Low angle bench planes, including the Stanley no. 62 and the Sargent no. 514 were bevel up, as are several models made today by Veritas. There is an advantage with bevel up irons in that the angle of the bevel can be changed to affect a change in the angle of cut.
Wood reacts to machining in observably repeatable ways. If we understand these ways and learn to recognize the conditions, our own success in working wood is repeatable as well. During planing operations, it is desirable for wood to be severed right at the cutting edge of the plane blade. It would seem obvious that this is happening.
Check the accuracy of your planing. Ideally, after you plane your wood, you'll have a smooth, flat surface that sits flush with any adjacent pieces of wood. Check your wood's flatness and smoothness by laying a straight edge along its surface.
• Fore planes have a sole that ranges from 14″ to 20″ long. The traditional (but by no means only) job of the fore plane is to remove material quickly. By virtue of its longish sole it also tends to straighten the wood to some degree. The fore plane is typically the first bench plane to touch the wood to get it to rough size.
A jack plane (or fore plane) is a general-purpose woodworking bench plane, used for dressing timber down to the correct size in preparation for truing and/or edge jointing. It is usually the first plane used on rough stock, but in exceptional cases can be preceded by the scrub plane.
Beginning woodworkers all ask this basic question; what is the difference between a jointer and a planer? The answer is simple, a lot! And is there such a thing as a jointer planer. No! Each machine does a completely different surfacing operation. A jointer flattens a face or straightens and squares an edge, and a planer thicknesses wood.
A hand plane is a tool for shaping wood using muscle power to force the cutting blade over the wood surface. Some rotary power planers are motorized power tools used for the same types of larger tasks, but are unsuitable for fine scale planing where a miniature hand plane is used.
A sharp hand plane blade should be able to shave fine shavings off the end grain from soft wood. It's necessary to cut with a bit of a skew when doing this. The cut should be left with a bit of a shine to it.
In Fine Woodworking #219, handplane pro Chris Gouchner took 14 smoothing planes for a test drive, and to help you become a more savvy tool shopper, FWW senior editor Tom McKenna has picked up where Gouchner left off.