplane Essentials," a made-in-America compilation of my writings about this important tool during the last 10 years. And free shipping in the United States.

I can make my own beef jerky, but that doesn't mean I want to apply veneer-making techniques to a hapless bovine.

So when I found out that long-time woodworker Bill Rittner was making knobs and totes for vintage Stanley planes, I jumped at buying a set for my vintage No. 6 fore plane.

That plane's original tote looked like someone had dragged it behind a truck with a bulldog attached to it (weird teeth marks and blood stains included). And it was a maple replacement – the plane still had its original (or at least original-looking) front knob in rosewood. So I had no qualms about replacing the wood on this tool.

The knob Rittner made is circa 1870 Stanley. That means it's a fairly low front knob, which I prefer to the newer high knob. The low knob is 2" high and the high knob is 2-1/2" high. You can easily convert the screw for a high-knob plane to one for a low-knob plane by hacksawing 1/4" of the threads off both ends of the screw.

Also worth noting: The front knob has a nice bead at the base.

The rear tote is like the best tote that Stanley made. Unlike the cheaper late-model totes, Rittner's don't have uncomfortable flats and sharp arrises. Rittner's are all just smooth hand-pleasing curviness.

The fit and finish on these knobs and totes are as good as anything I can do, and even looks better than some of the mint, new-in-the-box Stanley planes I've seen. In other words, I have no complaints.

Rittner makes the knobs and totes using cherry and walnut, though he can make custom sets using other species. The wood is finished with varnish. The set I purchased cost $40 plus shipping.

I think this is a fair deal for such nice work. To order a set, contact Rittner at rbent.ct@gmail.com.

If you want to make your own knobs and totes, see below for a link to the issue where we recently featured instructions for making your own.

— Christopher Schwarz

Other Handplane Resources

• Confused by bench planes? I wrote this free article on our web site called "Understanding Bench Planes" that might help decode the system for you.

• Charles Murray shows you how to make your own knobs and totes in the November 2009 issue of Popular Woodworking Magazine.

• I still like my book "Handplane Essentials," which is available in our store and is shipped free in the United States.

This is by request. And for me this is like showing you my basement. Did you see the pawn shop's basement in "Pulp Fiction?" It's like that – but without the Spandex, leather and shotguns.

A reader asked to see the angle-setting guide I use for setting my tools in my side-clamp honing guide when sharpening. It was featured (briefly) in the DVD "Handplane Basics" that we released late last year.

Before we get into details and philosophy, let me state that I know this jig isn't a new idea. And my version is junky blue-stained Eastern white pine. It is nothing like the sexy guide made by Deneb Puchalski at Lie-Nielsen Toolworks. Heck, that thing has a leather thong. No lie.

But mine is smaller (and now I can hear Deneb laughing all the way from Maine). And ... it works.

OK, here is why I have this thing and why I use it every day. People get obsessed about angles in sharpening. I do not. I am obsessed with consistency. Setting your honing guide consistently is the key to quick and fast results.

Yes, I know that different thicknesses of irons can throw off the angles when sharpening plane blades. No, I do not care. No, I'm not listening. Nunga, nunga, nunga, nunga. Why am I not listening? Because the differences in angles caused by slight variations in iron thicknesses are pretty petty. Do the math if you like.

So I set all my plane irons in my jig using the same stop for 30° (or a second stop for 35° when I want a steeper edge). It might not actually be 30°. But it is perfect every time, requires just a few strokes to pull up a wire edge and (like I said before) mine is smaller (stop snickering Megan!).

On the flip side of this jig are three other stops. Two are for chisels – one for 30° and one for 35°. Same philosophy. These angles work. I use the lower angle for paring chisels and the steeper one for chopping chisels.

The third stop is for honing a 15° back bevel on a plane iron. This takes my 45° bevel-down planes up to 60° with just a few swipes on a polishing stone. Then I can remove the back bevel by grinding away the primary bevel if I please.

Below is a SketchUp file that shows my jig and its measurements. Or build Deneb's if you want to impress the ladies with your thong.

SharpeningJig.zip (65.76 KB)

— Christopher Schwarz

Other Sharpening Resources You Should Investigate

• Download a pdf of Deneb's jig from the Lie-Nielsen web site.

• Brent Beach is a sharpening madman. Take a free afternoon and dive down into the rabbet hole of his web site. You might come up a different person. (www3.telus.net/BrentBeach/)

• "Perfect Edge" by Ron Hock – a great new book on sharpening by one of the nicest and smartest guys in the business.

• "Handplane Basics" DVD, my tutorial that started this crazy entry. Geeze do I look that dorky?

Stanley Toolworks unveiled three new hand tools today at a press conference in New York City – two different kinds of chisels and a shoulder plane.

I couldn't attend the press conference, but Publisher Steve Shanesy is there (as I type this) taking photos with his phone. I don't have a lot of details yet, but here is the first look at the new Sweetheart socket chisels, which look like Stanley's venerable 750 tools (and Lie-Nielsen's). And a Bailey line of chisels, which look like standard tang chisels.

The shoulder plane is a No. 92. Other people have reported on this tool, but I have yet to see one in the flesh.

The Sweetheart chisels will (I think – I could be wrong) be made in Sheffield and range in size from 1/8" up to 1-1/4". Prices will be $29.99 each, except for the two largest sizes, which will be $39.99 each. An eight-piece set will be $199 and a four-piece set will be $110.

The Bailey Sheffield chisels will be sold as a five-piece set in sizes from 1/4" up to 1-1/4" for $79.99. The sets come with a leather tool roll and should be available in September.

More details as I get them. This is all I know.

— Christopher Schwarz

In the world of infill planes, there are several tools that stand out as iconic designs, including Karl Holtey's "bad arse" A13 and his groundbreaking No. 98, which laid the groundwork for all the modern bevel-up planes.

On this side of the Atlantic, few planes are as distinct as Stephen M. Thomas's "Loopy" infill. It started as a joke, way back in the early years of the Badger Pond discussion group (we didn't have WiFi, we didn't have Skype, we didn't have "air" – and we liked  it!).

Thomas is, and I don't use this word lightly, a genius. A savant at both woodworking (he's in architectural millwork) and toolmaking, he designed and built the "loopy" infills – so named for their distinctive crescent-joint sidewalls – from scratch.

The Loopy is the first modern infill I ever saw with an adjustable mouth (though Norris advertised plates you could install, I believe). And the sole is an astonishing 11/16" thick. Using it is like pushing a big, beautiful, completely stable brick across a board. And it is capable of taking shavings both thick and gossamer thin without a shudder.

I can hear the anti-infill forces gathering from here, lighting their beech fore planes. Getting out their high-carbon pitchforks.

In any case, Thomas came for a visit a few months ago and loaned me one of his planes. I've been using the tar out of it and have been meaning to write about it here. But then I beat myself to it.

I wrote an article about the plane in the most recent edition of The Fine Tool Journal about Thomas and his plane. And now Wiktor Kuc has kindly posted it on his site at WKFineTools.com. The direct link to the story is http://www.wkfinetools.com/contrib/cSchwarz/z_art/loopyInfill/loopyInfill-1.asp.

If you like exotic iron, this is a fine piece of it.

— Christopher Schwarz

Other Handplane Resources For You

• "Handplane Essentials" by Christopher Schwarz. I write about a lot of infill planes and my experiences with them.

• David Charlesworth's "Hand Tool Techniques Part 1: Plane Sharpening" from Lie-Nielsen Toolworks.

• David Charlesworth's "Hand Tool Techniques Part 2, Hand Planing" from Lie-Nielsen Toolworks.

• Want to restore a plane? You need to visit RexMill.com.

John Sindelar, who owns the most jaw-dropping, drool-inducing tool collection I've ever seen, is bringing a big chunk of it to our Woodworking in America show Oct. 1-3 in Cincinnati.

And here's the best part: The collection will be displayed (in a traveling trailer) that will be on the floor of the Marketplace. If you are registered for our event, then you will get to tour the collection. No extra charge. Nothing else to register for.

And if you aren't registered, you can fix that here: WoodworkingInAmerica.com. We have about 50 slots left for the classes, and some slots still available for the Toolmakers' Dinner on the Thursday evening before the show opens. The event costs $335 for three full days of classes (more than 80) plus a Marketplace show floor that makes some other woodworking shows look like discarded freight sale (not that there's anything wrong with that).

If you don't know who John Sindelar is, you can catch up by reading this article I wrote about his collection for Popular Woodworking. Sindelar is a cabinetmaker in Michigan who has spent a good deal of his adult life – and his personal wealth – building a tool collection that is filled with the rarest of the rare. And he owns some of the most beautiful tools ever made, both ancient and modern.

We'll have more details soon.

One other cool update: I've been informed that Matt Hodgson from Gabardi & Son planes will be displaying his tools in the Marketplace. This is troubling news for the wallets of America.

— Christopher Schwarz

Tool Books You Should Hide From Your Spouse

• "Art of Fine Tools"by Sandor Nagyszalanczy. Yup, Sindelar owns some of these.

• "Tools Rare and Ingenious: Celebrating the World's Most Amazing Tools"by Sandor Nagyszalanczy. And some of these, too.

• "Classic Hand Tools" by Garrett Hack. Ditto.

• "Handplane Essentials" by Christopher Schwarz. He doesn't own the plane on the cover. I do. Neener neener!

When I was assisting a woodworking class this April, a student asked why anyone would buy an infill plane. They are more expensive than a premium plane from Veritas or Lie-Nielsen, and perform at the same very high level.

"Well," I answered. "I build stuff by hand. When people occasionally buy my stuff it's expensive. So I believe in supporting people who build tools in the same way I build furniture."

Another student at the back of room put it better than I did: "You have to practice what you preach," he called out.

This week I've been working with two planes made by Matt Hodgson, a Utah luthier-turned-planemaker who runs the Gabardi and Son tool company. (For a short story I wrote earlier about Matt, read this entry: Matt Hodgson: From Luthier to Planemaker.)

After borrowing his Norris A5 for a few months, I sent it back to him and started saving my money to buy one of Hodgson's planes for myself. I settled on an unhandled coffin smoother with a thick O1 Hock iron. The plane arrived while I was on my way to New Hampshire last week, and when I returned I immediately opened the boxes Hodgson had sent.

Boxes? Two? Hodgson had sent along two additional planes of his for me to try: a handled smoother and a small-straight sided smoothing plane, which he says is an adaptation of a Spiers No. 6.

I immediately set up the plane I had purchased and have put it to work -- in fact, I have hardly put it down as I've been finishing up this workbench and a few other projects. Then I set up the Spiers No. 6. Both of these planes are fantastic, both to work with and to look at.

The mouths of the two planes I've set up are super-tight, the workmanship is A+ and the wood is just gorgeous. I'll be writing more about these planes in the coming weeks and writing about them in great detail in the Fine Tool Journal. In the meantime, I'm off to buy my wife some flowers. And maybe some jewelry for good measure as well.

— Christopher Schwarz

Other Handplane Resources You'll Enjoy

• Gabardi & Son website

• If you think I have a problem, read about my visit to John Sindelar's tool museum.

• My book "Handplane Essentials" is also a bad influence on many woodworkers.

• And for the biggest rock of crack I know, check out Sandor Nagyszalanczy 's "The Art of Fine Tools."

The subject of skew block planes gets people's bodily juices going.

When I announced at our weekly staff meeting that we had received a new skew block plane from Veritas, two of the editors who use primarily power tools sat up straight and said "Really!?" and "Cool!"

After many years of working here, I can reliably translate "power tool guy" language. (I also speak "drunk guy," "baby talk" and "agitated feline.") So here's a quick translation of "Veritas Skew Block Plane."

"Veritas" translates as "high quality" and "good value."

"Skew" translates as "better and cooler than straight."

"Block" translates as "a plane I already know how to use."

And "plane" translates as "planer."

But what is the skew block used for? I know lots of woodworkers who swear by the tool and use it as a day-to-day block plane, trimming tenon cheeks, fielding raised panels, assisting with dovetail joinery, plus creating and trimming small rabbets.

I bought a Stanley No. 140 in 1997 and tried like heck to love it. I tried using it as a regular block plane; but with the tool's side plate removed, the toe of the tool was quite flexible. So I always had to make sure the side plate was on (and that I hadn't lost the screws that secured it).

I used it for trimming tenon cheeks, at which it works quite well.

I tried using it for raising panels, but the tool didn't have a cross-grain nicker, so I had to knife in the field on the top and bottom of the panel (or saw it in).

I tried using it make rabbets, but it didn't have a fence or a depth stop. It did trim up an existing rabbet quite well.

So I wasn't impressed with the tool. I sold it. Years later I bought a Lie-Nielsen version of the No. 140, which had some serious improvements compared to the original. The body casting is thicker, so I can use it as a block plane with the side plate removed. It has a fence, so I can use it in some joinery applications.

But my version doesn't have a cross-grain nicker (new Lie-Nielsens come with a nicker) and it doesn't have a depth stop. So the plane is more useful, but it still isn't as useful as a moving fillister plane (which has a nicker, fence and depth stop). So that plane does more sitting than cutting.

Enter the Veritas
The Veritas Skew Block Plane makes some further improvements on the original No. 140 and the Lie-Nielsen version. The most significant difference is (collectors rejoice) that there is no more side plate and locking screws to lose. Instead, one sidewall is solid and the other sidewall simply has an opening near the sole for a corner of the blade to peek through. As a result, the tool is always solid, and the toe doesn't flex during normal use.

The other significant difference is that this tool has an adjustable mouth, which is a serious bit of machining. As a result you can close up the mouth to pass only gnat keisters. This makes the tool even more suitable as a daily user.

The list of other improvements is impressive:

1. The tool has a Norris-style adjuster, which controls both blade depth and lateral position in the mouth.

2. The blade is guided by three setscrews, which assists in setting the skewed cutter. With most tools, I ignore setscrews such as these. In this tool, I found them helpful.

3. The fence is locked by the same robust collet-locking mechanism used on the company's rabbeting and plow planes. (Be sure to rough up the fence post with #100-grit sandpaper for maximum locking power.)

4. The nicker adjusts up and down, plus in and out. This makes it easy to align the nicker and cutter. And you can easily swing the nicker out of the way.

But even with all these improvements, this tool still isn't a replacement for a moving fillister plane. And that's because it lacks a depth stop. A depth stop allows you to make miles of rabbets that are all the same size. Because of the depth stop, the tool simply stops cutting when you are at your final depth.

As a result, I wouldn't put a skew block plane on the list of must-have tools for hand-tool woodworkers. Get a good moving fillister plane first. Or go old school and get a straight rabbet plane and use your fingers as a fence.

If, however, you do a lot of work with power tools and would like to have a high quality block plane that can also tune up tenons and clean up raised panels and rabbets, this tool is an excellent choice.

The plane is available from Lee Valley Tools for $189 (U.S.) until May 31. Then the price goes to $209. It's available with O1 or A2 blades (I prefer O1 blades for low-angle tools, but that's just me). And it's available in right- and left-hand configurations.

— Christopher Schwarz

After a couple of weeks of working with the legs for this new workbench, I am certain the material is not pine.

Yes, I know. Shocker. The good people at Home Depot were mistaken.

What is it? Heck if I know. My best guess is that it's Douglas fir or hemlock, based on my experiences working with the stuff out in California one year. However, while the stuff is stringy and sassy like Doug fir, my boss (who lived in California) thinks it might be aspen.

Why? Because some of the curly figure in these legs looks aspen-ish.

What I do know is that this stuff is no fun to plane. I trued up the legs with a sharp 50° jointer plane. That tool might as well have been a lawnmower because the wood ripped up like I was planing Silly String no matter which direction I stroked.

In cases like this I always do stupid things. No, I didn't sand the legs. I decided to use a plane with a really low pitch and see what happened. So I fetched my Wayne Anderson ebony miter plane, a tool that I have a long history with. It's a bevel-up plane with the bed somewhere sweetly south of 20°. I reground the iron at 25° and put a small micro-bevel on the edge.

As I have written before, this tool is like a long-time girlfriend. No matter how long I've been away from this plane, when I wrap my fingers around the brass body we pick things up like my fingers have never left the sidewalls.

You can, in fact, read the whorls of my fingerprints on this tool, which are pasted all over Wayne's name on the port sidewall.

The miter plane trued up all four legs in short order. It planed out the tearing around four nasty knots. It restored order to some reversing grain. It sliced out a wack-nasty patch of tearing that all the high-angle tools couldn't touch.

All this gives proof to a maxim that I've always thought was true: When conventional wisdom fails (high angles reduce tearing), slam the gearbox into reverse and see what happens. Sure, the transmission might appear in your rear-view mirror. Or you might just end up with glimmering surfaces that are smooth as glass and as deep as a Caribbean lagoon.

— Christopher Schwarz

The world needs more makers of new wooden handplanes, especially moulding planes. Vintage moulding planes can, in my experience, be testy. The narrow stocks can be twisted or bowed, the irons can be rusted to oblivion and many wedges need to be replaced.

If you read my article on Clark & Williams planemakers in the April 2010 issue, you probably concluded the same thing that I did: There are enough woodworkers out there to support another maker.

So I'm pleased to announce that I've gotten my wish. Matthew Bickford of Haddam Neck, Conn., is now a full-time planemaker. He's taking orders. And the planes look great.

This weekend he was showing off his wares at the Northeastern Woodworkers Association annual Showcase event, and I got a chance to chat with Bickford and shoot a short video of him making an ovolo moulding. I didn't get a chance to use the planes -- the vendors were breaking down all the booths, and we were receiving heavy stink eye from people who needed to get home.

But I did order some planes from Bickford to test for the magazine: a 7/8" rabbet with a boxed corner and a pair of No. 8 hollows and rounds.

Here are some early details for you early adopters. Bickford is a native of Hyde Park, N.Y., graduated from Yale University with a history degree and (naturally) became an equity and derivatives trader in Philadelphia. After nine years of that, he abandoned high finance, moved to the Connecticut town where his wife is from and started making planes.

His planes are British in form, much like the Clark & Williams planes. But there are some important distinctions. Bickford's planes are cherry instead of beech. And the way he packages his wares is a bit different.

Take a gander at his site: msbickford.com. In addition to offering the standard sorts of planes, such as a half set of hollows and rounds, Bickford offers smaller sets that get you started in moulding planes.

For example, take a look at his "starter set" of 13 planes for $1,575. For most woodworkers, this probably would take them through to the end of their creative lives. The set includes the even hollows and rounds between Nos. 2 and 10 (10 planes total), plus a pair of snipes bills and a 7/8" rabbet plane. That's a great starter set.

Additionally, Bickford offers individual pairs or hollow and round planes, plus side rounds.

Bickford has been at it full-time now for three months. Look for him at some Lie-Nielsen Hand Tool events on the East Coast this year and -- I hope -- at our Woodworking in America show in Cincinnati, Oct. 1-3.

I'll post more about the planes as I get my hands on them and get comfortable with them. In the meantime, take a look at this video of Bickford cutting an ovolo. Awesome stuff.

— Christopher Schwarz

Several weeks ago I was planing a piece of palm when my hand slipped, and a deep sliver of the nasty grass dove into the middle finger of my left hand.

I dug out as much of the splinter as I could. But now almost six weeks later, the foreign object (as my doctor calls it) is deep inside my soft tissue. I can wait things out, or I can see a hand surgeon (I'm a good waiter).

Wood can be nasty stuff. Rosewoods make my tongue swell up like a Ballpark Frank. Some species (redwood, especially) sting like crazy when I get a splinter. And spalted stuff can kill you dead.

But aren't you worried about what wood can do to your tools?

On Wednesday I was slathering epoxy into the cracks of my workbench top when Megan Fitzpatrick asked me if I was worried about what the epoxy would do to the blades of my handplanes.

"I don't really give a weevil's (expletive deleted)," I replied.

"Why?" she asked.

"Because I know how to sharpen."

The way I see it, unless the material I'm working is going to split my tool in half, I'll plane it. Laminated veneer lumber? Plywood? MDF? OSB? Epoxy? Plastic resin glue? Yup, I've planed them all. Here's why: It's easier to sharpen a handplane blade than it is to sharpen the blades in my electric jointer or planer. So I think a handplane is a great tool for dealing with engineered material. This is wacky chat, I know.

I too was afraid of planing odd stuff until one day in the late 1990s. We were training our fellow publishing employees in basic woodworking techniques, and each student was building a little project with our help.

We let the students pick the wood for their project, and half of the women in the class picked purpleheart. Purpleheart, I discovered, is not a wood. It's a mineral. After two swipes, my block plane began to dull. I had to hone my block plane a lot that week, but we made it through the class.

After that experience, I stopped worrying about what I was planing and focused on becoming a faster and better sharpener. The way I see things, a dull blade is a good thing because it means two things. 1. You are working the wood and not just fondling the forgings. 2. You get to sharpen it, which makes you a better sharpener.

And now back to scraping epoxy (which cuts a lot like maple).

— Christopher Schwarz

One of the great mysteries of the hand tool world is how Roy Underhill never seems to get older. (Is there a cursed painting in your attic, Mr. Underhill?) The other great mystery is about the unbeveled faces of vintage irons in handplanes.

If you've even bought an old plane you know of what I speak. You take one look at the face of the iron (what some people call the "back"), and it looks like crap. This flies in the face of modern handplane dogma. That surface is supposed to be flat and polished so our ancestors could see just how rotten their teeth were.

About half the time the face of the iron looks untouched. The other half of the time it looks like they dubbed over that edge – rounding it over. Bad form, no?

Plane pundits I know have speculated that this is the result of the plane falling into inexperienced hands after its previous owner retired and died. Or perhaps it was a carpenter's tool that planed softwood and didn't require a super-keen edge.

I have another crazy theory. Perhaps in some of these cases the woodworker had dubbed the face intentionally to create a back bevel.

Why would anyone do this? To increase the pitch of the plane and reduce tear-out. The higher the pitch, the less tearing. And because bevel-down planes are somewhat fixed at a 45° pitch, the only ways to increase your cutting angle are to get a new higher-pitched frog (a modern option for Lie-Nielsen plane users) or to apply a back bevel.

I have some smaller Stanley-style planes that I quite like. A No. 3 Bed Rock and a No. 2 Lie-Nielsen. Both have 45° frogs, which makes them unsuitable for reversing, interlocked or curly grain. So I polish a 15° back bevel on those tools, which transforms them into a 60° tool.

With the help of my cheapie honing guide, this is easy and repeatable. After honing the bevel, I'll flip the iron over in the guide, set it to 15° by sighting it against a block of wood (someday – how about today – I'll make a jig to set it automatically), and chase the burr off on an #8,000-grit waterstone.

It adds about five minutes to the sharpening time. And that's well worth it because removing tear-out takes a lot longer than that. Give it a try on your 45° planes and test it on some mahogany with interlocked grain. Work against the grain (like I am below). I think you'll be impressed.

— Christopher Schwarz

One of my first handplanes, a Stanley No. 5, had a shopmade tote that was all kinds of wrong. Wrong shape, wrong wood, wrongly made.

So as soon as I could, I bought a replacement front knob and tote. These also were all kinds of wrong. Wrong wood, wrong glossy finish, wrong high knob. But the tote was the right shape, so I kept it on the tool for the last decade or so.

Today I put on a vintage rosewood tote and the original low knob on the plane and went to work raising some drawer bottoms. I have no idea if the tote is of the correct vintage (nor do I particularly care), but it sure looks and feels right to me.

So thanks to Carl Bilderback, who sent me the tote after seeing my flashy one (and probably rolling his eyes).

— Christopher Schwarz

There are still some spots open in the woodworking classes I’m teaching this winter. If you’ve recently come into a little money (thank you First National Bank of the Plasma) and have a little time available, here are some details on these classes.

Handplanes and Workbenches

Feb. 26 at the Woodcraft in Alpharetta, Ga. (suburban Atlanta).

This is a lecture-style class designed so I can dump any and all information I have on handplanes into any available skull. We’re covering and demonstrating everything, from grinding and honing up to the finer points of removing tear-out.

We’ll cover all the edge geometry of bevel-up and bevel-down planes so you can choose the right tool for you. I’ll present the basic kit of handplanes that woodworkers need to build furniture (it’s much smaller than you think), including bench planes, joinery planes and moulding planes. I’ll show you how to set up all of these planes and put them to use (the bench planes and joinery planes in particular are very different).

And, most importantly, there will be plenty of time for questions so you can get answers to personal and specific questions. Should I buy a bevel-up jack plane for the work I do? What honing angle should I use on a plow plane? What are the differences between the premium plane makers and vintage tools?

And finally, because you cannot easily use a plane without a decent workbench, I’m going to show you how the workbench evolved from a rock up to its most perfect form in the 18th century and then de-volved into something that makes me want to work on a rock instead. We’ll show how the workholding on these benches has changed and discuss how you can modify your bench so it is optimized for planing.

Handplane Weekend with Thomas Lie-Nielsen

April 24-25 at the Marc Adams School of Woodworking

I’ve assisted Thomas Lie-Nielsen with this class for five years now and never get tired of teaching it. The two days are always a blast because the students are always an interesting sort, bring along lots of fascinating tools to the class and ask really tough questions.

And, best of all, this class is hands-on. The Marc Adams School of Woodworking has some great workbenches that make this class really work.

During the two days, Thomas and I discuss everything related to handplanes. Bring your sharpening equipment. If you struggle with sharpening, this is your chance to put that behind you. By the end of the first morning Tom, the assistants and I have everyone creating cutting edges that could split an atom.

We go deep into plane theory and boil it down so you can understand how the steel in your plane should encounter the wood so you get the result you desire. Hint: It’s as much about understanding wood as it is understanding tools.

We discuss set-up and then applying bench planes to the work and how to flatten stock by hand, even if you are beginning with a rough board. (Most planing classes skip this important step). Then we get into joinery planes and scrapers.

All the while, Thomas answers questions about toolmaking and even discusses some of the tools coming down the pike (last year he showed off his nice bench hardware). He narrates a movie about the toolworks – it’s different every year – and shows how he makes the tools.

And we wrap things up with a contest to get a board completely dead flat using the techniques shown here. There are valuable prizes at stake.

— Christopher Schwarz

If you're parsimonious, tardy or just plain wary, then this post is for you.

My book "Handplane Essentials" is now on sale for the first time since its release this summer. Until Feb. 15, you can get "Handplane Essentials" for 20 percent off, plus free shipping in the United States. The book is normally $34.99. With the discount, it's $27.99 plus free domestic shipping.

To get the discount, all you have to do is enter the coupon code: PW10LUV at checkout.

Before you order, keep in mind that the book is huge, made entirely in the United States and is filled with articles I've written during the last 10 years from Popular Woodworking, Woodworking Magazine, The Fine Tool Journal and various blogs.

In other words, if you already own everything I've written, don't buy this book (unless you like the thought of my children wearing extra warm and fuzzy clothes....).

If you're not sure that "Handplane Essentials" is for you, then I encourage you to read the February 2010 issue of WoodenBoat magazine. Associate Editor Karen Wales wrote a lengthy review of the book. And though I've gotten some nice write-ups for the book, this one is the most glowing.

Here are a couple samples:

"Pretty enough for the coffee table but not too precious to use, Handplane Essentials will provide hours and hours of enjoyable reading, is an excellent learning tool and a timeless resource."

And this one embarrassed me:

"...(L)ike some of the best food writing, he produces sensations so nearly tactile that I can almost smell the shavings; only afterward do I realize I've also learned something."

Thanks Karen. If we ever get to meet, the first round is on me.

To order the book, visit the WoodworkersBookshop.com. And remember, the coupon code – PW10LUV – expires Feb. 15.

— Christopher Schwarz

Many woodworkers think it's bonkers to use a curved cutting edge in a jointer plane. After all, the plane is designed to make things straight and flat, so using a curved cutter seems ... let's say "counterintuitive."

But the more I use a curved iron, the more I like it. I'm always stumbling on little ways it can help me.

Today I glued up the base of a small table that has hand-cut tenons. The aprons have 4-1/2"-long shoulders, which is a lot of wood to get mated perfectly against the leg. And this is where my curved iron came in handy today.

As I was dressing the legs with my jointer plane, I did something a little odd when working the area where the aprons attach. After dressing the area to remove the toolmarks, I took three or four stokes with the jointer plane running right down the center of the leg.

This made a very small curved depression on the face of the leg – it imitated the curve of the iron. You can see this (kinda) in the photo above. It's quite evident under a ruler to the naked eye.

When I assembled the table base, the slight curve ensured that the visible tenon shoulder would close up before the tenon shoulder on the inside of the table base. Works like a peach.

— Christopher Schwarz

Years ago I got a phone call from plane maker Larry Williams that changed the way I look at long planes.

"Do you have the book 'American Furniture of the 18th Century?'" he asked.

I sure did. I had rescued a damaged one that my company was throwing away back in 1996 when the book came out. It's still marked "cut" – the mark for the dumpster.

Larry continued: "Turn to page 118. What do you see?"

Then he was silent. I looked at the photo at the top of page 118 for a good 20 seconds before it dawned on me. The enormous wooden jointer plane on that page had an iron that was pitched high. Way high. Higher than my college roommate who would play the game "What can we fry today?" while working at Long John Silver's.

Larry said the plane was probably pitched at 60°. This was shocking because most planes these days are pitched at 45°. And it turns out that Larry was wrong. I measured the pitch of the plane in the photo, and I estimate it's pitched at 64° or so.

This is not lunacy. Joesph Moxon – a 17th-century chronicler of the art of joinery – discusses how high-pitched planes can be used for hard woods. Though he's discussing moulding planes in this intance, he suggests pitches of 80°. The bench planes shown in Moxon's plates (which yes, I know, are actually French) are shown with pitches approaching 60°.

So there's little doubt that pre-Industrial woodworkers used high-pitch planes, and not just for smoothing.

Why use a high-angle plane? To reduce tear-out on your show surfaces, primarily. But why have a high-angle try or jointer plane? Why not just use a high-angle smoothing plane? After all, a smoothing plane is the last plane to touch the wood, and its most important job is to make the wood look its best.

My answer is going to be muddy here. So sharpen your pitchforks and dip those torches in tar.

Deneb Puchalski of Lie-Nielsen Toolworks and I had a conversation about this topic today to compare notes. It was interesting to note how our experiences and feelings about tear-out overlapped, despite the fact that our planing methods are different.

First, Deneb and I agreed that you don't always need a high-angle jointer. A plane pitched at 45° will allow you to take thick shavings with a reasonable effort. And if the wood is behaving, as most domestic hardwoods tend to do, then there's no reason to move up to a higher pitch.

But when you experience tearing as you are jointing your surface, it's best to stop for a minute and assess the situation. That's because tear-out seems to have a half-life – that's Deneb's word; and I don't have a better one. What this means is that you can remove this tear-out with your high-angle smoothing plane, but it will take longer than if you started on the same surface and it wasn't torn at all.

In other words, as soon as you get tear-out on a board, you should switch gears to eliminate it immediately. That might mean reducing the depth of cut, sharpening the iron or tightening the mouth (both Deneb and I do this). It might mean switching tools (Deneb uses a plane with a toothed iron). It might mean skewing the tool – Deneb will try to plane the wood obliquely. Me, I tend to traverse a board that is tearing out – working directly across the grain. Any of these strategies can wipe out the tearing. Then you can move onto a high-angle smoothing plane with a clean, flat and tear-out-free slate.

The other option when you are getting into tough wood is simply to start with a high-angle jointer plane. Using a high-angle jointer or try plane can start the process on the right foot.

A couple other details about this are worth mentioning. Deneb reports that planes with more mass seem to deal with difficult woods better than lighter planes. We exchanged some theories about this, but they aren't ready for even a blog. Also, when you use a higher-pitch jointer you should back off on the depth of your cut a bit, which also helps to control tearing. And it makes the plane easier to push.

Also, in general, high-pitch planes seem to do better with hard woods than standard-pitch planes. They seem to be able to take a bite and to cut better than standard-angle planes, which seem to skitter across hard surfaces.

Tear-out is such a crazy, mixed-up problem that I plan to devote a couple more entries to the topic in the near future. And so I end with a question: What is the most difficult wood to plane consistently without tearing it out? I have a species in mind already.

— Christopher Schwarz

We've just received our shipment of our newest DVD: "Handplane Basics: A Better Way to Use Bench Planes." And despite my needing a haircut when we filmed it, I'm pleased with the result.

Check out the trailer above for a quick preview. (Yes, there is banjo music.)

Thanks to Megan Fitzpatrick's, ahem, firm direction and Drew DePenning's skilled filming and editing, we crammed a ton of information about bench planes into 71 minutes of video. This DVD decodes the bench plane system in a way I think is helpful. Instead of focusing on conflicting historical instructions, one craftsman's personal preference or numbers from a Stanley catalog, we explain the characteristics of all bench planes.

What does this really mean? Well once you see how the length, mouth, cutting angle and shape of the iron of the plane all interact, you can think for yourself. We boil it down so:

1. You can pick up any plane and know what job it is supposed to do.
2. You can set up any plane to do a wide variety of jobs.
3. You'll understand the conflicting historical instructions for handplanes.
4. You'll pick tools that suit your work and avoid buying tools you don't need.

I think this DVD is best suited for handplane beginners or intermediates (someday we'll do a DVD on advance planing – promise). In "Handplane Basics: A Better Way to Use Bench Planes" we cover (in a way that I've never seen before) choosing the right tools, sharpening the iron to the right shape and pushing the tool.

This DVD is available in our store now for $24.95.

— Christopher Schwarz

I'm a mediocre guitar player. But because I'm a fair judge of craftsmanship, I have an immense respect for real-deal lutherie.

Have you seen one of Jameel Abraham's ouds in person? They walk that fine line between something that looks and feels both handmade and perfect. On the other side of the equation are musical instruments that are neither, such as my Gibson OP25 acoustic guitar.

I'm telling you all this because earlier this year I got to pick up one of Matt Hodgson's infill planes and got that same feeling from it. It was decidedly handmade, but was at the same time perfect to the hands and the eyes.

So it came as little surprise to find out that Hodgson was a custom guitar maker before he started making tools to sell – he sold his first plane about 18 months ago. Since that time, Hodgson has shifted his efforts from guitars to infill planes. Hodgson works under the name Gabardi & Son, a tribute to his father who was a cabinetmaker and introduced him to the world of woodworking and toolmaking. Hodgson made his first plane when he was 12 from a 2x4 and file.

"Making tools was just part of what we did," Hodgson says.

Though Hodgson decided to go to college and had a career as a sales and marketing manager for Marriott, he was snapped back into the shop by the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. He decided to move his family back to his native Utah and take up the craft so he could travel less, be home more and make something he valued.

As he started making guitars, he also started making his own tools, like his father did, including a 6" parallel-sided smoothing plane. A customer saw it and asked to buy it, and from then forward Hodgson began to change his focus to tools.

In addition to his family tradition and training, Hodgson has other advantages, including a cache of 1,000 pounds of 50-year-old rosewood that his father brought to Utah's desert climate from Brazil. Some of it is perfectly straight-grained, which is preferred for guitars. Some of it is incredibly curly, up to 40 curls per inch.

"I am," Hodgson says, "reluctant to part with it. It's the highest quality wood."

Since opening his toolmaking business, Hodgson has been making lots of custom tools, including infill panel planes. But most of the planes he makes are unhandled infill smoothing planes. His other major project is trying to find a way to make a cast infill smoothing plane that is more affordable (he'd like to hit $500) than the dovetailed ones.

In 2009 he made a run of 24 cast planes that were 5-1/2" long with parallel sides, but he really wants to make ones with a traditional coffin shape, which is on the drawing board now.

I've spent several months using an A5-style smoother from Hodgson that I borrowed (it's his personal plane) and have since sent back. In general, I prefer little unhandled infill smoothing planes and have placed a deposit on one. Guess I need to take a few more teaching gigs in 2010.

I'll be writing a review of the smoothing plane for a future issue of Fine Tool Journal and Popular Woodworking Magazine. And I'm sure you'll be seeing it here on the blog as well.

In the meantime, take a look at the Gabardi & Son web site to see some of Hodgson's nice work. But just realize that it's much like a musical instrument. Looking at it is only half the joy; the music you make completes the experience.

— Christopher Schwarz

After years of development, Lie-Nielsen Toolworks is planning on making a No. 51 chute-board plane that should be released in the first quarter of 2010, Thomas Lie-Nielsen says.

Tool collectors and users have been requesting this rare tool for many years, and Lie-Nielsen has found a way to produce it by using many existing parts and a new ductile-iron body casting. A vintage No. 51 should set you back $300 to $450, according to tool seller Tony Murland. Lie-Nielsen expects the price of his new No. 51 to be somewhere in the range of $425 to $475.

The No. 51 is an unusual skew-blade plane that is designed to be used on a shooting board to trim miters or the ends of boards. The base casting is L-shaped. This shape allows the tool to be used easily and accurately on its side and to be captured effectively in a track on a shooting board.

Of course, what collectors and users are wondering is if Lie-Nielsen will manufacture the No. 52 – which is the No. 51 chute-board plane plus a heavy metal shooting board with a quadrant and a hold-down.

The answer is: Yes, eventually. Lie-Nielsen says the massive shooting board base would be tricky to make in iron, so he thinks they'll use steel. The board by itself will cost somewhere between $500 and $700.

Lie-Nielsen says the plan is to offer plans for a wooden version of the shooting board, plus sell the quadrant and hold-down separately so that users can make their own board for less. The quadrant sets the angle of your work; the hold-down keeps it in place. Patrick Leach's Blood and Gore site has photos and details on the vintage tool.

Right now the company is working out final details of the tool to get its weight just right – the original tool was too light, and a beefed-up version that used a 2-3/8" frog was too heavy.

Lie-Nielsen also mentioned that he's hired a new product-development specialist at the toolworks so he can get more new products into the pipeline faster – including the long-awaited No. 72 chamfer plane.

— Christopher Schwarz

Legendary English craftsman Alan Peters used a Stanley No. 7 for every bench plane operation.

David Charlesworth uses a No. 5-1/2.

Joseph Moxon says you need a fore, jointer and smoothing planes.

And many woodworkers use just a bevel-up jack plane.

After years of teaching hundreds of people to use bench planes and answering thousands (yes thousands) of e-mails, phone calls and questions from woodworkers, I became convinced that the more you read about bench planes, the more confused you'll get.

So a few years ago I began to rethink the Western bench plane system. Not to develop some idiosyncratic new way of using them – that wouldn't be helpful. Instead I set out to explain the bench plane system in a way that embraces historical approaches, explains all the modern ones and gives you the power to adapt your existing set of planes to your work.

The key to all this was to stop focusing so much on the size of the plane and to focus far more attention to how it is sharpened and set up.

This DVD "Handplane Basics - A Better Way to Use Bench Planes" is the result of all that work. Over the course of a month, Drew DePenning, Megan Fitzpatrick and I boiled down this approach in a 70-minute DVD that:

1. Explains the bench plane system so you can immediately understand the proper use of everything from a "scrub plane" to a "panel plane" to a "fore plane."

2. Shows you how to sharpen, set up and use the three planes you need to process rough lumber into gleaming boards.

3. Explains and demonstrates how to four-square your lumber. I take a rough board and show exactly how to deal with its faces edges and ends so you get a project part that is flat, square and good-looking.

I'm quite proud of this DVD, from the content itself, to Megan's direction to Drew's filming and editing. The DVD is being pressed as we speak and should be shipping withing four weeks. If you pre-order the DVD, you will get it for $19.95 – that's 20-percent off the $24.95 retail price. This sale ends on Dec. 31, 2009.

You can read more about the DVD or order a copy from our store.

— Christopher Schwarz

Today most of the magazine's staff spent the day with Ron Herman, a seventh-generation housewright in Columbus, Ohio, who has spent the last 29 years building, remodeling and restoring homes and historic sites – in many cases using only traditional tools.

His small shop north of the city is one of the wonders of the Western world. Amongst the machinery (much of it converted from a line-shaft system) are more hand tools than your eye can possibly take in. If this were a tool collection, it would be stupendous. The fact that Herman sets up all these tools and uses them is mind-blowing.

Herman spoke on handsaws at out last Woodworking in America Conference. But he knows about a lot more than saws.

I'm still trying to process all my notes and photos for a future article. Herman can talk. And his shop is a feast for the camera. In the meantime, I've pulled out a few good quotes from my notebook and some of the photos I took during our visit.

"You have to have good mojo. You don't screw widders and orphans for tools. Some guys will come in here and say, 'I got this saw for $1 and it's worth $500.' I tell them to get it out of here. It's bad mojo. That saw won't cut straight or hold an edge. I believe in that stuff. Bad mojo will follow you around."

"Tools all have life left in them if they fit your hand. Strip the handle. Salvage the parts. Whatever you do, don't s*&tcan a tool."

"We don't own these. We are their stewards for the next generation. We keep them and prepare them for the next generation."

"The more tools you have the more problems you can solve."

"I drive tool collectors nuts. They bring me something mint in the box and I give them the box back. I have no problems using a tool from the 1700s. I say to (the tool), 'How does that feel to have wood in your mouth again?' "

"The earth's gravity is a constant. I haven't seen it change. It doesn't run out of batteries. You can't kick it down a hill by accident. It's doesn't lie. It can't."

— Christopher Schwarz

Hi. I'm a long-time reader and a first-time caller. I really want to start using handplanes in my work. I've been looking at some of the premium handplanes from Veritas and Lie-Nielsen and wow! I can't afford that. Could you tell me where I could get some planes that are just as good as those but cost far less?

— B. Ginner, Poor, Tenn.

Mr. Ginner,

Thanks for your letter. Those planes are available at the same store that sells unicorns that fart cupcakes.

Sincerely, A Grumpy Editor

Ever since our magazine got Internet access in the mid-1990s, I've been answering the above e-mail. I have unpleasant dreams about it. I've even thought about drafting a form letter to respond, but I thought that would be too thoughtless. And so I've worn out two keyboards answering that question, trying to be helpful, wondering if it would ever stop.

Today, however, I can answer that question with a slightly different answer. Since 2007, machinist Steve Nisbett of Wheaton, Ill., has been restoring vintage handplanes to a condition that can only be described as mint.

He picks up planes that most people wouldn't look twice at, including many uncommon brands, disassembles them, remachines the critical surfaces and rebuilds them as new. If necessary, he will machine a new component, such as a lever cap or even a frog.

The blades are surface ground if necessary. The heart of the plane – the frog and the body – receive special attention. Nisbett says he has built special fixtures for machining the frog and body that hold these parts in a firm but unsprung condition so that when they are released they remain flat.

In the end, all critical surfaces get remachined. The sole typically has a flatness deviation of .0015" or less up to a No. 5 size plane (14" long or so). For longer planes the flatness deviation is more like .0030". This is crazy-good accuracy for woodworking.

A couple weeks ago I purchased at full price one of his planes from his eBay store for about $70 to take it through its paces in my shop. It's a Dunlap 3DBB smoothing plane with a sole that is 9-1/4" long – essentially it is like a Stanley No. 3.

When it arrived, it was like taking a new plane out of the box directly from a Sears store. The tool was still covered in a thin film of oil and every surface looked perfect. The sole was dead, dead flat. The frog and body had been remachined as promised. The tote and knob looked new, which is to say, they looked OK. Dunlap planes weren't known for their shapely rosewood handles. This one has wood that can only be described as "hardwood." But they were comfortable enough.

I set the plane up last weekend and spent some time using it while building a small wall cabinet that's a Christmas gift. It was everything that Nisbett claimed. It was capable of taking extremely thin shavings, as good as I can do with any other tool I've tuned.

There is, however, a single caveat here.

Though Nisbett has made this plane better than the original manufacturer, there are limits to what he can do with the tool. For example, with this Dunlap plane it was impossible to close up the mouth of the tool to more than 1/16", which is too wide-open for high-tolerance smoothing in my opinion. I suspected that perhaps the mouth was opened up when the frog was being reworked, but Nisbett said that was unlikely. His efforts usually only remove a few thousandths of an inch of iron here and there.

So in all likelihood, the mouth never closed up tight, even when the plane was new. So what can you do? I replaced the iron with a thicker one from Lie-Nielsen that was 1/8" thick (a $40 item). Bingo. The mouth could be closed up as tight as can be.

So now I think you have another option. You can buy a vintage plane at a garage sale and learn to fix it up, buy a premium plane or stake out the middle ground – get one that has been remachined by Nisbett. To buy a plane from him, check out his eBay store.

— Christopher Schwarz

In the interest of full disclosure, the following book – "The Perfect Edge" – is being published by my parent company, F+W Media. Also, I consider the author, Ron Hock, a good friend. Oh, and once I got on stage and shook it with a belly dancer in Greece after too many grape leaves and shots of ouzo.

OK, now that all that's on the table, I think I can also say I'm a big fan of the two other big sharpening books out there: "The Complete Guide to Sharpening" by Leonard Lee (Taunton) and "Taunton's Complete Illustrated Guide to Sharpening" by Thomas Lie-Nielsen. I've also sharpened a few tools in the last 15 years using everything from a brick to a $1,000 electric-powered record player.

So let's get the most important question out of the way. If you already own the books by Lee or Lie-Nielsen, do you need "The Perfect Edge?" Well, unless you are a sharpening geek, no. All three books are outstanding works, in my opinion. All three will teach you how to sharpen a wide variety of tools. All three will take you from rank amateur to a zero-radius-intersection connoisseur.

If, however, you don't own a book on sharpening, I think "The Perfect Edge" should be at the top of the list, if only for the fact that it covers the latest innovations in sharpening equipment and is written in a very breezy style that makes the technical information easy to digest.

Hock is one of the founding fathers of the hand-tool renaissance that has been blossoming during the last 20 years. He started out supplying plane irons to James Krenov and his students at the College of the Redwoods. From that modest beginning, Hock Tools grew to sell all sorts of blades, tools and even shellac through his company in Northern California. In fact, the term "Hock blade" is almost becoming the generic term for an aftermarket plane iron.

So Hock knows a good deal about woodworking tools, steel and sharpening. And what is remarkable is that this ironmonger also happens to be a fine writer. Reading about sharpening can be, for the lack of a better expression, a real grind. There's a lot to know about abrasives, steel, ergonomics, lubricants and (if you are lucky) common sense.

As a long-time sharpener, I think Hock did a better job of explaining the abrasive side of the sharpening equation than anyone else. "The Perfect Edge" finally made the light bulb go on in my head on the topic of how different abrasives work the steel.

Hock's book also is strong in other areas. While all three books do a fine job of explaining how to sharpen chisels and plane irons, "The Perfect Edge" really does an excellent job with turning tools, knives and saws as well.

Hock also covers all the new powered sharpening equipment and many of the honing guides on the market today. It's quite up-to-date for a book. Plus, I think the photography is great. It's sharp and gets right up on the action – plus Hock offer pages and pages of microscopic images of edges, which are very helpful for anyone trying to understand how steel becomes sharp and then dull again.

One last point of disclosure is in order here. Though I got to read Hock's book in its entirety before it went to the printer, I had absolutely nothing to do with the effort to get it written, photographed, edited and published.

But I wish I had.

"The Perfect Edge" is now available for pre-order in our store for $29.99. The book is scheduled for general release in December, when it will be available from suppliers nationwide. Oh, and here's a little hint: If you want a copy signed by Hock himself, you can order the book through the Hock Tools web site.

I like it when the name of something is eponymous – it fits. Was there ever a woodworker who was more aptly named than the late "Art Carpenter?"

When I was working as a newspaper reporter, I dealt occasionally with a spokesman named "Woody Forrest." I don't even know if that guy was a woodworker. Why isn't my name "Woody Forrest?"

Instead, I've had to endure a name that (according to our dog-eared dictionary of baby names) means: A Christ-like war-monger who is black in color.

So when it comes to the names of handplanes, I get frustrated with names such as "jack" plane, "block" plane or "Jenny" plane. Those names don't really describe what the plane does. I much prefer names such as "rabbet" plane or "smoothing" plane.

To that end, I've been trying to clean up my language when talking or writing about planes. It's easy to get mired in even less-helpful terms such as "a No. 6 plane" or a "Stanley No. 141." As someone remarked to me once: "I'm sorry. I don't speak 'Stanley.'"

So here's how I organize my bench planes in my mind using historical names that imply their function.

Fore Plane: Sure, it sounds a bit ribald, but Joseph Moxon tells us that this tool, which is about 18" long, is called a fore plane because it is used "before" the other planes. You could call it a roughing plane if you like, but the name "fore plane" implies its function to me.

Try Plane: According to Charles Holtzapffel, a trying plane is 20" to 22" long and is used for flattening a panel or "trying its accuracy." The modern term for a tool that's this length would be a "jointer plane," but that's actually a confusing term in my book. When you make a board flat, you are trying it. So what better plane is there than a "try plane?" Thanks to the encouragement of Don McConnell at Clark & Williams planemakers, I now call my 22"-long metal-bodied plane a try.

Long Plane: In several old texts, a plane that is about 26" long or so is called a "long plane." What was it used for? Trying large surfaces with greater accuracy than a "try" plane. While "long" plane certainly describes the tool, it doesn't really describe its function. Maybe a better name would be a "long trying plane."

Jointer Plane: These tools are 28" to 30" long, according to Holtzapffel. Think about that for a minute. Do you have a metal plane that long? Probably not. That ginormous size is outside the Bailey metal-plane system. These super-long tools were intended for creating edge joints. Hence their name. I don't own a plane this long.

Smoothing Plane: The old-school definition of a smoothing plane is a tool that is about 6-1/2" long to 8" long and is the last plane to dress the wood. So "smoothing plane" is an apt word. Smoothing planes have gotten a little longer in modern time -- up to about 10" long. Even so, their job is the same: smooth the wood for finishing.

Other Planes
These purpose-driven names don't end with the bench planes. Rabbet planes make rabbets. Moulding planes make mouldings. Hollows and rounds make round and hollow shapes. Fillister planes supposedly cut "fillisters," a word that supposedly means a cross-grain rabbet.

The names of other joinery planes don't quite make the cut. The name "router plane" isn't ideal, but I'm at a loss for what else to call it. ("Old woman's tooth" or "hag's tooth" are equally odd names in my book.) Yes, the router plane "roots" like a pig looking for truffles, but that doesn't really capture its function. Perhaps it does so many tasks that it's hard to describe.

The plow plane does indeed plow the wood. But why not call it a "groove plane" instead? Well, this is where things fall apart for me. I like the alliteration and assonance in the term "plow plane."

So what should we rename the oddly named "block plane?"

Holtzapffel suggests "modelling" planes. So are these planes suitable only for making wooden models? We can do better than that.

— Christopher Schwarz

I crossed the border from Missouri to Arkansas this afternoon, and I knew immediately I was home.

For starters, the land is achingly beautiful. I miss the Ozarks I grew up with, which are surprisingly unspoiled by development. Every curve in the rugged terrain brings a new vista. You might be high over a lake one minute, deep into a fog bank the next then spiraling down switchbacks the next.

The roads are magnificently contorted, narrow and treacherous. In other words, it's a fun drive.

The other evidence I was home is that my electronic devices began to malfunction. I entered my hotel's address in Eureka Springs into the Garmin on the dashboard. It promptly took me to Snaketown, a reptile farm six miles north of Eureka Springs, Ark.

I'm down here to interview Larry Williams and Don McConnell of the Clark & Williams planemaking company. I've known Williams and McConnell for many years, but I've never gotten to write about this remarkable little company, its interesting history and how they go about building their wooden-stock planes.

I arrived at their shop about 2:30 p.m. Thursday and we spent the next two-and-a-half hours just catching up. Then we went to dinner at an excellent little Italian restaurant and talked late into the evening. I've just now looked at my notebook. I don't think there's much there I can print. It's too wild.

I'm going to try again in the morning, but already I fear there is little chance I'll be able to do this story justice. That's because every question and comment leads down an interesting and odd side road.

For example: Snaketown. I told Williams and McConnell about how my GPS landed me there. Larry laughed and told a hilarious tale about his daughter's herd of bitey and impossibly fertile gerbils. And how Larry ended up taking the whole lot of them to Snaketown to become a little snack for the performing reptiles.

— Christopher Schwarz

I drove to Indianapolis last weekend for dinner. Chris was demonstrating there at a Lie-Nielsen show, a friend who lives in California cashed in some frequent flier miles and flew in, and it’s always fun to see Angie and Alex and the rest of the show gang. And Chris has been raving about Brugge Brasserie, a restaurant that specializes in crepes, and has excellent French fries served with myriad dips. He was right to rave – I’d drive 100 miles again for those fries (and farther to see my friends, of course).

But before dinner, I stopped by the show – and couldn’t resist the pretty, shiny toys. I blew my monthly cheese budget on a low-angle block plane. When we got back to the office, Chris showed me how to check it for bed errors. I neither expected nor encountered any, but it doesn’t hurt to check (even at the store). Here’s how:

Pull the blade and check it for square. As you can see in the picture above, the bevel on this blade is ground just slightly out-of-square, though not enough to cause trouble for this “test.” I marked the high corner on the flat face so I can easily identify it when I put the blade back in the plane. (Were the blade way out, I’d need to regrind the bevel square before I could use it as a reference for bed errors – so were I in a store and that happened, I’d ask for a different blade.)

Now secure the blade in the plane and advance it into the mouth opening. Sight down the sole and use your thumb and index finger to square the blade in the mouth by eye – you’ll see a consistent black line all the way across the mouth when you’re there.

If the square blade (or almost square blade) won’t line up, you may have a bed error. Ask for a different plane.

If all seems OK, retract the blade to working position, look at the blade in the mouth to make sure it still looks square, then take a shaving on a piece of scrap – you should be able to get a consistent shaving across the width of your test piece.

— Megan Fitzpatrick

When I bought my first smoothing plane at a flea market in Burlington, Ky., I could fit everything I knew about handplanes into one of the Elvis Presley shot glasses I stumbled upon that weekend.

One vendor had a lot of smoothing planes on his table, so I picked up each one, took it apart like I knew what I was doing and inspected its guts. After that mummer's farce, I ended up buying the plane that felt good in my hands. After all, some of the planes were a bit heavy, and others had totes that were square.

I set that plane up and used it for several years alongside my jack plane.

That plane was a Stanley No. 3 that was made before World War II, and it served me well for many years. When I started buying nicer tools, I did some research to figure out which smoothing plane I should buy. I settled on No. 4 because that was the most common-sized smoothing plane made by Stanley Works. That, I figured, should count for something.

But after switching to the No. 4, I was told by several woodworkers I respected that a No. 4-1/2 was really the superior plane because it was wider and heavier. I read that Anthony Guidice uses a low-angle jack for smoothing. I met David Charlesworth, who uses a No. 5-1/2 as a smoothing plane and prized its accuracy. And I learned later while watching a DVD that the late Alan Peters used a No. 7 for most workshop tasks.

Being a curious fellow, I tried working with all these planes set up as smoothing planes. Here's what I found: I like smaller smoothing planes.

The larger smoothing planes worked fine on small boards, the kind that you would use during a demonstration during a woodworking class – 6" wide and 18" long or so. But when it came to real furniture components, smaller smoothing planes were faster. Here's why.

Handplanes "see" the surface of the wood as a series of waves. Longer planes tend to straighten the wood, removing the tops of the waves and trying to bring them down to the troughs. The first pass with a long plane on a board will typically just remove a few high spots. Shorter planes tend to ride these waves up and down. The first pass with a short plane on our typical board will take a shaving from many more points on the board.

So here's how I work: I use the long planes to dress the surfaces that need to be quite flat (the interior of case pieces, areas where moulding needs to go etc.). If that surface won't show on the outside of the piece of furniture, I call it a day after using the jointer plane.

For parts that show that don't need to be flat, I use a short smoothing plane to get the surface looking good with as little work as possible. I like planing, but I also like seeing results.

Rethinking the No. 2
So this summer I bought No. 1- and No 2-sized planes for my 8-year-old daughter to use. She was struggling with my No. 4. After some practice, she preferred the No. 1 (perhaps because it's so cute). And so I was wondering what to do with the No. 2. I think the tote is too small for anybody to grip (except those woodworkers who have lost a fight with a table saw).

But then while building a chest of drawers I picked up the No. 2 and started holding it like a wooden coffin-bodied smoother. I wrapped my fingers and thumb around the frog and base of the tool instead of trying to jam them behind the adjuster. That different grip made a real difference.

The No. 2 is sized a lot like a wooden-bodied smoother. It's 7-5/8" long and about 2" wide. Typical wooden smoothers are 6-1/2" to 9" long, according to R.A. Salaman's "Dictionary of Woodworking Tools."

Because of its small size, the No. 2 turned out to be an excellent choice for a case side. Instead of trying to remove the high spots, the plane just made the side look good with only two or three passes. Is it flat? No. Can you tell by looking at it? No.

That experience made me break out my old No. 3. When I picked it out of my tool chest, the same thought flashed through my mind as when I first picked it up years ago at the flea market.

"Hmm. This one fits."

In a move that will please traditionalists and people who pare, Lie-Nielsen Toolworks has started offering some plane irons and chisels made using oil-hardened (O1) steel – in addition to the more modern A2 steel.

The O1 steel is available right now in the 2"- and 2-3/8"-wide bench plane irons, according to Thomas Lie-Nielsen. And soon the company will also begin selling irons for the Nos. 102, 60-1/2 and 62 planes in O1. After that, Lie-Nielsen said he will add O1 plane blades to the line according to customer demand.

Lie-Nielsen will also offer its bench chisels in O1 steel; the standard five-piece chisel set in O1 will begin shipping in about a month.

If you're not a steel geek, should you care? I think so.

A2 steel is a hard-wearing steel. I have found it holds an edge better than O1 steel in operations that tend to abuse the edge, such as in my fore plane, my jointer and the chisels that I use for chopping out dovetail waste.

However, I prefer O1 for paring chisels and for smoothing planes. I have found that O1 is superior to A2 at low sharpening angles (basically the tipping point is about 30°). So a paring chisel in O1 that is sharpened at 27° will last longer than a paring chisel in A2 at that same low angle. But move that angle up to 35° and the game changes in my opinion. That's when A2 shines.

I like O1 for smoothing plane blades because it is easier to sharpen – it develops a polish with fewer stokes than an A2 blade. Other woodworkers report that O1 also gives you a finer edge compared to A2, but I haven't really seen this.

Lie-Nielsen sent me some samples of the O1 smoothing plane blades and a chisel. They are nice, just as you would expect. One thing I noted is how thin the side bevels of recent bench chisels are compared to my earlier Lie-Nielsen chisels.

No matter which steel you prefer, you can't lose. The A2 and O1 blades and chisels will be the same price. I plan to purchase O1 blades for my smoothing plane and low-angle jack. Plus a few wider O1 chisels for paring jobs.

If you'd like to check out the O1 chisel sample and the O1 plane blade, feel free to stop by the free Lie-Nielsen Hand Tool Event in Indianapolis this weekend. I'll have both tools at my bench.

I've always been an advocate for low workbenches, especially for planing operations. My workbench is at 34" (and while standing on my horse stall mat it's 33"). And I've become quite fond of Megan's bench, which is at 30" (horse mat included).

But I can tell you that 16" is just too low. Yes, you really can get your weight right over the plane at 16", but then there's the problem of the occasional and inadvertent somersault.

— Christopher Schwarz

This week I'm building the sitting bench for the White Water Shaker community; the bench will be featured in the Winter 2009 issue of Woodworking Magazine. The version I'm building is a very close copy, so it will be 13' long. The version we'll show in the magazine will be 4' long (who really needs a 13'-bench, after all?).

Dealing with long stuff is a challenge, so I thought I'd post a couple movies during the next week that demonstrate some of the tricks to doing it well.

In this short clip, shot and narrated by Megan Fitzpatrick, I'm planing the long edge of what will become one of the bench's narrow aprons.

The trick, I think, is to keep the plane tucked against your body and lean forward. This allows you some forgiveness if you hesitate while you walk forward. If you do hesitate, you can push your arms forward as you recover your step to continue the smooth planing action uninterrupted.

Using this stance, I can plane any distance that I can walk.

If words don't do it for you, check out the clip above. And do note my profound lack of a backside in the film. I'm going to have to save up for some implants or something.

If you liked the video of me walking up a wall, you might enjoy this alternative treatment sent in by a reader who we like to call "Cheeseburger, No Meat."

If you are offended by references to my bum, or to masked avengers, then please do not click on the video.

— Christopher Schwarz

You know, at our Woodworking in America event last week I didn't get to talk to a lot of the toolmakers. In fact, I didn't even get to see some of them. That is what a madhouse it was. So that's why I'm particularly pleased to announce a couple additional toolmakers who are coming to the Lie-Nielsen Hand Tool Event Oct. 16-17 in Indianapolis.

Jameel Abraham from Benchcrafted (and hopefully his brother Fr. John as well) will be there demonstrating their awesome bench hardware, including their cool tail vise and their Glide face vise. They also sell my favorite scraper called (cleverly) the Skraper. It's a carbide-tipped tool that is great for removing glue, paint and even wood.

If you haven't met Jameel, you owe it to yourself to get to know the guy. He's an amazing craftsman (ask to see one of his ouds). And funny (ask him about Harbor Freight).

I'm also going to take the opportunity during the event to twist his arm about writing some stories for us. (Sheesh, I hope Fine Woodworking doesn't read this blog. I blab too much.)

Also, Andrew Lunn from Eccentric Toolworks is coming to the Indianapolis show to demonstrate his saws. I've spilled so many pixels on Andrew already it's hard to add to my long list of superlatives about his saws. Simply put: Try Andrew's saws. They will make a believer out of you. They are beautiful to look at (photos don't do them justice) and they are tuned to an almost ridiculous level.

And, as I mentioned before, Kevin Drake from Glen-Drake Toolworks will be there, plus design guru George Walker and staff from the Marc Adams School of Woodworking.

One more thing to tempt you that I neglected to mention in my first post about this event: Martin J. Donnelly is holding an auction and tool sale nearby at the Ramada Inn East in Indianapolis those same days (Oct. 16-17) It's a 10-minute car ride from the Lie-Nielsen show and well worth seeing. Click here for details on that.

If you need directions or more information on the event, click here.

— Christopher Schwarz

In my book, there is one rule for buying vintage tools: Buy them from someone who will take them them back if the tool stinks.

That rule keeps me on my toes on eBay, at auctions, flea markets and at garage sales. If I can't completely inspect, disassemble and use a tool before I buy it, I really want a money-back guarantee.

How can you tell in the store if a chisel is too soft to hold a good edge? How can you tell if all the moving parts of a plane and its sole will work together to do good work?

There are lots of really good sellers on the Internet who will take your money back, so don't be afraid to ask about it. Here are my three favorites in the United States:

Brass City Records and Tools: Walt Quadrato runs a Connecticut storefront that sells records and tools. He manages to find tremendous tools as he haunts the markets of New England in the wee hours of the morning. And because he's a woodworker, he knows what makes a tool a user and what makes a tool a plane-shaped doorstop.

Walt also is a prince of a guy and isn't out to make a fast buck. I bought a Stanley Everlasting chisel from him years ago and have become a regular customer. If I ever need a tool, I just call Walt and ask if he's got it. He usually does.

And if you have a scraper plane problem, then you already know Walt. He's in the support group you attend every week.

SYDNAS SLOOT (aka Sanford Moss): Don't let the unusual name fool you (it's actually "Sandys Tools" spelled backward). Sanford sells tools part time, but he always digs up good users at fair prices, and he turns up some occasional collectible gems.

His site is also the single-best source of information on braces on the Internet. Sanford always ships things fast and is just great to deal with.

Olde River Hard Goods: If you like the really old stuff, you need to get to know Tony Seo. He digs up cool stuff (his passion seems to be the 18th-century stuff). And unless it's a real collectible, Tony will restore the tools he finds back to usable condition (removing surface rust, tightening hammer handles and the like). Most of the stuff he sells is on eBay as a "Buy It Now" option.

Let's just say that Tony was very happy to help me out with my hammer problem. And when I needed a real old-school holdfast to examine and use, Tony was the man.

As I said, there are lots of other great sellers on the Internet. This is by no means a comprehensive list – but these are the three guys who get most of my vintage tool dollars.

One of the weaknesses of the so-called transitional handplanes is the way the tote attaches to the metal frame of the tool. The tote comes loose when you touch it, look at it or even think about it.

I've seen many of these tools with replacement totes – everything from a custom-made fancy doo-dad to a broomstick.

I own an early Stanley No. 32 jointer plane that is in good shape. The tote, however, is pathetic. Every time I pick up the plane I also need to pick up a screwdriver to tighten the bolt that kinda secures the tote.

This week I had a conversation about this tool with woodworker and collector Carl Bilderback (he's reading "Handplane Essentials" right now and has been pointing out the typos and things he disagrees with). He has some rare and expensive transitional planes in his collection and so he wanted to tweak me a bit for saying these tools were "dirt cheap."

Mine was $35. Several of the transitionals that have come through our shop were thoughtful gifts (read: foisted upon us). In general, I've found user-grade transitionals to be less expensive than their equivalent user-grade iron-bodied brothers.

In any case, Carl had a solution to suggest for my "wobbly tote problem" (which is still not listed in the DSM-IV). Here it is: Drive a screw through the base of the tote, through the metal frame and into the wooden stock.

"Stanley put a screw there on their metal planes," Bilderback said. "So it should work."

Well, duh. So this morning I did just that with a 1-1/2"-long pan-head screw. You probably don't need instructions on screwing, but the steps are outlined in the photos below. So far it seems to be a good fix. I flattened a few boards with the tool and the tote stayed put.

Begin the hole by boring a pilot hole with a brad awl. Chase the hole, turning it into a clearance hole, with a 1/4" bit.

Use a punch to make a divot in the metal frame of the tool. Bore a clearance hole with a 1/4" bit. Go slow and stop as soon as you make it through the frame. Drill a standard pilot hole into the wooden stock.

Drive your screw.

This year I've made friends with my chisel plane. In fact, I don't think I could have installed the Benchcrafted wagon vise as a retrofit without it.

Today I got another lesson in chisel-plane use from Carl Bilderback that I'd like to share with you. Carl is a woodworker, semi-retired carpenter, tool collector and active member of the Mid-West Tool Collectors Assn. As a finish carpenter, Carl had several specialties, including repairing finished or veneered surfaces on the jobsite and hiding those repairs from customers.

His skill at cutting a "dutchman" prompted me to publish one of his articles on his process in Popular Woodworking's February 2008 issue (if you have that issue, you should definitely check it out. Good stuff.)

In any case, Carl said that one of the reasons he was always sought out for repairs was because he owned a chisel plane.

Because of that tool, Carl said he could trim face-grain plugs and dutchmen without touching the surrounding finish. And he also could trim end-grain plugs with ease. Other carpenters would sand their repairs flush with the surrounding surface, which made more work for the guys who had to repair the finish.

Now I have had no trouble trimming face grain with a chisel plane, but trimming end grain with a chisel plane has always been difficult for me. Carl explained how he did it. I tried it in the shop this afternoon, and it was like the light bulb went on. I think everyone needs an old hand like Carl around. Perhaps Lie-Nielsen could start making Carls for everyone....

Here's what you do: Set the chisel plane so its cutting edge is flush to the sole and will not cut the surface of your work. (I know, this is obvious, but I have to say it.)

Now approach the plug with the corner of the cutter. You want to try to nibble off no more than 1/16" from the plug. Less material; less resistance.

Keep firm downward pressure on the the tool and pivot the corner into the plug, like you are picking away a small portion of the plug. Once you remove that first 1/16", head to the next 1/16".

I tried this procedure on some tough white oak and maple end-grain plugs and, as we say in Arkansas, it worked like a peach.

For me, there is something that is far more interesting than the purported uses of "the nib" of a handsaw. And that is: The origin of the term "jack plane."

In my book "Handplane Essentials," we reprinted a short bit about the origin of the term. For those of you who don't have the book, here it is:

The Jack of all Planes?

Many hand planes have nicknames that describe what they’re used for: smoothing planes for smoothing, jointer planes for jointing, shoulder planes for trimming shoulders etc. But what does “jack” have to do with a “jack plane?”

Ever since I got into woodworking, people have told me that the “jack” refers to the expression “jack of all trades.” The jack plane, it was explained, was a good all-around plane , so that’s its nickname.

So I asked Graham Blackburn, the author of “Traditional Woodworking Handtools” (The Lyons Press) and a longtime hero of mine, about jack planes. According to Blackburn, “jack” is an expression used since the Middle Ages to describe something that is common, such as jack boots or a jack knife. The jack plane is indeed one of the most common sizes you’ll find on the shelves of hardware stores. However, it could be argued that the “jack” refers instead to the most common sort of carpentry and construction work performed with this plane.

Indeed, Blackburn explained how carpenters called the plane a “jack plane” while cabinetmakers called the same instrument a “fore plane.”And to make things even more complex, the premier English plane manufacturers of the day tried to separate their products from the common ones by calling the same-size plane a “panel plane.”

But in the end, the people spoke, and in this country we call it a jack plane – no matter if the tool is used for the coarse surfacing of a piece of rough lumber, for fine furniture work or for trimming an interior door to fit its jamb on the job site.

So today Carl Bilderback, a woodworker, tool collector and angel-tongued carpenter, called me with another theory that he had heard repeated many times. It's a good one.

According to Carl, the term "jack" refers to "jackass" or "donkey."

"On a farm, it was the donkey that got in all sorts of jobs," Carl said. "You use a donkey for everything."

And a jack plane can be used for almost any bench plane operation: jointing, smoothing or hogging off material.

As evidence that he might be correct, Carl said to look at the Stanley literature for its line of "transitional" planes – those tools with wooden soles and metal blade-adjustment mechanisms.

Stanley called the Nos. 26, 27 and 27-1/2 planes their "jack planes." These planes were all 15" long.

However, Stanley No 37 called the No. 37 plane its "Jenny" plane. It was a little shorter than the jack plane. So what's a Jenny?

A female donkey.

One last thing: Carl also gave me a little talking to about my signature. Or, more precisely, the scribble that represents my signature (my kids joke that it looks like "C-star Slimy"). I promised to practice and do better. Here is my first attempt (which looks like that of a 15-year-old signing his first driver's license).

I never got to meet James Krenov, and so last week I hesitated to write anything about his death. But as I drove home on Friday afternoon I forgot to turn on the stereo in my car, and my mind drifted to a long weekend in 2006 when I was sure I knew the man.

That February we had hosted a meeting of many of the makers of modern hand tools, from Veritas to Wayne Anderson to Robert Baker to Bridge City to Lie-Nielsen Toolworks (you can read about it in the August 2006 issue of Popular Woodworking). Blademaker Ron Hock attended – he was one of the pioneers of the recent renaissance of toolmaking – and he brought along a plane that Krenov had made for him.

Krenov's plane was an interesting contrast to the astounding feats of brass, bronze and steel that these toolmakers had brought along with them. Krenov's plane was made from an exotic wood, but that was the most exotic thing about it.

It was band sawn to shape – and from the looks of the toolmarks it was done quickly and accurately. The final shape of the tool's wooden body looked like it was created by a knife, with clean facets on the corners. It was comforting to hold.

Hock left the plane with me for a couple weeks to test-drive it, and that is where the real surprises began. I expected the plane to work well, of course. A sharp, well-bedded blade in a 2x4 can sing. But I was amused to find out how Krenov had tuned the tool.

The chipbreaker was made from some cast-off piece of metal that was painted red I think and was ground by hand and a little rough. The bed of the plane was shimmed with blue painter's tape to close up the mouth. The blade was a Hock (naturally), and Krenov had written an "H" on the plane's wedge in what I assume was a black Sharpie marker – "H" for "Hock" perhaps?

In any case, the plane worked brilliantly, as well as any of the exotic infills or high-end production planes I've ever used. I used the tool on some of the nasty boards that I keep lying around. These boards aren't for building stuff – I try never to build stuff with nasty interlocked grain – but for testing the limits of tools. Krenov's plane handled the wood with aplomb. And at that moment I felt I'd had a nice conversation with the man who wrote "A Cabinetmaker's Notebook."

I was a bit sad to send the tool back to Ron, and I planned to purchase one of Krenov's planes – planemaking was one of the things that sustained his spirit when his eyesight failed. But I never got around to contacting him. So chalk up another regret.

What I am left with, however, are his delightful books. Like many woodworkers, I was captivated by the ideas inside them. And as a writer, I was struck by his prose. Here was a guy writing woodworking books that contained little in the way of how-to information, the stock-in-trade of people like me. Instead he explored his long relationship with the material and the tools he used to shape it to his liking.

Few woodworking writers have ever managed to capture, bottle and distribute that impossibly compelling but difficult-to-explain relationship that all artisans have with their raw material. That was James Krenov's gift to us all.

So I'd like to end this entry with my favorite quote from James Krenov, from page 93 his book "With Wakened Hands."

“The understanding eye sees the maker's fingerprints. They are evident in every detail … Leave Fingerprints.”

Look carefully, and I think you'll see Krenov's fingerprints almost everywhere on our craft.

— Christopher Schwarz