Hand Plane Chatter

[johndelmore at suddenlink.net]

Hi TF:
You may get better results if you back off the breaker/cap iron a bit.  Planing "into the hole", as it were, may not give enough clearance with the mostly standard 1 mm.  Never used one of these (it's a beaut, btw, whatever others may think!), but it's (backing off the breaker) worked for me with other obstinate planes.  Obviously, you don't want to move it much...1/32 to 1/16 is a usually recommended range (0.79-1.58 mm).  Another, more radical, option would be to find a thicker blade.

John
---- Farrell <mfarrel2 at tampabay.rr.com> wrote: 
> Question for the wood chomping gurus out there.
> 
> I have a hand plane that has a propensity to "chatter" in use. Picture of it is below. The reason the base looks as if it is curved is because it is curved. That's the whole deal with this plane - the base curvature is adjustable to any gentle curve - convex or concave. It's great for planing many wooden things found in piano bellies and jigs to make those things. But it can be a bear when the darn plane wants to chatter.
> 
> Obviously, the plane is not a 35 lb. forged steel heavyweight. It is a high quality German plane, but I think the adjustable base feature necessitates a lighter weight. I wonder if the chattering is simply related to it's light-weight design (relatively speaking - the plane is NOT really anything I would call light-weight).
> 
> The blade is sharp, the cap iron is mated nicely to the blade and adjusted about 1 mm from the blade edge. I think everything is in order. But the darn thing still chatters up a storm. Any ideas/suggestions?
> 
> 
> 
> BTW, I am trying to plane a curved caul, so I can't use a flat plane.
> 
> Terry Farrell
> Farrell Piano
> 
> www.farrellpiano.com
> terry at farrellpiano.com