Rob Keeble
Member
- Messages
- 12,633
- Location
- GTA Ontario Canada
So by now i guess most know of the new line Lee Valley have put out in the way of Handplanes.
Yesterday i received a mini catalog with these pages in it and I thought it would be of value to put them out here for some discussion because they do a great job of showing what the big feature of this series is.
Personally i think these planes are a modern work of art if you one admires design and engineering and innovation. But that's just me.
My dilemma and something i want to gather input on is something that i feel is missing from all this marketing. Sure it tells me the options i can get with each plane in excellent detail. But it kind of reminds me of the time when i was marketing a complicated system that i had acquired a patent on in an entrepreneurial manner but did not know the real value of to the customers i was trying to sell it to, so i could not put it to them at that point in time in terms of how it would relate to value for them.
There is an assumption made again in my opinion (and i am no plane aficionado but I am a customer and a woodworker) that all woodworkers know exactly why they need each of these planes.
I already have a #4 and a #5 and #7 all old stanleys. I have a Lee Valley low angle block plane and love it to bits. For reasons that make me want to go out and get a few of these. The biggest one is , it works and the machining etc and features are just less fiddle than my old stanleys apart from my #7.
But i dont see any informative information on how and why i should buy one of each of these planes and what their individual purpose is.
Now i know we say the #4 is for smoothing yeah i get that and the #5 is the good old general purpose carpenters do it all plane and i know the #7 is a jointer.
But what about the 4 1/2 and the 5 1/2 ? Where do they fit into the process of dealing with milling a piece of wood.
Take note were one to go out and buy one of each of the lowest cost of these planes one is looking at $1615 in planes (and for Canadians that's before the 13% tax) so in reality $1 825
That's a lot of woodworking coin for one specific operation.
But there is a bigger issue that's kicking around my head and preventing me from rushing off and pulling the trigger.
With all these planes being able to be customized by frog, tote and knob besides blade, why could i not achieve a great compromise and buy a single one say the #5 and get a variety of frogs for it and perhaps even two totes and have a pretty good all round plane for use outside my initial jointing.
Now that may be a little extreme given its length so ok lets say a #4 1/2 thrown in too because then at least i have a wide smoother.
So that gets me down to $670 including our taxes. But now we in the realms of what i paid for my DW735 planer and my Grizzly 8 inch jointer. Yeah yeah i know not the same things if you love handtools.
So whats your take, can you explain to me in compelling reasons why i need one of each of them.
Yesterday i received a mini catalog with these pages in it and I thought it would be of value to put them out here for some discussion because they do a great job of showing what the big feature of this series is.
Personally i think these planes are a modern work of art if you one admires design and engineering and innovation. But that's just me.
My dilemma and something i want to gather input on is something that i feel is missing from all this marketing. Sure it tells me the options i can get with each plane in excellent detail. But it kind of reminds me of the time when i was marketing a complicated system that i had acquired a patent on in an entrepreneurial manner but did not know the real value of to the customers i was trying to sell it to, so i could not put it to them at that point in time in terms of how it would relate to value for them.
There is an assumption made again in my opinion (and i am no plane aficionado but I am a customer and a woodworker) that all woodworkers know exactly why they need each of these planes.
I already have a #4 and a #5 and #7 all old stanleys. I have a Lee Valley low angle block plane and love it to bits. For reasons that make me want to go out and get a few of these. The biggest one is , it works and the machining etc and features are just less fiddle than my old stanleys apart from my #7.
But i dont see any informative information on how and why i should buy one of each of these planes and what their individual purpose is.
Now i know we say the #4 is for smoothing yeah i get that and the #5 is the good old general purpose carpenters do it all plane and i know the #7 is a jointer.
But what about the 4 1/2 and the 5 1/2 ? Where do they fit into the process of dealing with milling a piece of wood.
Take note were one to go out and buy one of each of the lowest cost of these planes one is looking at $1615 in planes (and for Canadians that's before the 13% tax) so in reality $1 825
That's a lot of woodworking coin for one specific operation.
But there is a bigger issue that's kicking around my head and preventing me from rushing off and pulling the trigger.
With all these planes being able to be customized by frog, tote and knob besides blade, why could i not achieve a great compromise and buy a single one say the #5 and get a variety of frogs for it and perhaps even two totes and have a pretty good all round plane for use outside my initial jointing.
Now that may be a little extreme given its length so ok lets say a #4 1/2 thrown in too because then at least i have a wide smoother.
So that gets me down to $670 including our taxes. But now we in the realms of what i paid for my DW735 planer and my Grizzly 8 inch jointer. Yeah yeah i know not the same things if you love handtools.
So whats your take, can you explain to me in compelling reasons why i need one of each of them.