Hand Planing Wood - How to Prevent Tear Out 

To find grain... I find lightly running a microfiber cloth over the wood, it will grab against the grain and glide smoothly with the grain.

"I’m not a huge believer in having the chip breaker close to the edge " . I think you should do a video where you’re trying different positions of the chip breaker. Because when I set my chip breaker close to the edge of the blade I can go in any grain direction without any tear out. I know that you have a ton of experience and that you are a real master, but I just found that comment a bit chocking. I use Stanley type chip breakers , I don’t know if that makes any difference?

Thanks Rob! Loving your videos lately, thanks so much for everything you're doing for this community!

outstanding techniques, skill and patience. It really makes the results you get

I'm just starting to plane wood to finish vs. sanding. It's almost like you've seen my struggles and made this for me. And I appreciate it. Another great video. Well done!

That was the best explanation of reading wood grain I've heard.

I really regret not learning how to use the tools I had/have, some 30 years ago, until watching Mr Cosman, what a wonderful teacher. Thank you. ross

Thank you Rob and crew for this. I had questions, you had answers. 🙂

Tools. I bought a cheap no name smoothing plane with the ambition of restoring a solid kitchen table after serving our family of three kids for 20 years. I made a horrible mess with tearout and who knows what. I practically ruined it and left me wondering what to do. Since then I've followed a lot of your valuable advice and bought a recommended plane along with many other things and managed to make my table respectable again. I did try to sharpen by hand but sorry to say I had to succumb to a sharpening jig to make my blade look respectable. Again, thank you very much Rob for making these videos.

Hi Rob, I know this is an old video, but I gained a lot on plane prep for figured woods. Though when it came to the white oak, I let the video play while refreshing my drink as my opinion of oak (white or EEEE red) one of the best woods to overnight in a wood stove! I live in New Hampshire USA on a 3rd generation dairy farm surrounded by mostly red oak, Rock Maple, ash, beech, white birch, popular, (butternut and black walnut) but only if planted. My favorite combo is figured Maple with Black Walnut! I am purchasing some exotics to try, though species, sizes and quantities are very limited! Figured Maple is one of my favorite woods(especially tiger/curly, birds eye 2nd choice), thank you for showing how to hand plane those!

Great details and very helpful once again - thanks, Rob.

Thanks for all the great content. My first plane was the WR 5 1/2 and it has been great to use. One wood I've had a hard time planing is shedua with the interlocking grain. Even my thinnest pass on the jointer left huge pits. I could only get a clean face with a toothed blade and a #80 scraper.

This video is great! I am making a white oak bench and my planes are chewing up the wood very bad even after a good sharpening (tested on pine and cuts like butter) I will be sharpening my blades to 65°, Thank you Rob.

Nice explanation you are best teacher to teach these teach I regularly watch your videos for gaining knowledge about woodworking and handplanar if I am in your country I will definitely your students to learn about wood working techniques. Nice sir keep it up.

When you turned the oak board around, you could clearly see the wood completely change appearance on the first pass as the fibres got laid down. Great camera work 👍

Great demonstration Rob, thanks.

Hi Rob,Great video as usual. A couple months ago I was building some hickory cabinets for our kitchen. The hickory is flat sawn and has some really nice grain but it swirls and rises and dips all over the place so I was having a lot of tearout problems. You provided some really great suggestions at the time, including most of what you went over in this video. A lot of what I was experiencing was similar to the white oak in the video. The 20 deg back bevel solved quite a bit of it but there were still a few areas I just couldn’t get smooth on the panels and the frames no matter how often I sharpened and how tight the mouth was. I ended up having to use a card scraper to get those areas and then I sanded the whole thing with 220 grit to blend everything. If you ever get a chance to demonstrate the techniques on some hickory like that I’d love to see you apply your arsenal of tricks on it. I would really like to learn to defeat grain like that with a handplane because once the wood has a finish on it incident light reflecting off a handplaned surface is so much more beautiful and interesting than a sanded surface of the same wood. Thanks for all you and Jake and your team do. Since finding you on RU-vid I’ve learned a ton and acquired some really great tools from you. Someday after all this pandemic stuff is behind us I’d like to take one of your classes. Until then I’ll keep practicing what you teach us.

That has got to be one of the simplest, easy to understand explanations to reading wood grain direction. Heard it explained many ways, but nothing makes as much sense as the way you did it. Mind blown lol.

Thanks for the video, very interesting !!!

Great information. Rob does a great job. I still can’t stand how he pulls each shaving out after every stroke. I’m always looking to become more efficient and… yeah.

Thanks for sharing that

I know many woodworkers want to grow and learn, but eliminating problem boards has changed things for the better for me. It can be difficult to always try to have a perfect piece of wood but man, many of my problems have been solved by being very picky about wood choice .

Don’t have a question but just wanted to say I used my LN 5 1/2 plane to put the 24 inch long taper on the 30 inch long 4 legs of the writing desk I am making. Took forever, but it was so relaxing and satisfying to make table legs that look better than a table saw with tapering jig.

Wher's my pencil... 😀 Magnificent work, thanks a lot master. This really helped me. 👏👏👏

I wonder if adjusting the chip breaker would have helped. On a Japanese setup it would make all the difference. Thanks so much for these fun videos!!

Hi Rob, I have had a difficult time planing hickory. If I remember correctly, even a freshly honed and burnished scraper still produces fuzzy spots on the surface. Thanks for your videos. I have been able to refine my techniques through them.

It is nice to know that even if you prepped and sharpened the blade properly that sometimes the normally sharpened blade can’t get the job done, and you need to look at other methods, such as that high angle blade. I would have liked to see a piece of wood that you have had to use a scraper on. Is scraping something you would do after getting the thickness/flatness close to the desired dimensions? Thanks for everything you do Rob! Love the videos!

Greetings Mr Cosman and thanks a lot for the new video. i would really like to see how you would approach planing some olive tree wood, i have managed to plane a variety of exotic woods but olive remains to this day the one most nasty lumber i have ever tried to get flat with hand tools ( also it responds well to helical spiral head power planers )

Rob do you have a video on how to make a 65° blade setup? I would like to make one for my Stanley! Always enjoy your videos and your style of teaching! Always a lot of good tips to understand! Steven Columbus Michigan USA

Great video, would love to see a test on cherry. Having a hard time with German grown cherry wood, when it changes the grain direction.

that walnut is beautiful wood

Great tips Rob, I was hoping you would have some highly figured black walnut, this stuff is a nightmare.

Instead of going straight to the 65° setup to tame that piece of White Oak, I would have experimented with advancing the chip breaker closer to the edge. If you can get it to work, it saves the need to have several different blades.

Can you do a video on hand planing edges on super long boards in order to get a super crisp glue seam? That would be fantastic!

Great video and very useful as I have often encountered difficult grain in the timbers available to me. With regards to the "65" are you talking about the frog angle or simply an increased bevel on your cutting iron? I have a plane with a dedicated increased frog angle but if altering the angle on a spare blade I will most likely sell the other plane. Many thank

What are your thoughts about machining troublesome wood close to finished thickness if you don't have a segmented head, any tips?

Hey Rob, Thanks for this great instructional video. Is IBC back to making blades? I think I bought the last one in existence for a 5-1/2 at my local WoodCraft recently.

Hey Rob ive had trouble planing Sapele. Any suggestions?

One key element that Rob did not call out in this video is the use of Magic Wax next to the sharp blade this helps so much with hand planning. I swear by the stuff.

When sharpening, at what point do you resurface the primary bevel ? My secondary just keeps growing and growing and I’m not sure if there’s a rule of thumb of if/when I should grind the primary angle back down so it’s a fresh edge for secondary bevel..hopefully this made sense.

Thanks Rob for the high quality content as usual. Two questions: 1) I recently bought a WoodRiver No. 5 completely based on your recommendation and although I absolutely loved it, I noticed the sole isn't completely square with the sides. it was about 0.6 to 0.8 off of 90. Got it replaced with a No. 5 1/2 and this one came out at 0.4 off of 90. WoodRiver says this is within the manufacturing tolerance. At the moment I have to shim the shooting board with surface with masking tape to bring the sole up to 90 degrees with the sides, otherwise the blade has to be protruding so much in one side that it just doesn't look right. Do you have any suggestion on how to deal with situations like this? And 2) Where can I get one of those adjuster knobs you have on the plane in this video? Thanks again!

No clue if this would work or not. I am a bowl turner. One of the nastiest bowl woods to turn is dry Koa. On bowls, 1/4 of the revolution is with the grain, 1/4 against, then repeat. To tame tear out in Koa or other woods that are being nasty, some times just dampening the surface with water can help 'lubricate' the fibers as you gently turn off the wet wood. Had some Koa that was years old from up in the rafters of a friend's shop. It took several dampenings to get rid of the tear out.

Cool video, very informative. Question - a grain tear out on a guitar fretboard (rosewood) - is this something that can be sanded down to feel smooth? ATM some areas of the board feel course/ sand paper like.

Doesn't matter what level of kit you've got, or your proficiency level. The deep and broad nature of the knowledge imparted here means that - if you understand and follow it - you will always be able to work at your best, relative to your means. If that's not an example of excellence in instruction, I don't know what is - and I've been going it for 31 years.

Do you think you can discuss how to know when it's time to resharpen, and anything to look out for? I'm new to sharpening at this level, and I was planing some maple today and it was beautiful! Then, after a bit, the shavings were shredding on the grain lines of the board edge. Is that a sharpening tell, or a clue to use more blade? Is it possible to accidentally sharpen to a fragile edge? Those kinds of hints would be great!

I agree with you with respect to the chip breaker setting. As 72 year old does it make sense for me too hand plane large glued up panels?

I see your using the wood River planes. Do you like them? If so, what do you prefer about the wood River apposed to the other makers

I plane with the plane pointing straight down the board. Would it help with tearout to have the plane at an angle like you do as it travels down the board? Does that skew help reduce/prevent tearout.

There are 5 dislikes so I can only assume that the white oak, quilted maple, bird's eye, claro and purple heart boards all have internet access

Now that was a workout!!! No need to have the weight set in the shop, just do that everyday. 💪🏻 Very informative video as always.

Thank you for sharing Rob. What did you mean 65° I missed that. You change the blade or did you change the frog?

I live in the UK. Where can I buy the wax stick you use on the bottom of your plane? If I can't get it here, what would you suggest as an alternative?

Great info and video. What type magnifiers do you use?

I'd like to know what Rob did during the camera cut when he was starting to plain the walnut (the 2nd board).

Can you give me a basic idea of Wa closing the throat down does? Very narrow gap versus a larger gap.

Thanks for the great contents Rob. Recently I am working with ash on a project, and I have trouble getting a smooth finish with hand plane. I found 220 grits sand paper yields a much smoother finish than planing. Is it due to the coarse grain nature of ash, or is there something wrong with my planing technique?

I was so please when I was finally able to plane curly maple. Very sharp blade with a right throat did the trick for me. However, no matter what I do, I can’t seem to plane quarter sawn sycamore... have tried tight throat, chip breaker right up close, lightest pass while still getting a shaving, and a higher plane angle. Am I missing something or is sycamore just too soft a wood?

Hi Rob, I have had some issues with a bade and chip breaker I purchased for my #8 Stanley. while trying to flatten my Maple bench I have significant tear out . should I regrind to a 65 degree setup and give it a shot?

Do you have a video explaining the high angle blade? Also is there any difference in sharpening the high angle blade?

hi rob would you prefer a no 5 or no 5 1/2 in terms of all rounder everything, but if you had smaller hands.

Hi. That is, to achieve an angle of 65 degrees, I simply grind the spare blade at an angle of 20 degrees, put it in the same way as in the plane low angle fax up. And how to fasten a chipbreaker? In a video with an angle of 65, you have a chipbreaker installed.

As a woodworker new to hand tools, I’ve struggled with figured grain. I just don’t seem to get the results I’m hoping for. I actually bought your plane based on your videos.. I do have a question. What do you mean when you say high angle? Because it looks like you’re using the same plane.

When you pull your plane back across the wood for the next stroke you can hear the scratching sound how does that benefit either the wood or the blade, I would think it would either scratch or compress the wood or round over the bottom of your plane blade.

I have to ask is your purpose for planing wood for surface preparation or for removing stock. When I pick up a plane I'm wanted to reduce the stock size by a fractional amount much as you would with a scrub plane or to take the twist out of a board. Am I missing some here?

Hi Rob, and thanks for another great video. Do you have anything on sharpening blades to different angles? I noticed you have 45 and 65 in this video. I only sharpen mine to 30/25. Thank you.

Does the speed of the travel of the plane make a difference? I like using an Aussie timber called Southern Silky Oak (Grevillea robusta) due to it's fine quilting and other usable qualities. That quilting can make it prone to tear-out. I was sharpening to 6000 but would end up with some tear-out now and then. I then bought a Shapton 16000. Using the same blade sharpened so as to provide an attack angle of 62 degrees I rarely get tear-out. Sharp wins! It's not a sales gimmick.

I might be a little confused. I thought you had to put a high angle frog in a bailey type plane (isn't that what you were using?) in order to get a higher angle setup for wood susceptible to tearout. In your video you changed irons to do this.. How is that done? Thanks.

Does WoodRiver offer different frog pitches (e.g. york, etc.)?

Did you change the depth adjuster knob on your plane?

Would it matter on the white oak if you angled the plane more to more of a skew?

Rob, I like to finish all show surfaces by planing, and when tear out occurs, I first try skewing the plane for a shearing action, and if this proves unsuccessful, I finish with a card scraper or scraper plane. Suprised you didn't mention these techniques.

Please try White Ash! I'm continually having a difficult time planing Ash without causing tear out. Thank you!

Hello Rob I don't get why the close set cap iron isn't an option, since it's not exactly doing any terrible modifications to the plane. Have you issue with honing your cap iron to 50 degrees ? Good to know you can still have an open mouth with your IBC irons, I was thinking that they might have been too thick for it to work, and the plane choke up, so I'm quite confused why you choose not to utilize it? I'd never take the risk of not doing so, especially on camera! I gotta guess your dislike of the close set cap is just to demonstrate how well you can sharpen : ) All the best Tom

What kind of lubricating stick wax Rob is using?

For the high angle setup, did you just do a 10-15 degree bevel on the blade?

Did you simply change the frog to get a 65 degree or do you have a dedicated high angle plane?

Not forgetting the old trick of wetting the surface of the wood slightly. Not a brilliant method, steel vs water being an issue, but it worked reasonably well when machine planing and thicknessing gnarly timbers.

You briefly mentioned, but didn’t show (probably because you got it done with the plane) how a scraper might have fixed the tear out. Were you thinking about a simple flat scraper or something more involved, like a lie Nielsen scraper plane? Would a simple flat scraper and possibly changing direction in the middle of the board work?

What is the type of wax Rob using?

I would like to see how a low angle bench plane compares on those same pieces of wood

What I learned here was that the most effective way to avoid tearout is to sharpen like Cosman. I can't sing like Pavarotti either.

A bit tangential, but looking at that piece of walnut there appears to be a lot of large pores. What would you use to fill those?

little confused on changing the angle on the blade from 45 to 65, i kinda thought you would have to change the frog bed angle with bevel down plane , does the change take place on the micro bevel?

What kind of wax do you use and where do we find it?

Where did you get Birdseye stock that size?

What I'm hearing you say here Rob is that I need to buy a high angle smoothing plane in addition to my standard angle smoother.

sorry, i know this question is kind of hard to answer but i really need a master's opinion on thing like this because it is kind of hard to choose.

Maybe something is missing: I found iroko to be a bad ass to plane, always dealing with curly grain and never got rid of tear out...

I found that I had small tear outs with African Mahogany but they tore out a lot. It seemed easier to plane it sideways.

Brill simply Brill

Who makes wooden tool boxes?

Looks like you found the only straight grained piece of purple heart on the planet!! Stuff is a nightmare to work with lol

Understanding the Grain: 1:58 Planing with and against the grain: 4:48 Birdseye Maple Test: 6:08 Clario Walnut Test: 9:53 White Oak Test: 13:20 Purple Heart Test: 18:47

What do scrubs do that do not posses a power plane and need to plane before the surface finish and only get the cheap wood with grain going its own way.

You should try japanese planes

Thanks for another great video, Rob. You mentioned the chipbreaker position - of course your experience is it's own authority on the matter, but I do want to share the below video of extreme close up footage of several chipbreaker geometries and positions to see how it affects the shaving. There is undeniably a big effect, but how it affects the work is up to the craftsman to decide, I'd say. vimeo.com/158558759

I have a plank of Bolivian Rosewood, no matter what I try the tear out is awful.

now I know what Im doing to make tear out not ribons. If you could show a better way to deal with knots please.

Interesting that Rob wasn't a fan of placing the cap iron tight to the edge of the blade, as advocated by several other experts who claim this cures tear-out without the need for high angle blades. If the experts disagree, what hope is there for the rest of us?

Can't remember if I sent you this before: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-pdk4uRYioZg.html It's a Japanese study done under microscope of the effects of different plane blade angles and chip breaker set when planing against the grain. Suprising how much difference it can make.