RWW 31: Sharpening a Curved Plane Iron

As a follow up to last week’s podcast on thicknessing a board by hand, I wanted to illustrate how I add a radical curve to my Scrub and Fore plane irons. I’ll walk through creating a template of the curves, roughing out the shape using sandpaper or a grinding wheel, then finally hone it to a mirror polish.

Remember these planes are used for rough work and don’t need to be as sharp as your smoothing plane so don’t agonize over the perfectly symmetrical curve or hone the bevel to 8000 grit. These irons will take a beating so should be honed to a 35 degree bevel at least so that the edge stands up to the pressure you will put it under.

I also drop a little edition of Tales from the Horde into this week’s episode and show off some beautiful spalted curly maple turning squares with which I am contemplating Mother’s day gifts.