I work primarily with hand tools and traditional joinery, but I have no problem illustrating machine use or techniques if that's what I'm feeling at the time. Being a hobbyist woodworker; I want to show things that are more accessible to those without access to a bunch of expensive machines and a large shop space. You can do almost anything with just a few basic tools and skills.
There is no regular schedule for new videos. I'm not a professional "content creator." I'll publish things that I think are worthwhile, as I have the time. At the moment (early 2024), my time has been exceptionally limited, but I'm pushing a few projects forward.
Seems like your support wedges just need to be the exact size of the slots they're going into, then hand tight is all you need, no need for the additional wedge to hold that wedge in place.
That might work, I think the only way to tell would be to try it out. I can surmise a few difficulties, though. First, you need the slots to be a very consistent width. Probably the best way to do that would be with some kind of router jig rather than the way that I glued cut pieces of plywood together. You'd also have to use something quite seasonally stable for the wedges. Softwoods are usually the best for that, but you don't want softwood because it dents. Perhaps MDF, or some sort of 3D-printed thing. Third, you don't want the wedges to slip out. I think you could prevent that with sandpaper on the bottom of the slots. It also depends on how careful you can manage to be with the sled when you move it to the planer and feed it through. I don't have a lot of self-confidence there, but some people have much steadier hands. Note that I considered something like this idea that was adaptable to slots without such precise spacing, a sort of spring/feather thing on the sides of the wedges to keep them stuck in place. In the end, though, I just found the fixing wedges to be easier to deal with.
This is an innovative design approach to building a planning sled alternative. The wedges look very secure. This is an excellent video, well explained.
Thank you, I appreciate the kind words. I hope to be making videos again at some point. I just moved and getting my shop set up again has been taking priority.
Just was reading the comments on your restoration video of this particular saw where, at the end, a couple of three "Karen's" were a' busily complaining. As the late, great Pat Paulson would've put it: "Picky; Picky; Picky". Bye the by, I tried printing out your teeth guage five times at different settings and which only allows metric page image sizing. Seems the "Metric Inch" is 7/8' of the Imperial one. In other words, if you ever do find the time, energy and urge to redo it, would adding imperial settings be doable with your system? Sure would cut down on the bad language to the good Lord quite a mite. :)
Try looking at your print settings--there might be some sort of scaling issue (this is often a problem when people print out sewing patterns, especially if the paper size doesn't match). If that doesn't work for you, I can have a closer look sometime to see I goofed with the paper size or something. The guide is actually the output of a PostScript program I wrote a while back, which uses points as units (1/72nd of an inch).
@@bricsuc, Thanks for the response. The point system takes me back to my semester in the late '50's of print class in high school. Yes, hand set type used in a real (but powered) printing press. Now, on my mid 2011 iMac running OS 10.13.6, for a Canon 2500 printer, I seem to be getting conflicting results as your chart shows up as only being printable in metric dimensions even though it shows its for standard American letter size - 8 1/2' x 11". As a dear friend used to wryly note: "Murphy never sleeps". Thanks anyway.
Hey You, and Hey to Carmonius, i'm new in woodworking by hand and kind of helpless here in Germany because there are not to many working by hand. I like to ask for the plans of both, it will help me a lot. Br Andi
I didn't work off any plans for this project. I just built it according to how wide an area my plane needed to slide on, the clearance for the little distance between the side of the plane and the cutter, and the typical lengths and widths of boards that I normally work with. I could dig up some measurements if you like, but otherwise, I'd encourage you to examine the plane that you want to use. A lot of those details will probably depend on that. Some of those Emmerich planes that are popular in Germany ought to work well for something like this, as long as the sides are perpendicular to the sole--I don't have one, so I don't know for sure.
This is not correct. The vintage saw is filed rip, and I used it mostly as a rip saw, but at around 29:07, I used it in the crosscut direction to cut of the half-dovetails at the ends of the board; I noted this in the narration. I did this because (1) I didn't want the viewer to get confused when I grabbed yet another saw (2) I was too lazy to go over and grab a crosscut saw, and (3) I wanted to illustrate that it's possible to crosscut with a fine-pitched rip saw, as long as you're not expecting a very clean cut.
The ingenuity is impressive! I made something similar by attaching a small lip onto the end of an old 3/4" melamine MDF shelving. I use two sided tape (or sometimes hot glue) to hold it in place, and wedges to brace out the slop. It works pretty well, but, it takes WAY more massaging than this system. Looks like it's time for some mods! Thanks for sharing!!!🙂
I'm glad you liked it. As far as subscribers go, I haven't put much effort into chasing them. It can be very difficult to build an audience on RU-vid and I generally don't have a lot of time to devote to video production and promotion. So I'd rather use what I have to make (hopefully) worthwhile videos. And I'm always trying to get better at making them!
It seems like the issues that you mention for this are almost always why the hot glue gets used in the more “typical” method. Namely, keeping things from shifting around because you bump something on the sled. I like the concept of helping to simplify the process of supporting the material to surface joint it but I’d personally still use hot glue in at least a few places to secure it. The cleanup of it is not a big deal to me, but a wedge shifting and causing irreparable damage to expensive project material would infuriate me. Still love the idea and will probably make one with a few tweaks. Main one would be using stable, and flat material for the sled. Having bow or cup in it literally defeats the entire purpose. I don’t care if it adds weight to be sure it is going to function properly. If I’m running 8 or 6 quarter walnut through the planer why would I want to risk the material over trying to make my sled a few pounds lighter by using crappy big box store plywood instead of using MDF or another stable product for the bottom?
The notes on wedges slipping and such are mostly for those who have never used a planer sled before and therefore not used to how small shifts when setting up the wedges can mess up the setup. As mentioned in response to a lot of other comments, this has not been a problem in practice. As for the flatness of the sled itself and material stability, it can be difficult to accept that the base doesn't need to be totally flat all the time. I had a lot of doubts of my own when iterating through this design, and I expected to fail when I first thought about making the sled out of such crappy plywood! But it really does turn out that It need only be held flat when setting up the support wedges, hence the importance of that step of clamping it the a flat bench during setup. When going through the planer, the feed rollers in the planer press down hard enough to reform the flat setup for the section going through the mechanism. Of course, this only works if the sled is somewhat flexible. If the sled were fully rigid, then you would indeed need to it to be flat at all times. I've heard from others that they've built the sled with MDF so that they don't need to clamp it to the bench during setup, and you can see a sorta-copycat video out there whey they've built a torsion box. (Note that the latter requires really robust support so that it does not cave or buckle under the pressure of the feed rollers. I sometimes think that I could make a whole video about feed roller pressure.) Ultimately, the user's needs dictate their decisions. Weight is important to me because my planer is kind of far from my bench/setup area (or at least it was in my old shop; not sure what the new one is going to look like). For others, it could be more difficult to find a flat reference surface, so why not make it from MDF if the extra weight isn't a problem?
Wow. Awesome video! Thanks for sharing your sled design. I'm close to retirement and need to put a sled together for all the woodworking I have planned for the coming years. Will likely copy your approach.
Congratulations on not showing us all the build steps. For some reason woodworking channels insist on making people watch 30 minutes of tedious construction. I suspect that people who are trying to build a jig, will have enough knowledge to build the jig, if you show them how it works. Wait, you're not using the Dewalt planer? That's almost blasphemy. As far as the internet is concerned, Dewalt is the only company that makes a good planer.
Yeah, though keep in mind that this was only my second video, and I still feel like there are some bits that I could have moved along quicker. For example, the wedge installation probably should have been a time-lapse. Maybe I'm improving with each one. Regarding the brand of the planer, yeah, you know how it goes: "dogs and cats living together, mass hysteria!"
I think you're talking about the Veritas Saw File Holder. You can achieve something similar by drilling a hole in a small chunk of hardwood and poking the top of the file in the hole at an appropriate angle--I did this for years before Veritas released the file holder.
Brian, I hate to break it to you, but you’re too good a craftsman to become successful on RU-vid. Your craftsmanship with hand tools is intimidating, and most of us hacks will never rely on hand tools over power tools. All that said, I will subscribe and watch your videos because I enjoy your communication skills and, of course, your fine craftsmanship.
Then I guess it's a good thing that I don't have any ambition to become successful on RU-vid! That said, thanks for taking the time to watch my videos, and don't feel awkward about using whatever tool you need to get the job done. Though I like to use hand tools, there are plenty of operations where I appreciate what a power tool can do can do for me.
@@bricsuc I’ve seen all your videos and looking forward to watching more when you have time. If I may ask, is furniture making your vocation or avocation? Love to see photos of your work.
I am primarily a hand tool woodworker, but I cheerfully accept the time and effort savings that power tools give me, especially when it comes to milling rough lumber. But it galls me when more power tool use is forced upon me by a big project, and I really don’t want to buy yet another expensive and space-consuming major power tool like a jointer… but my current project, a Mission style bookcase, required so much lumber milling I almost broke down and bought one. I went through many, many hot glue sticks fastening rough boards to my planer sled. If I had only come across this video 2 months ago! 😂 I will be building a duplicate of your sled before my next project!!
I think you've pretty much described why I developed the sled. Having learned with hand tools only, the thickness planer was the first machine I bought to take some of the labor out of projects. Even though it did exactly what I expected, for years I was irked that it was such a one-trick pony unless you wanted to go through the hassle of hot glue or some really complicated design. I also really, really wanted to avoid getting a jointer. Now I'm much happier with the planer. Good luck on your build!
Why bother to invest so much time on that while you can achieve the same with a solid maple board and using double side tape? I don't want to criticize but practically save time. The amount of wedges you have to use to me is not efficient compared to tape. Also the side clamping gets difficult if you have a beveled edge.
Because you can't achieve the same with double-sided tape, and it does not save time. Setting aside my goal of using no consumables (which is very important to me), consider how you would set wedges with double-sided tape. Once you apply the tape and set it down, a wedge will immediately become very difficult to set due to the nature of the adhesive introducing friction; the wedge will advance in fits and spurts rather than easily slide precisely to the point where it just touches the underside of the workpiece. This is the same principle that enables the simpler hot-glue planer sled seen in other videos: The glue in its liquid form makes it possible to slide the wedges with significantly reduced friction. Setting that aside, when you use the sled often (which I do), sliding and securing the wedges means you never have to reach for the tape, order more, or clean off anything because the workpiece and/or sled is too dirty for tape to adhere. You may be overestimating the time it takes to make the sled. I didn't show the sled build in the video because it's so easy. Side-clamping: If you're doing live-edge pieces with a beveled edge, with the cup side up (see the video on why you should do this), the edges will have their wider sides down. This is because the cross-section of the log gets larger as you get closer to the pith, and wood cups up away from the pith as it dries. So unless you have strange workpieces, this will not present any difficulties, and even if it is beveled, it's probably not going to be a big deal--it doesn't need to grip it very tightly, just provide a little bit of resistance. (Also, if you're routinely doing this kind of weird stuff, use a rear-clamping sled, or just get a jointer.)
Hey this is an awesome video. A unique concept as well as very straightforward no-nonsense style of presentation. You earned yourself a new subscriber. Looking forward to more such interesting videos.
It could be that the reason your saw teeth are slipping when the hammer hits the anvil is because of the paste wax applied. Maybe if the wax was applied after setting the slipping wouldn't be an issue. I have that same (or extremely similar) saw set tool & I've never had an issue with it slipping on any of the saws I've set.
That's a possibility. I haven't really thought about it much. But you bring up an interesting point, and now that I think about it, that slipping hasn't happened on the many other saws I've set with this (waxed or not). There might be another contributing factor: This particular saw set is for finer-pitched saw teeth, and the plates for those are normally thinner and don't require a lot of effort. This saw, however, has fine teeth on a rather thick plate, so more effort is required--you're pressing down on that plate at a spot closer to the bottom of a gullet than you normally would at, say, 12TPI or lower. Maybe there's a possible experiment here. Wish I had the time to dig further, but I don't right now.
If you have only a single board to flatten, you may want to consider just using a hand plane if you've got one handy. Otherwise, this does work well when you have several boards to flatten. I have been wondering if there's some sort of convenient way to make a version that's extendable--so that you can have a short one for most boards, and then just put on an extension when you need the extra length.
@@bricsuc yeah I was thinking the same. Problem I have is I don’t have time right now to play around. I need to get this project done. It this is on my list now
Think of the consequence of that being true: If the blades were pushing so hard against a workpiece that it shoved it backwards on the sled, it would also send a workpiece backwards if no sled were present at all (i.e. normal operation). And in that case, the machine would not work at all, because the workpiece would never be able to advance through the machine. The feed rollers must always completely overwhelm the force exerted by the cutters; otherwise, the machine does not function.
This is great and I'd like to replicate the design but I'm confused on one point. Why doesn't it matter if the sled is flat? I know you mentioned you're clamping it to your mostly flat reference surface, but when you release those clamps the bow in your sled returns. doesn't that throw off the board you're milling, but also make it so that the planer is reflecting the bow in the plywood sled and not the flat surface?
The slight bow in the plywood doesn't matter due to the high pressure that a thickness planer's mechanism exerts. When the planer's feed rollers grab the board and smash it down, they smash it against the sled, which in turn gets smashed against the bed of the planer. The bed is flat, so it's basically replicating the clamped sled on the reference surface for the segment of the board that's on either side of the cutter. If the feed rollers did not exert so much pressure, this wouldn't work, and you would indeed need a flat sled. I should note one thing about sled bow, though: one reason you might not want an excessive amount of it is because the board could come ajar from the stop at the end after being fed through. However, if you build it with the cup side up, this is unlikely to be a problem.
Based on what I've read, I have a feeling that, in the past, there were a fair number of things of this nature in shops, with a lot of variation based on the needs of the particular worker. Some variants show the board without anything to hold the work in place--if the pieces you work with are sufficiently short in length and easy enough to get a grip on, you can just hold it in place by hand as you plane.
Others have mentioned it, but that the black substance left after Evaporust is rust that's been chemically altered (chelated), but not un-bonded with the chelating agent. One thing to watch out for with Evaporust is to make sure that the object has enough contact with it, and is fully submerged. Otherwise, you may get uneven rust removal, like the 2 sides of the saw. Since you layed it flat, I think parts of the saw might not have gotten much contact with the chemicals. I had a similar situation with a block plane body sitting in a bath of Evaporust for a day or two; it removed all the rust, except for under the price sticker I forgot to remove. The sticker was unharmed, and the adhesive was gone, but the sole of the plane still had some rust there. On a similar note: Evaporust is water-based. You can get small etched lines on metal where it breaks through the surface, if the liquid level drops in your container from the water evaporating.
The two sides of the saw had consistent rust removal. One side had just been far more corroded than the other. The resulting pitting there wasn't particularly nice to look at, but the rust was gone.
Hi there, this comes up from time to time. I've already written up a fairly detailed answer to this question in another comment. Try here to bring that to the top: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-6aB21q58MkU.html&lc=Ugx1NgcHJ-JkTMJBvj14AaABAg.9Sha8nTDOOo9SiDbbUqLC5 If that doesn't work, search for "Dances with Aardvarks" in the page.
Ugh, sorry about that. I wish RU-vid were better about referencing in comments. I'll just paste my response to that comment below: The reason has to do with the feed mechanism. In benchtop/portable thickness planers, the feed rollers are at the top, inline with the cutterhead. They smash down (hard!) on the board and pull it forward. Rotating in the direction opposite the cutterhead, they exert far more force than the cutterhead. This is by necessity, because the board wouldn't travel through the planer otherwise. When using the sled, putting the stop in first prevents the feed mechanism from grabbing the board and slipping it forward along the sled. This happens when the friction between the sled and planer bed is greater than the friction between the board and the sled. In practice, this tends to be somewhat uncommon, so that's why you've seen it work when people feed the stop in last. If the feed mechanism were on the bottom, you'd need a stop at the rear.
currently trying to use plain plywood as a sled using hot glue to fix it to the "sled" after some shims. Its a pia to scrape the glue every time an I'm not getting a jointer any time soon so I need a better solution an something like this might just be the one. thanks for the idea
I'm not totally out of it, but my time has been limited since I put out this video. That said, I am working on a new one right now; if everything goes well (cross fingers and such), it should be ready soon-ish. Thanks for taking the time to watch my videos!
I've never had them come loose due to vibration, or really anything else other than a careless bump from my knuckles or something. The feed rollers of a planer press down pretty hard when it's working, so there isn't much opportunity for anything to move once the machine starts working.
I have a commercially made tapering jig for a tablesaur (a gift IIRC) and I have not and never will use it for it's intended purpose. Maybe I can use it as a long-grain shooting board!
You might be able to put a piece of that UHMW stuff underneath the jig for the plane to slide on (with possibly another thin strip along the edge where the plane bed slides). If you can come up with a way to make it easily detachable, it could possibly still be used as a tapering jig. (FWIW, I have found my [separate] tapering jig to be fairly useful on the bandsaw; it was still quite new when I made this video.)
