Thursday, July 16, 2020

Making a small ovolo infill plane

Since I have returned to the blogosphere, I have been thinking about something new to blog about.
The projects that I have made the last year have been completed without any photographic evidence, so I might as well start something new to make out here.

We are currently in dry dry dock, and I haven't brought my tool set with me.
I could go out and use the tools in the carpenters shop, but where would the fun be in that?

Instead I have decided to try and make a small infill plane. We happen to have some sheet brass on board, and That should be a "heckuva" lot easier to work compared to my last infill plane which was made out of regular mild steel.

As I predicted when I completed the last infill plane, I haven't used it a single time since I made it. But that is because I have a nice Stanley Bedrock #4 that I use as my everyday plane at home.
I haven't got a functioning ovolo plane though, so merging an infill plane with a moulding plane should be a fun little experiment.

I drew a rough sketch which sort of gave me the overall measurements of the plane. It will hopefully end up being sort of 4.75" long and 1" wide. The height of the sides will be around 1.5"

First I marked the outline of the sides and the bottom on the sheet of brass, and then I used a hacksaw to saw them out. The sides were held together in the vice and filed to the same overall size.
The bottom just had one side filed smooth.

Using the smooth side of the bottom, I marked the two baselines for the dovetails, Doing it that way should in theory result in that any deviations in width will be on one side only, and I won't end up with a wedge shaped plane.

The brass is 4 mm thick which is pretty close to 5/32". in order to make sure that there will be enough material to peen, the pins will be 1/4" long.

I marked out for a half pin on each end of the bottom, and two full pins in between them. A bit of sawing followed by some drilling removed most of the waste. I started filing one end, but decided to stop for the evening instead of stretching it too far.
It feels good to be back at making something like that again!



Starting to file the waste away.

Dry mock up of the plane to be.

4 comments:

  1. Looking forward to seeing how this turns out, Jonas. I can't picture it yet.

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    1. Hi Jeff

      In my mind I have a pretty good idea about how it should end up looking, now the challenge is to make it look like that in real life too. :-)
      I'm sorry but I can't really describe it very accurately. Except for that it will be brass/bronze coloured on the outside, and that the infill most likely will be teak.

      Brgds
      Jonas

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  2. Interesting, but not sure how you are going to handle the sole shaping required for cutting an ovolo?? But I have no doubt, you already figured it out :-)

    Bob

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    Replies
    1. Hi Bob

      I have a couple of ideas for shaping the sole, but I am not sure if they will work though..
      The plan is to make the plane as a sprung type, so that you will hold it at an angle over the corner to be planed.
      If I had to make it as an unsprung type, I would need a much thicker sole, and then I am afraid that the plane would be too heavy and bulky to use.
      Brgds
      Jonas

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