Router Plane - No money for Veritas/LN!

Very cool….I have a number of old allen wrenches laying around, I may just give this a try.

-- Greg - Charles Town, WV

Good job, Jeff. This is a clever use of an allen wrench. I am sure a lot of us have old ones lying around that could be transformed into a useful tool such as this.

Well done.

-- With God's help all things are possible- even woodworking. Woodworking is not just a hobby, it is an (expletive deleted) expensive hobby.

Hey that looks great! Nice job.

-- Eric at http://adventuresinwoodworking.com

wonderful idea….thanks for sharing

-- Dusty56@comcast.net

Outstanding. I love homemade tools, and jigs.

-- Bill from Lithia Springs, GA I love the smell of sawdust in the morning.

Sweet.

-- We must guard our enthusiasm as we would our life - James Krenov

Very nicely done, Jeff! Save those big bucks for your family.

It is also a very good use for scrap wood. I have some walnut and hard maple scraps too small for a regular project that are just looking to be used. I also have an old 7/16” and 1/2” allen wrenches that would make good “blades” so I can use them on larger dadoes I usually cut.

God Bless,
Hawg

-- Saving barnwood from the scrapyards

Look out LN, very nice.
And it does the job, great work!

-- Ed Collinge- Edmonds, WA.

I wish I had seen this 2 days ago, I just bought a Veritas – Nice use of the Allen wrench

-- Tony - All things are possible, just some things are more difficult than others! - SKYPE: Heron2005 (http://www.poydatjatuolit.fi)

Very inventive! I wish I would have thought of that…

-- There's no tool like an old tool...

Necessity is the mother of invention, and so is the cost of things

-- WoodChucker, Sherwood Park, Alberta

Beauty!

always,
J.C.

-- "Imagination is more important than knowledge" -- Albert Einstein

That’s pretty nice! How well does it work?

-- Gary, East TX -- The longest journey begins with a single step.

Nice work. It shouldn’t dull that quickly (being tool steel) so I’m guessing that you lost the temper by heating it too much when grinding.

Take out the blade, and heat it to a dull orange colour, then submerse it in used motor oil to cool it, then re-sharpen (slowly :) )

Should restore the hardness and make it keep it’s edge.

Ryan

-- If you can't set a good example, at least serve as a horrible warning... www.rarewoodcreations.com

Gary: I can’t really give a comparison of function compared to the commercial planes as I haven’t used one. It does what I needed it for in that it cleaned up grooves and such smoothly. I’d be amazed if a commercial iron didn’t hold it’s edge much longer, but I’m satisfied with this set up. I cleaned up three shelves worth of dadoes (7’ to 8’) before I felt it needed sharpening. That length will get me through most projects without having to stop to hone.

-- Jeff, South Carolina

Ryan: You’re probably right. I did keep a cup of water on hand to cool it a few times during grinding. I heated the steel initially, but couldn’t get enough heat to get it the red color needed to make it hard. I’ll have to pick up a torch or make a coffee can type furnace. I tried to use some of the gel sterno I had in my emergency kit. I was pretty sure that wasn’t going to work before I started but gave it a shot. I’ve also read that a heating and gradually cooling in a toaster oven is a good idea after the initial heating and rapid cooling. Not much of a blacksmith, though.

-- Jeff, South Carolina

Uhhh, Cool? What does it do?

-- Kalamazoo, MI

I’m lazy this morning check the following link. http://www.fine-tools.com/G307867a.html

-- We must guard our enthusiasm as we would our life - James Krenov

VERY COOL!!... I’ve been looking at buying one of these but I haven’t because of the $$. This came at a perfect time, Great post!! Thanks!

-- As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another. (Proverbs 27:17)

http://www.leevalley.com/wood/page.aspx?c=2&p=52609&cat=1,41182,48945

I think the LV replacement blade is $12.

Would the LV blade fit the plane you built?

I’m thinking of buying the blade and building the router like you did.

Great work.

Thanks you just saved me some $$$’s. What size allen wrench did you use? Great post

-- Only the Shadow knows....................

The LN blade is about twice as much, but might be easier to work with….

http://www.craftsmanstudio.com/html_p/A371.htm

-- We must guard our enthusiasm as we would our life - James Krenov

WOOHOO! Just got an email from Woodsmith. They bought the tip/design. Wonder if I should’ve posted this??? I hadn’t tried submitting things to mag’s before this, might try again in the near future. Extra gas money couldn’t hurt.

-- Jeff, South Carolina

thats really cool. i’ve had my eye on those for a while but there is no way i can justify spending the amount of money they ask for one on it. i think this might be a good project someday. thanks for the post.

Jeff, great idea! Congratulations on the Woodsmith deal. Do you know if/when that will be published? I’ll have to watch for it. Good Job!

-- Martin, Kansas

Well done sir.

I love it!

-- Dust collectors suck.

As Jon Lovitz used to say, “That’s the ticket!”

No idea about when/if it will make the magazine. They are sending the paperwork. I just got the email saying to expect it and cashing the check means I accept their terms. I’d imagine they buy many things and see what is popular at the time. Router planes seem to be popular lately and are being marketed strong at the moment, which was kind of my thinking behind sending it in. Don’t even know how much $ it is. The magazine says, “up to $200”. Could be a lot of Walnut, could be a night at McDonalds. Crossing my fingers.

-- Jeff, South Carolina

A very clever use of an allen key. Thanks for the thought provoking post.

-- ....next big purchase is wood for the next project, Mark

That is sweet. Good for you, and quite clever also.

Have you tried honing it while the blade is in the holder to achieve parallelism? I was thinking some kind of sled for the wood to slide on with sandpaper or a stone in-between. Maybe just two strips of flexible cutting board plastic placed on a stone.

-- Stevethepeeve -- I'm no rocket surgeon

nice job…

-- making sawdust....

Steve: You’re dead on in what I finally did. I put strips of various grits of sandpaper in the miter slot of my bandsaw. I got it pretty close on the grinder, but the slot got it perfect. I’m hoping that the walnut proves to be tough enough to not give after a lot of use. I would imagine hard maple or an exotic like cocobolo would be stronger, but it might be a moot point.

-- Jeff, South Carolina

Router planes are among my favourite tools, being something of a galoot; I have a Record 71 and a 722, both beng superb. You have done something great here, building a tool that looks good, meets your needs entirely and is a great project in itself. Try e-bay for Stanley and Record irons; if you find one then build the next plane around it.

-- Stanley generally struggling

Superb use of the inventivenss of the mind. In other words great idea. mike

-- Mike. Profisher50@yahoo.com

Jeff, I was reading down the list of commentings and thinking to myself, “he should submit this to one of the mags, they would love it” I got to the bottom of the list and whaddaya know? Congrats and I look forward to hearing how that process works for you. I have an old Stanley that I got on ebay, but I like the small sized LN that you modelled this after. I’m going to give this a try.

-- Check out my new blog "The Renaissance Woodworker" at www.rogersfinewoodworking.com/blog

Neat!

-- Dorje (pronounced "door-jay"), Seattle, WA

It must be pretty good to cut that dado in that cast iron table !!!! just kiding. Nice job.

Go get ‘em, partner! Saved seventy bucks on a tool and getting paid to share the idea and get published. Not a bad day’s labor.

-- "Bordnerizing" perfectly good lumber for over a decade.

Just got the payment from WoodSmith/ShopNotes. If anyone was curious, they paid $100 (Woodsmith) for this design and $150 (ShopNotes) for my tablesaw safety stop. Not sure how they determine how much each warrants. Both are the same publisher and the same assistant editor handled both for each of their magazines. Gotta figure out what lumber to get.

-- Jeff, South Carolina

Very nice. I’m in a cherry mood. Shaker tool cabinet perhaps. : ^ )

-- We must guard our enthusiasm as we would our life - James Krenov

hey USCjeff. working on one of these now. have any advice?

Just sent you a private message Teenage. Thanks.

-- Jeff, South Carolina

Hi Everyone,

It’s strange that I stumbled across this on an unrelated search because I am currently in the process of building a router plane similar to this one.

For anyone that is interested there is a similar router plane using the same allen wrench concept included in the August 2005 (Issue #149) issue of Popular Woodworking. It’s titled as ”$5 Router Plane” and starts on page 72. The router plane itself is basically a clone of an E.C. Emmerich and is also heavily inspired by a Record No. 71.

The magazine suggest using a thumb screw that has been drilled out and filed to match the hex shape of the wrench. I like Jeff’s idea of the threaded insert a whole lot better.

Great job Jeff!

I’ll have to get that back issue. The idea more or less came from a more involved design in a jig/shop made tool book. I think it was by Nick Engler if I remember correctly. He used a round clear plastic base. It looked to have a 4-6” diam. by the photo. That design suggested ordering an iron for the shop made plane. The irons all look like allen wrenches so the jump from buying to making really wasn’t that profound. I’ve actually not used it much so far. It’s definitely a specialty thing for limited tasks.

-- Jeff, South Carolina

Jeff,

Now that you say that I have another magazine somewhere that has one using a clear acrylic base. I remember it being a combination article that also talked about making a scratch stock. Now I’m curious and I’ll have to dig that out too.

If you can’t get the article let me know and I would be happy pass along the information to you. Here is a link to the author of the article. Looks like he mostly deals in Shaker oval boxes.