What about the chisels laid flat on the surface? The Japanese back touches the surface all along to the back.The handle stays out of the way. Western chisel backs only touch the surface at the edge .
I recently bought 5 Japanese style planes from eBay. Upon receipt I found two of the blades had been drilled through. First; Have you seen this or know why this would be done?
Thanks for the comment! I don't know which part has the hole, but maybe that is a planer with a good quality iron. Bridges manufactured in the past were made of good quality iron that is not available today. When the iron from the dismantled bridges was used to make the planer blades, some planers seem to have holes left after the bolts.
Quite a complex procedure atleast to me ,very well clearly explained and demonstrated thank you.I bought an inexpensive Japanese hand plane ,Ive probably improved it about 40 or so percent not knowing I had to do this to the sole. It's s still a great useful tool as is though.
I got one of your small 42 mm planes today and the kanna / blade can protrude out of the mouth. Literally brand new. I thought that I should be able to use the plane if I wanted without the chip breaker. This is second one I have received like this. Poor quality if you ask me.
At the risk of telling you something you already know, these planes ship with the blade upside down. While I'm quite certain there is a good reason for this, it can be confusing. You may find that once you make this change, the blade stops a good 1/4 to 3/8" (6mm-9mm) away from the mouth. If so, all is as intended, and now you have some setup work to do. Japanese planes almost never come ready to use as shipped, although, I will say, Kakuri ships some fairly sharp blades with their product. Again, if you already knew this, my apologies for wasting your time.
I should be more specific. The blade goes bevel down. It ships bevel up. In bevel up configuration, both my Kakuri planes appear to have a blade that extends to far past the mouth. When I turn them bevel down -- which is the correct position -- I find that they do not even reach the mouth, let alone protrude. Hope that completes what I was trying to communicate.
It's possible that if you live in a drier climate than Japan the wood block has shrunk a little bit leading to some looseness. And no, most modern Japanese planes are not designed to be used without the chip breaker.
