Bay Area Dave wrote in
m:

I was thinking about the difference between a jointer (powered) and a
plane. A jointer has the outfeed table level with the blade so that
as the work passes over the blade and onto the outfeed table, if the
operator uses good technique to keep the board flat on the outfeed
table, the board pretty much has to come out FLAT.

A hand plane on the other hand isn't built that way. It has a
projecting blade. So unless the sole of the plane is extraordinarily
long, how can you get a perfectly machined straight board? Just for
grins, I was using a tiny hand plane to plane the edge of a board and
found that no matter how hard I tried, the small plane "unflattened"
the straight edge I started with. The more passes, the worse it got.
How long of a plane do you need to get a perfectly flat result on say
a 2' board? a 6' board? Is it MOSTLY technique, or do you have to
have a reference straight edge and keep checking your work constantly
as you plane? OR do you just take a few light passes over an
essentially flat board to start with, and know that it is flat? In
other words, when I use the jointer, I KNOW it's flat. I don't have
to check it. Can I do the same thing with a plane, or do you have to
stop, eyeball it with a reference straight-edge, and then touch it up
an little here, a little there?

Lay it on me, WW gods!

dave


Read the sources listed below, but short of that:

- jointer planes run 22" to 24" long, generally;

- you can make nice, flat surfaces for joining with them and lots of
practice;

- you can use the edge of the plane as your straightedge while planing;

- there are some tricks to creating joinable board edges (e.g., jointing
both boards at once to remove one variable in the process).



--
John Snow
"If I knew what I was doing, I wouldn't be here"