Tuesday, May 12, 2009

PHILLY STYLE

Fine Wooden Planes made in England

I'm getting geared up to start production of an Exterior Wooden Door for a client here in Toronto. The house is located in the historic neighbourhood of Cabbagetown and is declared a Heritage Property.
The existing door was put on about 25 years ago, so I'm building a replica of the original. It will be made of 8/4 Quarter-Sawn White Oak and to keep it true to the local history when it was originally made a century ago, I'm building it using only hand tools.
The carcass is a straight forward frame and panel design with some interesting moulding details. In order to reproduce these mouldings I've ordered four pairs of hollows and rounds from Phil Edwards in Broadstone, Dorset.
Phil is craftsman, musician and clearly a hand tool enthusiast; during his process of manufacturing my planes he's sent me a photo of the progress. I'm looking forward to getting my hands on them and taking some fine shavings...
Stay tuned.

6 comments:

  1. You had purchased some hollows and rounds in an earlier post. Why did you decide to purchase these new sets?

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  2. The hollows and rounds I had are still in my tool cabinet and are still used for small scale work like drawer pulls and the like. The iron is a little brittle in them and usually needs some fussing over...that said they were very inexpensive and have worked out quite well for small cabinet work applications. For the larger scale door mouldings I'll be making, I've decided to upgrade to a larger/heavier wooden body plane- more traditional style I suppose. Also, the small Japanese style moulding planes I have are not all that comfortable for working on anything longer than say 12". (at least this is what my hands tell me)
    That said...
    I'm looking forward to the new Philly Planes, besides...can you ever really have enough hand tools!
    Thanks for the question.
    Cheers!

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  3. Phil has made me a half set this year - wonderful tools. You will enjoy.

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  4. Thanks so much for the comment Steve...Any thoughts on this business of non-tapered irons being difficult to set-up? A visitor to my sister-site www.workingwood.ca posted a note about this...
    I suppose I'll find out soon enough and share what I can with everyone.

    Cheers!

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  5. Hi Tom. These are my first wedged planes so I can't compare, but I've been pleasantly surprised at how easy they are to set up, and what a delight to use.
    So much so that, in spite of having a 778 which works just fine, I've already asked Phil to make a moving Phillyster for me.

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  6. 'Phillyster' eh.?

    Perfect!

    Thanks for the feedback.

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