Sometimes bigger is better

Bill Satko

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Methow Valley
especially when you are flattening the top of your bench.

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Early today, I did a final planing of the vise chop, cleaning up all the marks and pencil marks. First using my number 7 to make sure it still was nice and flat and followed that up with my 4 1/2. Absolutely flat and smooth. Look at that shine.

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First coat of finish on the chop, equal parts of BLO, turpentine and spar varnish. Brings some nice color to the maple.

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Now you making me jealous. Your neander shop is taking root and looking real good. The finish you got their with the plane is fantastic. What a good pic with the reflection. Bill i cannot make out from the pictures but which make of planes are those?
That vise is gonna be real cool. With mass like that you wont need much clamping force. But take a careful look because it aint gonna stay looking like that. :)
 
nice job bill:) i just noticed that you dont have any dog holes on top just your sides??? and are using a clamp for a stop to smooth the vice face.. why dont you have dog holes????
 
Bill that looks fantastic!!

Thanks Stu!

Bill i cannot make out from the pictures but which make of planes are those?

That is a Lie Nielsen #8, set up for a heavier cut.

nice job bill:) i just noticed that you dont have any dog holes on top just your sides??? and are using a clamp for a stop to smooth the vice face.. why dont you have dog holes????

I am holding off on drilling any holes on the top until after I get it flattened. Even then it might take me awhile to decide where to put them. I will probably be very conservative and let the use of the bench decide where I need them.

As for how I plane on the bench right now, I am planing against a stop, a block of wood I clamped at the end of the bench. You don't really need to have your work piece clamped down for most planing operations. Often all you need is stop block to prevent it from moving in the direction you are planing. Not having a proper bench for so long, I have become very good at just using a stop block. I think it has really improved my planing, because you have to really learn balance in applying force with the plane. It makes me really tuned into how the blade is cutting.
 
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