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I use a Veritas bevel- up jack plane. With a well sharpened iron on a good quality top, and good technique, it produces fine fluffy ribbons and great fun that I look forward to. [

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I use a Veritas bevel- up jack plane. With a well sharpened iron on a good quality top, and good technique, it produces fine fluffy ribbons and great fun that I look forward to.


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Several reasons I'm wanting to go this direction. Superior gluing surface, a chatoyance/sheen you can't achieve any other way. Not sure if chatoyance adds anything under finish but I'd like to find out.

20 years ago I built a small end table with a walnut top about 24" by 16". I was able to smooth the top with my new hand made wooden plane without any sand paper. I had just read James Krenow's book and made the plane from his plans. It was beautiful but looked the same, when finished, as a similar top sanded down to 600 grit.

Ove the years I have turned many bowls and lided boxes on my lathe and sanded up to 1000 and 2000 grit to remove all scratches. Fine sand paper is as good as the plane blade. How fine depends, I guess, on your eyes.

I would disagree with your overall sentiments. I think a lot of it depends on the type of finish, wood etc. If you use a film finish you want a flat surface and sanding works well for that. It may have "looked" the same but it certainly doesn't feel the same. And with slight scallops from the hand planing and open pores it catches the light differently. Surfaces have a shimmer. If you bury it under finish then of course you will lose that. For most table tops and tops of guitar tops I would sand or scrape to even things out and to provide tooth for certain finishes or sand finer for certain finishes.
To proclaim that sanding is "just as good" does hand planing a disservice and dismisses it without telling the story. Different methods have different uses and validaties.
I don't mean this in a snarky way but 1 small table 20 years ago is a small sample size and your first effort. I have seen many, many pieces of furniture displaying beautiful hand planned surfaces that wouldn't look the same sanded. It is not appropriate for all styles or pieces though.
One thing hand planning does is it gets through the compression wood caused by machine jointing, planning, and some drum sanders. A lot of time if you just sand you get down to a flat surface you leave some of the wood that is compressed. The rows of compressed wood you see on a lot of mill work is what I am talking about. It will look like it is gone with some sanding but will reappear when the wood gets exposed so some humidity. Raising the grain with a damp cloth is a good idea. When you hand plane you can see and feel when you get past this compression wood.
Hand planing is an art but I would say that sanding is as well. I digress.
L

Also, working to flatten your plane sole makes limited improvements to your work.

I only report what I have noticed. No opinion.

Fine sand paper is as good as the plane blade.

Also, working to flatten your plane sole makes limited improvements to your work.

Link, I believe the issue is one of context, with the comments you quoted. And so it is to whole hog call it "false information". Context matters.

There are no lack of situations where fine sandpaper is indistinguishable to a planed finish. And maybe in some circumstances, better in certain ways. Then there are circumstances where a planed wood finish is preferred, et cetera. It matters on the circumstance, and then frankly to a level of "who gives a hoot" detail. In the world of craft, my experience has been that people like to hyperfocus on minutiae "this is better than that" discussions. YMMV ...

As an example, maybe, I prefer planed finishes for joining tops. Lots of people use sandpaper for this. I prefer the precision of the plane, along with a sense that the glue-up is stronger (no proof on my part) than a sanded surface where fibers can be crushed and pores filled with dust. The aforementioned is conjecture on my part ... and likely navel gazing.

Precision doesn't matter until it matters. Hopefully one will find out when it matters to them .

Andy

This is a baseline issue - Link's right, but the other guy is too, given the differences in the likely experience baselines re: hand plane use. Link probably knew how to use a plane before he did a couple years with Jim Krenov at College of the Redwoods, which was one of two seriously challenging, hand-tool focused cabinetmaking programs in the country back in the 1970's and early 1980's. The other gent IIRC from your earlier note learned from reading books and trial-and-error. Van Cleave has a couple decades of messing around making a living with hand planes as a custom furniture maker. Not sure about the other guy, but you can see the baseline issue, right? Link's probably dealt with planes like that #3 I had you work up the first month you were in the shop. Remember I made you do the blade and CB first, then try to work a couple different sticks? Recall that you kept setting the blade too shallow to cut, but as soon as you set it just a bit deeper, it took a thick chip and tore everything out. Also recall that once we started leveling the sole, we found a big hollow area in front of the mouth...that hollow is one of those things that you can;t believe can make that much difference until you encounter the problem, but once you do, you get why the toe, the area in front of the blade, and the heel all need to be in the same plane. Link understands the issue because he's had the problem - it's on his list of 'absolutely, positively matters' stuff, while the other gent may not have seen that particular issue...especially with if his baseline does not include vintage Stanleys or wood planes, because most of the modern stuff from LN, LV, or other higher end plane makers comes with that particular problem taken care of with sole that is flat to half a thou.

John says it better - you don't know what you don't know. See you Fr

Don't mean to pick on you but you shouldn't make these statements with a broad brush that are completely untrue. If your plane sole is already flat I would agree with you but if it isn't then it needs work, how much depends on how out it is.
A flat sole is critical on a jointer plane. For a shorter plane not as critical but if your sole is concave you won't do to well and if convex not so great either. If you have a bump or hump in the sole behind the blade no go. Just to head this off the wave on a Japanese plane is essentially flat, you just have 3 points to bring into plane with each other but once on the wood it is like a flat sole with less resistance. All the technique in the world won't overcome a poorly tuned plane.




What I have noticed is that those look like opinions to me but it really doesn't matter, IMO you are spreading false information.
Sorry to be so blunt but with bad info folks can go down a wrong road and make things hard for themselves.
L.