What price a good blade?

[Trevor Gore]

You will all have seen pictures something like this - continuous fine shavings from a piece of curly wood, in this case Jarrah.

Veritas Hi Angle.jpg (128.96 KiB) Viewed 8513 times

So what's different?

Well, it's what this blade went through before I got to this.

First, I sharpened it and used it to level a rosette; a combination of face and end grain:

Rosette.jpg (99.47 KiB) Viewed 8513 times

Then, a few days later, I used it to straighten out the edges of some bandsawn Perspex, then to do a similar job on some bandsawn polycarbonate (jigs) and THEN I needed to take a few thou off a 500mm length of aluminium, so I used it for that, too. It planed it rather well and left a smooth, shiny finish. And then I did the curly Jarrah, a few days after that. No resharpening over any of those jobs.

How cool is that?

The plane is a standard angle Veritas bock plane with the standard blade sharpened at a 40 degree bevel to give a 60 degree cutting angle.

(Now maybe they'll send me one of their flash new ones for free! )

[Tom West]

Trevor: Is that a CANADIAN made plane your using.................................???
Tom

[Trevor Gore]

Sure is!

I'm not sure I'd be putting an HNT Gordon over aluminium, though the blade would probably take it. I tend to use steel planes on all sorts of materials, but wooden planes really don't like working things other than wood.

Talking about HNT Gordon, I got one of these a while back. It doesn't quite pass as machinery porn, but it might pass as tool porn. I didn't take to it immediately, but with a bit of getting use to it and finding a way to get that tiny blade really sharp, it is a very cool tool. Great for doing those tight inside curves on necks. I'll have to see if I can persuade Terry to supply a holder for the blade to make sharpening easier.

[Tom West]

Don't own any of the Veritas tool. Well stocked with older gear. But if I was looking for planes they would be on my short list for sure. The Lee family has done a real fine job with providing desent gear in general and the Veritas gear in particular.
That shave is a little gem,smallest I've ever seen. Shaves are my main tool for necks.Old ones around here can be picked up quite cheap if you put in a bit of work on the flea market scene.
Tom

[Nick]

I'm impressed that you would set to a piece of aluminium with a Veritas plane! But it's testiment to the blade that it came through that and went on to produce those Jarrah shavings. Think the least they could do for you now (after that endorsement) is supply you with a Veritas tool of your choice!

[Kamusur]

I have to tell you Trevor it has never entered my mind to run a plane across a piece of aluminium but unfortunately i'm going to have to try that, albeit whilst no one is looking. And it never ceases to amaze me, the ideas, skill levels, craftmanship etc that everyone else seems to possess, definitely way above my level.

Steve

[Crafty Fox]

I've bought a few Veritas tools over the last few years and am well pleased with them. I've got that block plane too and use it a lot. Never tried planing ali though, except with my Makita (blades easily replaced).