How to Use a Two Handled Wood Planer Draw Knife

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These once-standard tools have a place in the modernistic shop.

When the last grains of sand run through my hourglass, I know how I want to check out. I desire to drop on the shop floor in the centre of a project. The mortician will have to pry my woodworking machines out of the cold dead fingers of my left paw. He will then take to pry my hand tools out of the cold expressionless fingers of my right. The last two tools he will wrest from my grasp will exist my drawknife and my wooden spokeshave. I am and then dependent on these ii tools, that I am certain when that final moment comes, they will be in my hands.

Traditional tools. Drawknives and spokeshaves used to be standard in any toolbox – often in multiple sizes. And they're still useful today. Equally the proper noun implies, the drawknife (pictured superlative) is used on the pull stroke. A spokeshave (shown at above) is commonly pushed, but on straight-grained wood can be pulled.

Early records show that a drawknife and a spokeshave were in every woodworker'south kit. In fact, these guys often owned more than than one. Why? These are two of woodworking'south most useful tools. Today's woodworkers will benefit as much from them every bit did the old guys. I am writing about the two tools together because that is how they are frequently used – together.

As its proper name implies, the drawknife is a knife that is used on the pull stroke. Using 2 easily provides a lot more control. Pulling with arm, shoulder, back and leg muscles places a great bargain of force behind the blade. An experienced user can slice a shaving every bit thick equally his pollex, or cut one as fine as a human hair. This ways a drawknife can attain quick stock removal, fine work and everything in betwixt.

Old Tools Grow

A versatile tool. Taking a hair's breadth off a workpiece is quick piece of work for a drawknife – equally is heavy stock removal, and anything in between.

The problem for today'south woodworker is to notice a good drawknife. Many sold in stores and catalogs will non generally piece of work. The reason is simple. The tool is supposed to be a knife, just toolmakers insist on grinding their drawknives like a chisel. A 45° bezel won't work any ameliorate on a drawknife than information technology would on a knife.

Bad grind. The modern drawknife on acme in the picture above is ground with a chisel edge, which severely limits its usefulness. Expect for ane with a knife border (they're easy to find on eBay and on old-tool web sites).

Happily, our predecessors bought scads of drawknives back when toolmakers still knew what they were doing, and many of them are still effectually. Yous should have no trouble finding a good knife on eBay or from former-tool dealer spider web sites. Look for one with tight handles, that has not been beat, or ground down to nix. Drawknives were made with cutting edges more than a foot long or every bit brusk as 4″. An eight″ to ten″ pocketknife is the correct size for near piece of work.

Go a Grip on your Drawknife

Get a grip. In that location are many unlike ways to grip a drawknife, depending on your goal. How yous hold the knife is a function of your work.

When choosing a knife, don't be tempted by the ones with folding handles. They look nice, but leave them for the collectors. The extra length created past the hinge places the handle as well far away from the edge. You cede control. Drop handles cause a similar problem. They lower your hands out of the plane of the cutting, sacrificing ability.

A drawknife's handles are misleading. They suggest that y'all hold a drawknife similar y'all did the handlebars on your tricycle. In fact, how you hold a knife is a function of the work, and a straight grip on the handles is only one of many possibilities. A drawknife is ofttimes used on terminate grain. Then, y'all have to asphyxiate upwards on the command handle (the correct paw if y'all are right-handed). Sometimes I hold the bract vertical, then my right hand holds the handle with an overhand grip. The important point is to non get locked into a misperception and be limited by information technology.

I tell students that a drawknife is a slicing tool, not a two-handled hatchet. This ways y'all do not apply it by hacking. My illustration is a butcher cut meat. He starts close to the handle and makes a slicing stroke that ends with the betoken of the blade. The result is a make clean, piece of cake cutting. So too with a drawknife. Start the cut shut to your control hand. Lift the bract ever and then slightly to create some clearance behind the cutting edge and to engage it. As you pull the knife, make a slicing cut that ends up at the far end of the blade. The closer you are to cease grain, the shorter the radius of the slicing arc.

Besides an piece of cake, glassy smoothen cut, using the knife this way has other benefits. Past slicing, you lot distribute the cutting action forth the entire cutting edge, and it will stay abrupt longer. Pulling directly toward yourself, or hacking as with a hatchet, places the clothing all in i spot on the bract. This surface area becomes dull faster, and you will eventually develop a hollow in the cutting border.

Once you empathize how a drawknife cuts, y'all volition understand the flaw behind a mutual misconception. Some woodworkers hold the knife upside downwardly. This position – with the bezel down – changes the cut action. You have created a high-angle cut that will not slice. To meliorate understand, imagine dent with a chisel. Yous identify the bezel upwardly, raise the handle slightly to create clearance, and cut with a slicing activity. Consider what kind of cut you will get if yous attempt to peel with the bezel down, and how much control you will accept in this position.

Unclean cut. If you hold the knife upside downwardly, the bending of the blade is college and you're likely to go a crumply shaving and crude surface.

The guys who use a drawknife this mode argue they have more control. They fault a limited cut for control. In accepting the limited cut they sacrifice the drawknife'due south most important feature: its power to remove wood fast. Furthermore, the higher cutting bending will not cut equally cleanly and information technology creates more friction, which dulls the edge faster. I liken using a drawknife upside down to grooming wheels on a bicycle. If you only know how to ride with preparation wheels, you error them for command considering you don't autumn. Better to have a few spills and acquire how to really ride. So, you lot truly take control.

Sharpening

Flat lesser. Although the bract should exist ground with a knife edge, the back of the drawknife should be flat, like a chisel.

A drawknife will eventually need to be sharpened. In fact, if you buy an old ane, it will need some work earlier y'all can utilize information technology. Never grind a knife-border tool. I sharpen my knives with sandpaper adhered to a wooden block. A drawknife edge is a special case, in that information technology is only 1 one-half a knife. The bottom of the blade is flat, equally on a chisel-edge tool. That is where I begin. Agree the block, or the stone, apartment on the surface and work back and forth. Be very careful not to enhance the block, equally this volition circular the edge, aggravating the very condition you are trying to correct.

Next, work the bezel, or upper surface of the edge. This surface is curved like your pocket knife. If you piece of work but the cutting edge, yous will gradually increase the angle and reduce the tool'southward ability to slice hands and cleanly. So while honing this surface, be sure to gradually lower the block so y'all are dressing the unabridged bend, rather than just the edge. In other words, do not just sharpen the blade. You as well accept to maintain the curve's original shape.

Dress all surfaces. Brand sure you dress the entire curve on the forepart of the blade to maintain its original shape. Don't just wearing apparel the border, or the angle will gradually increase.

Work the lower surface and the upper bend through several grits. It is non necessary to create an border every bit abrupt every bit on a chisel or plane blade, but information technology causes no harm.

A give-and-take of safety about drawknives: The tool has an open up, unprotected cutting edge. I hang mine on a wall.

This protects the tool and me. If you store the tool in a drawer or tool box, wrap or cover the edge. Otherwise, it can give y'all a real nasty bite when you reach in for the tool.

Spokeshave

The spokeshave unremarkably cleans upward afterward the drawknife and brings your piece of work downward to the line. The tool will create a finished surface, or one that requires merely a calorie-free sanding. The deviation in the two tools is that while the drawknife tin also make fine cuts, the spokeshave cannot do heavy jobs. It is a lightweight tool intended for fine work.

When I use the term "spokeshave" I am referring to the blazon with a wooden body. While the metal-bodied version has the same name, information technology works in a very different mode, and nowhere near every bit well. Take a minute to expect at the two tools. The wooden shave'south cutter is shut to parallel with the sole and the bezel is placed up. It is the same configuration every bit the drawknife. The metallic version's cutter is bedded at 45°, with its bezel downwards, in the same configuration as a airplane and a drawknife used upside down. The wooden version's cutting angle is much lower, making it a true shave. This lower cut angle is the reason the tool works and so well on end grain, and cuts so effortlessly with the grain.

While you may have to hunt to notice a skilful drawknife, wooden-bodied spokeshaves are readily available. They are not mass produced and do not prove up in catalogs. Rather, they are fabricated past private tool makers, and have to be purchased from their web sites. About of these shaves are equally expert every bit whatsoever shaves made in the past. My shaves were all made by Dave Wachnicki of Dave'southward Shaves.

There is another advantage in dealing with these individual makers. In the past, common-grade shaves were fabricated of beech. Best grade were boxwood. Neither is a particularly pretty wood. Today'due south shave makers work with highly figured woods, and their shaves tin be spectacular. If y'all own a small slice of really special wood, they are happy to make it into a shave for you.

Materials Matter

Some catalogs sell low-angled shaves with metallic bodies. I do not like these. Chatter is a spokeshave user's biggest trouble. A wooden trunk absorbs shock better than metal and reduces the tendency to chatter. I prefer to stick with wood.

Material difference. The difference is more than material between a wood-bodied and metal-bodied spokeshave. Observe the difference in cutting angles – when assembled, the wooden-torso'due south blade is close to parallel with the sole.

Like drawknives, shaves were once office of every woodworker's kit. Having a wooden body and a lightweight cutter, fewer of them take survived. Of those that have, a large percent are worn out. Because shaves clothing quickly, I strongly recommend you lot not use an old shave. Put it on brandish equally an artifact, only spare information technology. You lot'll be real happy with a new 1.

While you can manage very well with just one drawknife, you will find that the more familiar you become with wooden shaves, the more of them y'all will want to own. I have well-nigh a dozen. Information technology is more efficient to dedicate a shave for a certain chore. The more than jobs, the more shaves.

Multiples. Information technology's hard to cease at just ane spokeshave; multiples allow you to dedicate specific tools to specific jobs.

Spokeshave Setup

Tricky setup. Fix the blade and so that it'southward a flake higher on one side; that style, by moving the tool left and right, you take every setting you demand without irresolute the tool'south setup.

Unlike a drawknife, you have to set up a spokeshave. Most of today's shaves have a superlative adjustment, which allows you to set the tool without removing the cutter. Adjustment is commonly made by turning a small Allen screw. If not, yous volition have to examine the tool to run into how it is adjusted. The trick in setup is to cock the bract so it is higher on one side than the other. In this configuration, you take every setting you need. When you desire to take a very light cut, move to the shallow side of the blade. To make a deep cut, move to the deep end. Much of your work will be done with the medium setting in the middle.

The drawknife is designed to be pulled. A spokeshave can be pushed or pulled, depending on the job. Even so, 90 percent of the fourth dimension, the tool is pushed. The only time it tin be effectively pulled is when whittling very straight-grained wood. An instance would be Windsor chair spindles.

A shave is a very lightweight tool. Dissimilar a much heavier bench plane, gravity is not giving you any aid. You provide all the strength needed to appoint the cutting border. Without sufficient pressure, the tool volition either skate or chatter. When pulling a shave, the tool is controlled by your wrists, and any downward pressure is provided past your shoulders, way out at the far ends of your extended arms. This is sufficient when whittling, every bit little weight is required to engage the cut edge.

However, most of the work you do with a shave is shaping, which involves cutting beyond grain. In this case, the muscles involved in pulling a shave are inadequate. When you push a shave, y'all can utilise weight from your upper body down onto the tool. It is your weight that keeps the edge engaged and cutting.

Proper Handling

Like the drawknife, the spokeshave's body seems to propose you lot grip information technology in your hands by the handles. In reality, yous pinch a spokeshave in the center of its stock with your fingers. The only divergence in your grip when whittling and shaping is the position of your thumb. When pushing, place the thumb of your control hand low on the stock, close to the cutter. Your thumb provides forward forcefulness behind the cutter, while your shoulders provide weight over it. The outcome is a clean cut with picayune or no chatter.

A spokeshave'south low cutting angle can make it a claiming for the first-time user to engage the cutting edge. Apply this play tricks: Lay the tool on the flat of its blade. Stone information technology forward until it is now resting on its cutting edge and the sole's front corner. That'south the placement. You lot're set to cut.

Proper stroke. A spokeshave is, ninety percent of the time, used on the push stroke. Even so, if you take a straight-grained workpiece such as a chair spindle, it can be pulled effectively.

Similar all other edge tools, a spokeshave works best when its cutter is slightly askew, rather than being worked straight on. When you work stop grain, all the downward force you tin can muster however may non prevent chatter.

In a pinch. The handles advise that ane grip the shave by the handles. Still, more than control is gained past pinching information technology in the middle.

Attempt increasing the amount of skew. If this doesn't work, try skewing the blade in the other direction. In woods with a pronounced difference in early on and belatedly wood, such as pine and oak, what appears every bit chatter may actually be washboarding. The border cuts easily through the softer growth and rides upwardly over the harder.

Cheap sharpening jig. A slice of sandpaper stuck on a minor slice of wood is perfect for removing any rounding in the bract. Merely this is a time consuming method.

Each pass makes the situation worse. When you lot skew the blade in the other management y'all run the cutter across several layers of growth and the hard office of several annual rings is shaved along with the softer.

Sharpening

Training. Gear up the shave flat on your work, and so identify your thumb in the curve to slightly increase the angle; that's the correct angle for employ.

A spokeshave cutter is pocket-size, so it sharpens pretty readily. The problem is that beingness small, information technology'due south hard to hold. I start by lapping the flat bottom. Check the edge in adept light to be sure you accept removed fifty-fifty the almost microscopic rounding acquired past wear.

Now, hone the bezel. I use a piece of fine sandpaper adhered to a strip of forest about the size of a tongue depressor. The trouble is to avoid changing the bezel bending with repeated honings.

Hollow grind. Cutters with hollow-ground bottoms make sharpening fast – only two narrow strips of metal have to exist dressed rather than the entire blade surface.

This is a lot of piece of work to do with a minor strip of wood. I recently acquired a Work Precipitous. This arrangement has fabricated the process a piece of cake. Information technology apace flattens the cutter and dresses the bezel. I repeat the procedure through several papers and my shave will cut translucent cease-grain shavings.

Piece of work Sharp. A more expensive – simply easier-to- handle – blade sharpening method is the Work Precipitous.

I accept refitted almost of my shaves with hollow ground cutters from Woodjoy Tools. These cutters have a hollow bottom that speeds up sharpening even more. I merely have to flatten ii narrow strips of steel, rather than the entire surface.

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Source: https://www.popularwoodworking.com/tools/drawknives-spokeshaves/

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