Coffin Smoother Plane Rehab

Rob Keeble

Member
Messages
12,633
Location
GTA Ontario Canada
Prior to me leaving SA my Dad told me to go to his workshop and take the tools I wanted to keep. He was already at the age and stage where he could no longer turn a screwdriver so for him it was to ensure the tools got handed down to me.

One of those tools i kept was what i come to know as a coffin smoother plane.

Now back in the day when my Dad and I used to work together, and he taught me what he knew, there was no such knowledge between the two of us as to the fact that a myriad of planes exist for all the different purposes. Even at high school shop class the teacher did not seem to know as all we had was a #4 type Stanley and they were in such bad shape that we never used them to plane never mind got taught that it was a smoother.

So when i got to Canada and set up to do woodworking as a hobby it was only after joining this forum and old grey beard taking an interest in me that i got to really learn about the range of planes and what they were all for.

As most of us do i went through a phase of tuning up planes and one that i never got around to was the coffin plane due to the fact that i really did not "get it"

The i found out that it is intended as a smoother, well i discovered that the throat of the plane had been messed with by my Dad. Obviously if one "thinks" that a plane is intended to take a good chunk of wood off in one swipe like a jack plane then when one in ignorance comes across a coffin smoother that should for smoothing purposes have a narrow throat gap between blade edge and sole, one goes and files the throat bigger and this is what my Dad must have done to this plane.

Its got a good blade and the body is still like new so I plan to fix it.

The question is how.

One option i have come across in my research is putting a new sole on. I dont wish to do this.

What i have in mind that i would like comments on is to use a brass strip and fit it in front of the blade much the same as the old wooden spokeshaves have
wooden-spokeshave-blade-detail.jpg


In doing some research on the web the only other person i can find is a image Derek Cohen of Australia posted on Lumberjocks of how he put a piece of brass patch in one of his wooden planes. I could not find the post to this on his website even after google searching the image. And Derek does not have search on his own website.
http://www.inthewoodshop.com/index.html


BuiltaJointer_html_m35b7a9c3_zps3f4610e3.jpg


Anyone here have an idea how he secured this patch in the plane? The wood he uses much of the time is Jarrah (Eucalyptus ) and its hard and I don't see it taking to absorbing epoxy too well. But don't know.

I was originally thinking of using screws and first putting inserts in and using machine screws but i actually would prefer what Derek has done as it does not have any nooks and cranny's.

The other day I was in an electronics components store and lucky me they had just the perfect strip of flat brass for this job hence it coming up on list of items i want to attend to.

So if you guys are still into woodworking and hand tools please let the debate begin i need all the input i can get before i take to modifying this plane.

BTW it has a great thick heavy blade so I think its well worth the effort besides it being a heirloom.
 
Screws will work for the brass inlay.

If you prefer wood (I do), then a piece of ebony, lignum vitae, or even hard maple will work nicely.

A whole new sole can get to be a whole new set of problems - like keeping it perfectly parallel to the original, cutting the new (tight) mouth, etc. I have one oldie that I think someone ran thru a power jointer several times, and it had a mouth that was about a quarter inch wide. I put a new lignum vitae sole on it - about 5/16" (8mm) thick, and messed with it quite a bit, but eventually just put it on the shelf. I'd actually forgotten about it until your post, above, reminded me. Maybe I'll take it down, dust it off, and mess with it some more...:dunno:
 
http://www.inthewoodshop.com/ShopMadeTools/CoopersJointer.html I think is it, but doesn't discuss the attachment method. Clearly he didn't use screws so my best guess would be epoxy.

Another option would be to drill holes all the way through the body of the plane and cut beveled slots in the brass insert and use slotted flat head machine bolts (i.e. https://www.boltdepot.com/Machine_screws_Slotted_flat_head.aspx for a picture) to attach it. That way you could adjust the width. Likely overkill and adjustable mouths are probably over hyped anyway :D
 
You can use brass screws, just make sure that they portrude enough on the countersink by making it shallow so that you can file the head of the screw away until the slot dissapears. I did it that way in my spokeshave and they became almost invisible.
Here you have some pics of my spokeshave sole.IMG_4765.jpgIMG_4766.jpgIMG_4767.jpg

Another possibility is making the insert with slanted sides making it go from side to side of the plane and insert it as if it was an an sliding dovetail joint.

Looking at the pics you show, I would say that the brass insert of the plane was introduced when building the plane as it is made using the sandwich method if you look at the glue lines.
 
Great idea Toni have incorporated in my process which i have drawn out in stages.
Cut a large test piece yesterday from a slab of European Beech i have to do a dummy run first.
Plan on using my wood milling machine ( aka Carols jig from her book) to cut the slot.
Will use brass machine screws and two inserts to hold in place.
Considering epoxy between brass and wood as extra.
Will try take pics of the stages i have planned.
Should be fun to see if i can bring it back to life.

Sent from my SGH-I337M using Tapatalk
 
So i finished off this project. But as usual made a mistake of not closing the mouth up enough.
Here are the pics of the whole shebang.
Toni as u can see i took your advice and sanded down the countersunk brass screws. But i discovered my new drill press needs some work it was chattering when using countersunk bit and as u can see there is a small gap on one screw head.
Bottom line throat is better but no prize its still not a smoother.:(

uploadfromtaptalk1435782050092.jpguploadfromtaptalk1435782060814.jpguploadfromtaptalk1435782071215.jpguploadfromtaptalk1435782082006.jpguploadfromtaptalk1435782095822.jpgView attachment 91007
 
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Ok had another thought. How about i cut a thin flat piece and glue behind plane blade in here to move the whole blade assembly forward essentially narrowing the throat opening.
uploadfromtaptalk1435782923600.jpg

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problably you will need to retouch the front of the side grooves if you do that, because what you want is to bring the blade forward without changing its angle. You can make a trial by just inserting a piece of cardboard from a cereal box or similar before going for it. Or you can also work the opposite way which is easier to do; instead of shimming the blade bed just stick the piece of cardboard on the back of the blade with double sided tape, the result will be the same. Then once you know the right thickness that you need you can glue a piece of veneer on the blade bed.

If by doing that the blade doesn't move forward it means that you will have to retouch the front of the grooves, and for that you'l need a float.
 
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Well its now able to be configured as a smoother. :)
uploadfromtaptalk1435866275622.jpguploadfromtaptalk1435866285752.jpguploadfromtaptalk1435866294800.jpguploadfromtaptalk1435866303849.jpg

But.....there is a bigger issue here.
When testing a plane on some scrap wood, one can go at it until u get it tuned and working. But.....t...
Would u trust it on a project with some fine wood one off.?
Definitely not.
Something i did while fussing with this plane was apply some wax to sole and brass insert sole. Made a nice difference in how it glided across the surface.

Something else i realize now big time thinking back to the days of Dad and I working on projects is that neither of us had a clue what sharp meant. Lol Had we, we may have gotten by using a smoother to do a jack plane job. Lol.

I will re sharpen the plane blade and try it again but i dont see this plane being a real user.
 
Why wouldn't you trust it? Those planes have made incredible pieces of furniture, Krenov made his own ones like many others, and he was not a plane maker.Don't get biased by those high tech space steel planes with micro adjustements and marketing gimmicks. While those tools help a lot many woodworkers since the dawn of times didn't have them and made fantastic pieces only with a wooden body and a well sharpen and set up blade of good steel.
 
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