Facing up the bed area.

It is important that I get things back to centre at this stage and I do this with an edge finder. All my co-ordinates work from the centre line.

Now that everything is back on centre I can drill through the fixing bar for the adjuster.

Whilst I still have all my co-ordinates and work holding I hand tap the previous drillings for the adjuster fixing.

There are many jobs in the making of this plane which don’t get mentioned and these pictures show the blade pads for bedding.

Boring for the blade pads. I drill to a suitable depth where I can engage part of the plane structure. The pads are then cemented in – on previous pictures you can see the retention recesses turned onto these pads.

Some browsers seem to make my nice round holes like polygons!

Handles ready for fitting, and trimming pads

The handle in position with temporary rivets

Parting off and trimming spacers which I use on all my infill planes for better dimensional stability.
 

The spacers are drilled and reamed for the 7/32” rivet, from both ends for better concentricity.

Flushing off rear infill.

This is done with a temporary spacer to represent the handle as it is too difficult to do this with the handle in position. I also use sleeper rivets and spacers for location

The polishing is done after excess materials have been removed.

At this stage the plane with its infill can be put into the milling vice to flush the end. After further polishing the infills are ready to accept the handle.

Even without any machines this is one piece of equipment that everyone should have – just an ordinary drill press. This picture shows the drill press being used to drill the hole for the brass bar which is then drilled and tapped later on in situ for the adjuster fixing.

Inserting the brass bar for the adjuster fixing.

Some of the preparation work and then putting the metal parts together.

One of those tedious jobs – polishing the chamfers. As you can see these need constant blueing to maintain the true flat angle all the way round.

No, not a piece of origami!

The sides after chamfer polishing and blade kickers which seem to have appeared already riveted by the workshop fairies.

Peining the underside

This is the first stage of peining. As you will notice the body is clamped onto an aluminium former by two surface ground steel plates. These are castellated to match the dovetails so that there is continuous pressure over the whole of both sides including the dovetails and prevents the space between the sides getting larger.

Peining the underside

With the sides and their dovetails firmly supported, I can then pein the tails by starting in the centre and working to the outside. Without this kind of support the sides would blow apart. The object is to expand the dovetails inside which normally cannot be reached as these dovetails are true compounds and not the illusions that are normally practised.

In short this clamping arrangement behaves like a die.

Side peining of plane

As you can see this is peined straight off the flat of the hammer. All the joints here are already tight and have not moved or wandered due to the clamping arrangement as described above. By peinning with the flat of the hammer it makes the metal expand and flow keeping all edges straight and maintaining the true dovetail form. Everything is sharp and crisp when flushed off.

The reason I do not use the punch here is because I am making the harder steel flow into the brass. The brass being softer would lose its form. Care is needed as a missed hit could leave an unwanted ‘dink’ in the side of the plane.

This is after the peining, but showing one dovetail left undone for comparison.

The plane body after dovetailing showing the precision aluminium former.

Here I describe some of the work to the bottoms of the planes. This is an area where most of the work of the plane is. It is probably light years ahead of any other infill plane.

Rebate to dovetail

Machining stops to the dovetailing, this adds extra support to the plane sides and also provides a light stop. This is something I currently do to the shoulder planes and it will be a new feature to all my dovetail planes.

Roughing out bed area to mouth.

This area is rough machined prior to the frog fitting to facilitate better access around the mouth.

Milling to the front side of the mouth

This is one of the main reasons for leaving the finishing of the bed until last so that I can access an end mill to the front side of the mouth.

Frogs waiting for riveting

Now that 80% of the work to the mouth area is complete the frogs can now be riveted.

As you can see that most of the surfaces are surface ground and especially the contacting surfaces which will be air tight once the frogs are riveted. This is not achievable with filing.

Frogs after riveting.

All that remains now is for the flushing of rivet heads and the bed machining.

Finishing cut to blade bed

Work holding for bed working

The highest standard of bed working on a true plane with no azimuth error and the bed pitch is exact to 51 degrees to within 1 minute. This might not seem that important but it is to me because I know where everything else goes then. I want to know exactly where the pressure points are when the blade is clamped.

Plane bottoms complete

This is a nice sight for me as it is a milestone in the project. Once this is achieved I am a happy bunny.

Roughing out the dovetails

I usually do these 6 pairs at a time and it takes several pecks especially with brass as it tends to chatter more than steel.

At last the final dovetail cut

Checking for fit.

Now we are starting to look like planes.

Much of the infill work is always trued up flat and square before any of the work commences, as in most woodworking projects.

In this picture are the rear infill sides showing the frog area routered away and this gives me a datum stop which helps me work out the drilling positions and its position in the plane. This will also be the same with the handle.

This is one pair of A13 rear infills being drilled for rivet spacers. Note the frog cut out being used as a stop. After this is done then I can drop a template over the holes to mark out the cutting line for band sawing.

This is the handle being drilled for rivet spacers using the same stops. As you can see I am making planes with rosewood and boxwood at the same time.

Whilst the holding fixture is still in position on the CNC milling machine it is prudent to use this for other work as all the datum positions are set up. Breaking down and setting up can be very time consuming and a little tiring on the grey cells.

This picture shows the finger hole and handle being roughed out.

As I have said; taking advantage of the holding fixtures before they are taken down.

This is the final cut after using the band saw to cut the infills out. I use the CNC mill to cut the true form of the sides. I add on a few thou all round for better finishing.

Using a manual milling machine with a purpose made cutter to produce a moulded form on the front bun. This is very accurate on a milling machine especially equipped with a DRO.

Milling the dovetail pins on the A13 plane bottoms.

Milling these is very advantageous on a CNC milling machine as I can work two bottoms together face to face in mirror form. I have a left and a right side of the bottom being worked together. With a dovetail form cutter and tracking in a butterfly pattern this allows me a left and right cut. I use three different cutters for this process – roughing, finishing and form cutters.

After cutting the compound dovetails in the plane bottoms.

At the risk of criticism from the purists I will say that with some very careful setting up I can produce a near perfect fit between the sides and the bottom without filing.

Not quite all of the sequential process, but most of it – not necessarily in order

A13 drilling lever cap for pivot screw

All my drilling and tappings are done in the milling machine so that I can achieve the best positioning and concentricity.

This is my A13 lever cap. As it is going into a brass sided plane I am using my original machine screws instead of my removable lever cap system. These pivot screws are, as in everything else, made in house. This screw is of a cheese head type for positive bearing contact. I have seen some planes with countersunk screws here; this lacks understanding because if tight it will have a pinching effect on the plane sides and lock everything and you will impede the lever cap rotation. If it is not tightened it could allow the lever cap to float a bit. It must be positively stable with a good bearing contact, a cheese head screw has a flat underside to the head which tightens down on to the side of the lever cap. The head sides are parallel which meets the forces directly.

A13 draw filing lever cap

As some of you will know most sand castings are from perfect. The contours need truing up.

A13 lever cap filing

This photo shows the lever cap with a reference template which has the top and bottom contours either side of its centre line.

A13 lever cap edge polishing

A13 lever cap using light reflections

Using light reflections is the best reference for showing up errors in the compounding contours.

A13 finished lever caps

After much filing the polishing is done with an abrasive paper and graduated down to 1200 in 6 stages. Then the lever caps are lightly buffed and then polished with one of many metal polishes available. Any irregularities are shown up with this type of reflective finish.

A13 bottom thicknessing

Often it is necessary to resize the raw materials. The mill does the job quite well as it also removes the scale.

A13 side drilling

Sometimes I rely on the milling machine as a jig borer. As you can see all the holes are drilled after the raw materials have been thicknessed and prepared.

This way each hole can be a datum on its own, used for fixing until it becomes the actual rivet hole.

A13 set up and ready for side profiling

As you can see the rivet holes have a slight 60 deg chamfer the same as my jig screws. This assists the positioning on the milling jig and then again providing the retention for the riveting.

A13 sides removed after profiling and chamfering is complete. (There is no point in photographing this stage as it is the same as the A1 pictures shown previously in Window to my workshop 2)

Time to go home

Look out tomorrow!

After grinding and drilling the sides they are then screwed to a holding jig via jig screws for profiling.

Roughing out the shape on the A1 14.5 sides.

A1 sides being chamfered.

A1 4.5 after chamfering.  The picture showing chamfering complete and removed from its holding jig.   Even with all the time saved from not having to manually file there is still the polishing.  This has to be done by hand with a great deal of care otherwise all the finish and precision can be lost.  But the dovetailing needs to be done first.

A1 after the dovetailing.  Picture showing dovetails after completion.  In this situation there are only 4 sides but I would do up to 12.

Cutting the dovetails on the bottoms.  These are usually done in pairs only as they need to be back to back to produce a compound dovetail.  Saves a hell of a lot of filing.

Bottom dovetails complete.

A1 14.5 drilling and breaking through for mouth.  Showing the bottom after the dovetailing, slotting for mouth and drilling holes for the frog riveting.

A14.5 frog riveting – a boring task; one of many of the riveting operations which I hate.  The frog is one I prepared earlier.

Rivet flushing on frog.

Milling operation to the mouth after the frog has been riveted in position. Easy isn’t it?

Second part of the mouth forming.

Mouth almost complete but will need tuning at the final stages.

Once all the work on the sides and bottom is complete one of these is very useful to have.  This is the tool I use for closing up i.e. joining bottoms to sides The inner former is precisionally machined from aluminium and also the two clamping plates are precisionally ground.

This picture is showing the plane assembled around its former with the dovetailed clamping plates applying pressure from a pair of milling vices, not just on the sides but also on the dovetails.  The dovetails would have a tendency to spread pushing the sides of the plane wider apart.  This means that I would start to lose the internal dimensions.  This process of closing up is extremely critical as things will run out of true if they are not secured well enough.  This can result in oversized and twisted plane body, There is a lot of evidence of this happening in some of the original infill planes that I have seen.  This means that you will notice that these planes usually show no uniformity in thickness to the sides and bottoms.

As you can see I use a very light hammer and a punch for the closing up, which means that I can make the metal flow in whatever direction I want.  The light hammer blows do not transmit too much stress into other areas.

My aim is not to discredit these people but to take this product and build it to the very highest standards possible. Without any financial constraints, over the years I have developed my workshop with a number of machine tools which could probably receive criticisms based on ignorance, as my aim is purely for precision and perfection which these machines play a great part in. I hate to disappoint those people who think I can set a dial and the planes fall out the other end of the machine in the style of Heath Robinson. Although the machining is very simple when it is running, the hard part is getting there. All this invisible work becomes part of the void in people’s thinking and leads to lack of understanding. Then when the machining is done the other work starts – this can mean hours of carving, filing and polishing. When it comes to flattening it is a story of its own.

Most of the following pictures will be based on a A1 14 ½” plane, I may use pictures from other planes where I need extra examples.

(e.g. grinding picture is of No 982 bottoms).  This picture shows the bottoms being surface ground to give me a starting point.

The material that I am using is hot rolled mild steel and comes in either bar or sheet form. It is ductile and has no stresses so this material can be worked easily without fear of movement.

The infill plane seems to be more of a sculpture than a technical innovation and which is coveted for reasons of vanity. I have tried in my designs to deal with some of the weaker points.

Brass spacer being drilled for the 7/32” mild steel rivet.

The original infill planes never used metal spacers and just riveted straight through the sides of the wood. It would seem that modern makers are also avoiding the use of spacers. I personally put a lot of store in the use of these spacers as they will be the only support for the plane sides which are already loaded with tension, should the wood infill give up some of its moisture and shrink.

I have no secrets in my methods. It just takes a lot of dedication to achieve this much work and detail.

A1 14 ½” panel

This is my long awaited A1 14 ½” panel plane.

The object in all my planes is to make it better than the ones that preceded it and the standard can only go up. This high standard can be seen from the close up photography and illustrations on this site .  I go to a great deal of effort to achieve this high standard and you won’t find its like in other infill planes.
 

Notice that these sleeves are shown in steel but I usually use brass.
 
The riveting passes through metal sleeves which gives positive support and spacing to the sides (the illustration just gives an image without the wood). Without these spacers there would only be wood which is dimensional unstable which would shrink with moisture loss which is a common situation. The antique planes usually reflect this with the rivets raised.. When the wood does shrink and the sides, which are always under tension as a result of the rivet peining, move inwards as this tension is released. So as the tops of the sides move in, the bottom also flexes and becomes convexed. Of course the opposite effect would be caused by humid conditions, with more moisture present in the wood, the wood will expand, this will push the sides out in my planes and everyone else’s as nothing can hold that force. By using these spacers at least I can deal with the shrinkage but it is essential that all wooden infill planes are not exposed to dampness or too much humidity.

I will show my work piecemeal and in no set order as I have lots of things I want to say and show, both current and past.  I do not have the time to edit into any order.  I have a large archive of photographs which I will be publishing over a period of time.  Also I will discuss techniques etc on request if time permits.