Spiers Smoother Blade from M2 steel

[Basilg]

I have been fortunate to own a Spiers Smoother for a number of years but sadly the Iron has reached the end of its life as the back iron screw is fouling on the Rosewood infill. The simple solution would be to cut out a section of the infill But it would upset me to do so.

The chances of getting a replacement iron in good condition I suspect are very limited & I am therefore considering what other options there may be. One of these is to make one using the same method as the original by attaching a piece of hard steel, to a mild steel iron. I was thinking of forming the iron from mild steel which would be simple to do, then soldering or brazing a piece of M2 steel onto the iron. Would anyone be able to advise what effect this may have on the hardness or temper of the M2.

Regards

[lightwood]

I have been fortunate to own a Spiers Smoother for a number of years but sadly the Iron has reached the end of its life as the back iron screw is fouling on the Rosewood infill. The simple solution would be to cut out a section of the infill But it would upset me to do so.

The chances of getting a replacement iron in good condition I suspect are very limited & I am therefore considering what other options there may be. One of these is to make one using the same method as the original by attaching a piece of hard steel, to a mild steel iron. I was thinking of forming the iron from mild steel which would be simple to do, then soldering or brazing a piece of M2 steel onto the iron. Would anyone be able to advise what effect this may have on the hardness or temper of the M2.

Regards

Basilg,
The cutting iron may be too short to reach out through the mouth, but the back iron determines where the screw is located, and if too close to the throat will foul on the slot cut into rosewood and be held too far away from the edge of the cutter, independent of the blade.
Some woodie back irons just don't fit Infill planes.
The blade is too short when the hard steel is used up, or you have sharpened so much you have run into the slot for the screw....or the screw falls through the hole at the top of the blade.
Silver solder of HSS to extend the blade is no problem.
Old parallel blades to suit ( Mathieson etc.) do turn up at our tool sales, they usually sell for around $25.00 - $50.00

Regards,
Peter

[thumbsucker]

The heat will have no problem if the M2 is heat threat probably and is actually M2. I know the stuff that Mc Jing sells maybe HSS steel but it is nowhere as well as the M2 and heat treat we have used in our batch orders.

I had one long 12 mm wide chisel from the Chisel Order whose tang had broken during heat treating. I decided to grind the chisel down with an angle grinder and then to grid the tang into the end of the chisel. I blued the tang blue and black hoping to draw the temper from the tang. Having the tang softer would make it less it would less brittle and therefore less prone to snapping. Having tried my best to draw the temper on the tang. The tang was still rock hard. Testing the tang with a file was impossible as the file could not get a bite on the tang, it just skid all over the place. Indicating to me that the heat was unable to hurt the temper. So I will suspect, that soldering will not affect the M2.

How thick is your Spiers blade, I could add a custom blade for you if it will fit a 4 or 6 mm blade. If you supply all the dimensions in a drawing.

[Basilg]

How thick is your Spiers blade, I could add a custom blade for you if it will fit a 4 or 6 mm blade. If you supply all the dimensions in a drawing.

Helmut

Thanks very much, having the full blade in M2 will save me a lot of work, & the M2 steel will likely be as good if not better than the spiers cast steel blade.

Regards

[thumbsucker]

Give me until the weekend and I will have the drawings done for you.

[Basilg]

Peter

I still have around 15mm left on the iron before hitting the bottom of the slot and did try bringing the back iron back from the edge of the blade to clear the head of the screw, but then found the blade kept shifting back as I was trying to make a cut. I checked it out again today & what seems to be happening is, the front of the brass wedge is sitting on the wrong side of the hump in the back iron. looking at the back iron it has a bend of about 3mm which seems like a lot more than what I would have thought necessary.
Both the blade & back iron are stamped with the Spiers logo and a number 3 so I don't think they have been swapped. Would you know what the clearance usually is between the blade and the back iron under the crown of the hump.

regards

[lightwood]

Peter

I still have around 15mm left on the iron before hitting the bottom of the slot and did try bringing the back iron back from the edge of the blade to clear the head of the screw, but then found the blade kept shifting back as I was trying to make a cut. I checked it out again today & what seems to be happening is, the front of the brass wedge is sitting on the wrong side of the hump in the back iron. looking at the back iron it has a bend of about 3mm which seems like a lot more than what I would have thought necessary.
Both the blade & back iron are stamped with the Spiers logo and a number 3 so I don't think they have been swapped. Would you know what the clearance usually is between the blade and the back iron under the crown of the hump.

regards

Basilg,
The back iron should look like the pictures attached, and on the planes I just looked at there is a gap between 1 and 2mm max.
I also marked in red on the back iron where the front of the lever makes contact.
This plane is the one I know came right off a organ makers work bench onto mine.
Fincham organbuilders tools
I also measured a couple of back irons from the screw center to the front edge, they were mostly 2 3/4 inches on the original blade sets in planes, but a couple of narrow ones, and a couple with closed handles were different, some shorter and some longer.
Is it possible the back iron has been made shorter, so it can't reach down far enough without the screw fouling on the bottom of the slot in the frog?
I'm a little surprised the blade pushes out in use?? Is the leading edge of lever coming down nice and parallel to the back iron, and is that parallel to the blade?

Regards,
Peter

[thumbsucker]

Basilg I had a few minutes to draw up the blade for the Spiers and 50 mm and 60 mm skew. Have a look and if you are happy with them.

I am not familiar with skews but it would be important on which side the bevel was ground?

[Basilg]

Basilg I had a few minutes to draw up the blade for the Spiers and 50 mm and 60 mm skew. Have a look and if you are happy with them.

I am not familiar with skews but it would be important on which side the bevel was ground?

Helmut

Thanks very much the drawings look fine, I suggest a length of 200mm for the skew, with a bevel , of 25 degrees and 20 degree skew, on the side you are showing in the drawing.
A bevel on the reverse side would mean the force of the cut would be in the upward direction which would increase breakout and mean using greater force to hold down the workpiece. However, an iron with the reverse bevel would be useful for anyone wishing to make a lefthanded shooting board.

I am intending to make a wooden skew plane for a shooting board, with the blade bevel down with a pitch sub 40 degrees. I need to weigh up the conflicting issues of low pitch versus strength of the plane body in the heel of the plane, before I set this angle but I am thinking of 35 to 38 degrees. The skew of the blade will mean that it will produce a slicing cut pushing down and along the workpiece, which should minimise breakout on the edges with the work supported by the fence & the base of the shooting board.

If you are OK with organising these blades I may start another thread on the topic of making a wooden skew mitre plane

I think I will go for the 50mm blade

Regards

[thumbsucker]

A bevel on the reverse side would mean the force of the cut would be in the upward direction which would increase breakout and mean using greater force to hold down the workpiece. However, an iron with the reverse bevel would be useful for anyone wishing to make a lefthanded shooting board.

If that being the case we will need to give a left or right options for the bevels. I would prefer to offer only the 50 mm.

We are a while away from filling a sheet for the wooden hand planes. So hold off on a skew thread.

[Basilg]

Peter

Many thanks for the information, & congratulations on getting what looks like a very nice plane. Did you manage to get any of the other tools from that collection?

I have decide to give the plane a bit of a workover, as there were a few minor issues that I found, & thought it best eliminate those.
The sole was not perfectly flat so I polished this with wet & dry to 1000 grit. The back iron had a gap of 10 thou or so on one back corner so I have levelled this. The length of the back iron from the centre of the screw is a little over 2 3/4" so this should be OK. However, at the front of mine the curve is more pronounced, and there is no hard edge like the one that can be seen on your back iron. Additionally, the top surface of the back iron from one edge across to the other, has a slight convex curve. I suspect this may be the problem as the lever may be only sitting on a point formed by the two curves, and the plane seems OK when I removed the back iron & held the blade in position using a block under the lever screw. I will sharpen my files and level the top surface of the back iron and see how that works out.

Regards

[Basilg]

Peter

I have improved the top surface of the Back Iron and the plane now seems to be performing satisfactorily. I will try to improve things further as the Back Iron is about 0.4mm higher on one side.


Thanks again for your assistance
Regards

[RayG]

Just wondering, my understanding was(is) that tapered blades are intended for use with wedged planes (aka, your typical woodie) whereas planes with a lever cap type of holding mechanism are better if the blades are parallel, the advantage being that the mouth opening remains constant over time as the blade gets shorter through repeated sharpening.

The Spiers blade Peter shows in that picture is a tapered blade?

Obviously I am misunderstanding something here?

Of course it stands to reason that a tapered blade will work just fine, but mouth clearance is one of the critical dimensions for a smoother, and that's going to vary with a tapered blade.

On the other hand, a tapered blade in a plane with a wedged holding mechanism will wedge tighter ( not real sure about that), I'm guessing that a parallel blade (when wedged) would move more easily than a tapered blade which couldn't move down with out wedging tighter. Although it would back out more easily.

Anyone help out with my misconceptions?

Regards
Ray

[Basilg]

Ray

The blade in my plane is parallel. I can't say for certain whether the blade in Peters is parallel or not & it certainly appears to be tapered in the photo. However, this may be just the effect of the photographic image. Perhaps Peter could confirm this.

Whilst the blade is parallel on my plane in combination with the back iron a wedge shape is created & as long as the lever cap is sitting behind the hump on the back iron, and sitting flat on the top surface. It would take a great deal of force to push it back out of the plane. Both types of blade holding methods have been around for a long time, & I have both & find they both work well, and can't say that I would favour one over the other, as long as they are properly fitted.

Regards

[lightwood]

Just wondering, my understanding was(is) that tapered blades are intended for use with wedged planes (aka, your typical woodie) whereas planes with a lever cap type of holding mechanism are better if the blades are parallel, the advantage being that the mouth opening remains constant over time as the blade gets shorter through repeated sharpening.

The Spiers blade Peter shows in that picture is a tapered blade?

Obviously I am misunderstanding something here?

Of course it stands to reason that a tapered blade will work just fine, but mouth clearance is one of the critical dimensions for a smoother, and that's going to vary with a tapered blade.

On the other hand, a tapered blade in a plane with a wedged holding mechanism will wedge tighter ( not real sure about that), I'm guessing that a parallel blade (when wedged) would move more easily than a tapered blade which couldn't move down with out wedging tighter. Although it would back out more easily.

Anyone help out with my misconceptions?

Regards
Ray

Ray,
Well spotted!
The blade is slightly tapered from the edge 4.3mm to the end of the hard steel face just below the slot at 4.1mm, but then tapers quickly down to 3.7mm over about 20mm and is then parallel to the top of the blade, 3.7mm also. The bevel side of the blade is pretty flat on the straight edge, all the taper is on the top, logo side of the blade.
It has one of the tightest mouths on a smoother I have.
The blade, back iron, the infill and behind the lever cap are all stamped "5" and are original to the plane.
There are plenty of slight variations on Spiers planes, much more than the other two major makes, Mathieson and Norris.
The plane has the fattest handle of all Spiers smoothers I've ever seen, 30mm ( 1 3/16 inch)
Regards,
Peter