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Hand plane is perfectly fine. As mentioned, very very sharp and well setup is critical. I highly recommend a simple sharpening jig to keep a consistent angle, although doing it by hand is doable.

I did my first few instruments this way. All with a wooden smoother. Having sharpening and planning skills under your belt goes a long way. And is way WAY more satisfying than sanding. When everything is clicking and those sub .001" shavings start coming off, you don't want to stop. It's like surfing, when you catch your first wave and harness its power, you instantly know what "stoked" means!

I pretty much only do the final thicknessing on tops with my hand plane now and occasional fine tuning of other pieces. But, definitely won't be giving up my drum sander. (Unless I get a wide belt)

Michael, I too like your plate holding fixtures. I'll be making one just for fun!

I had been holding the corners of the plates down with counter sunk brads, but I recently made this vacuum fixture.

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Pat

I have posted this before --- I had great tools and a hands on instructor, after processing exactly one set of backs and sides --- I invested the $$ and time to build a thickness sander. If I did not like machines, power tools, hand tools, saw dust, chips and noise, more modern woodworking if you will -- I'd likely be a better golfer.

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Ken Cierp

http://www.kennethmichaelguitars.com/

Great vacuum clamp!!

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Ken Cierp

http://www.kennethmichaelguitars.com/

Where does 5 different Planes come from? Why do you need A2? Sharpening every 10 strokes? $2,000 for the Planes?
Get serious Tai. You can buy 5 different Planes, you can buy A2, you can pay your $2,000 and you can sharpen every 10 strokes. . . if you want to. Myself? I'll stay with exactly what works for me and it's a far cry from the rather false assumptions that you have stated. Over the years I've probably had more than 50 Planes through my hands (not counting the little fellows or indeed the 30 Planes that I have made). I may have paid $2,000 for ALL of them. The vast majority of them I bought and sold sometime later. On a few I broke even, some I actually made money, some I lost money. I doubt that I have over $400 in Planes, taken over nearly 40 years (and I've got a few!)! I mean I bought 3 wooden Planes off Ebay a year ago. They cost me $1.50 + $8 shipping. They are perfectly good planes. Hardly anyone wants them, yet they can be made to work perfectly well.
Old Stanley's, Records can be picked up for very, very little. Even a brand new Quangsheng 5 (with a couple of spare blades) isn't going to cost much over $300. It's the only Plane you will really need for thicknessing and jointing, with the spare blades. Believe me, you don't need to pay half that amount if you don't want to.
I owned that very same ECE Plane Pat, (thankfully not from new). Never did like that tensioning device. I called it the obstacle course for sharpening. I sold it on (I 'lost' on that one) and bought a much cheaper used ECE with the simple wedge. It's one I still use on a regular basis.

Different strokes for different folks, except for the power planer. I wouldn't even use that on a door. They are good for taking the crown off of a floor joist, though.
And lets not get into another drum sander vs hand plane discussion. Neither side will give the high ground, and there's the chance of hard feelings.

Alex

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"Indecision is the key to flexibility" .... Bumper sticker

AKA, "Woodriver" in the states.

Excellent post, Michael.

Just to be clear. I haven't turned it into a hand plane v drum sander. I've just tried to bust a few of the terrible assumptions that some people have with hand Planes.
Anyway, just off to get a bit of exercise. I'm trying to stave off the heart attack. Hard to do when you are stood feeding wood into a machine.

Interesting to come back and find so many more posts. I nipped down to the workshop and---
EIR, 10 minutes work by a tool hand absolute novice (I'll confess, I've used a drum sander since I started) with an beat old up Stanley no.6, original blade, from ebay ($45).
About .5 mm planed (across the grain)

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

I have 2 planes right now, a #5 and a block plane.

I have been able to thickness with planes, at least for the backs and side. The problem is it's SLOW and painful. Not only that but getting a consistent thickness was hard (but that may be technique). Also the plane was able to shave a thin slice but after a few swipes the blade starts to glide helplessly and would often tear out badly. I then started using the Wagner Safe T Planer to take down most the thickness and then removing all the black marks with hand planes and scrapers, then random orbital sander.

I never had a drum sander because when I was in Taiwan it was impossible to find (a wide belt sander was too large for the space in the shop)

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Cat-gut strings are made from kitten guts, stretched out to near breaking point and then hardened with grue saliva. As a result these give a feeling of Pain and anguish whenever played, and often end up playing themselves backwards as part of satanic rituals.

Typhoon Guitars
http://www.typhoon-guitars.com

Looks good colin.. will give it a try tonight .. did you go right angles to grain.. i think i was about 45 degrees but not sure if thats right.. a guy on youtube was going straight with grain but with planer at 45 degrees ..

Everyone should try and thickness a back and side set for themselves -- there may be some joy there? As pointed out for some of us its economy of effort. If I did the math correctly based using 10 minutes per .5 mm on a raw 3/16" back set Colin will/would invest at least 90 minutes for the back set and likely 90 minutes for each side. I think even Micheal would have to admit its really physical work. Just not for me (different strokes) Not sure either if its a good idea to overlook the basics of efficiency though -- if the old adage is true "practice makes perfect" would it not be better to make more complete guitars rather than spending time on operations that can be sped up with machinery? Just a thought.

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Ken Cierp

http://www.kennethmichaelguitars.com/

Cablepuller. 45 or straight across, see which works best. The blade has to be EXTREMELY sharp! It should shave hairs without you feeling it. If it isn't sharp enough you'll blow out wood on the far end. Strop, either the Green crayon, autosol or whatever works.
Learn how to set and adjust the chipbreaker, extremely close to the blade edge for dealing with tear out on your 'finishing' Plane. Set it further back for bigger shavings. Make sure it seats on the blade correctly, no shavings going under it.
Test how it Planes before setting it to good wood. If it sings sweetly you should be good to go. If it's proving difficult there may be a problem with the Plane which will need diagnosing and correcting. The sole of the plane doesn't necessarily have to be perfectly flat but you need to avoid a hollow just immediately ahead of where the blade peeps through. That seems to effect it's performance in a detrimental way.

Possibly. Depends on a number of decisions. I quite enjoy the process of hand planing. If I was hand planing 10 sets per day I may not. I doubt I'll ever need to Plane 10 sets per day. It hasn't happened yet and I very much doubt that it will happen soon.
I suppose if it was a case of efficiency I could just order the wood pre sanded. My supplier offered to do that for not very much per set, providing I ordered enough sets. I declined. I could also order pre made rosettes, pre made purfling, pre cut fretboards, pre cut bridges, maybe even pre cut Necks. Maybe I would just go to China and order the Guitars complete!
Decide your working pattern and your working model. If you need to be very efficient I guess that you haven't much choice but to go the efficient route. Personally I don't think I would be making Guitars if I had to use Routers and drum sanders. I would have chosen another vocation.

I like to order my woods unsanded and unplaned. I find that the wood can move during storage and by getting them rough sawn I can plane out any irregularities. I've seen too many cases of wood moving AFTER thicknessing for me to take my chances ordering those wood

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Cat-gut strings are made from kitten guts, stretched out to near breaking point and then hardened with grue saliva. As a result these give a feeling of Pain and anguish whenever played, and often end up playing themselves backwards as part of satanic rituals.

Typhoon Guitars
http://www.typhoon-guitars.com

Michael -- was that last comment supposed to be an insult? Its seems it certainly was unnecessary -- isn't 'different strokes for different folks" OK with you?

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Ken Cierp

http://www.kennethmichaelguitars.com/

I went straight across at 90 degrees to the grain, plane held straight.
Tried all sorts of directions and angles.
Nothing worked better than just straight across. The shavings just rolled off.
The plane's sole I flattened after buying it, and the blade is shaving sharp with a slightly convex edge, so shavings are thicker in the middle and taper to nothing at each edge. (I overlapped each stroke of the plane)
Good luck tonight.

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

Sounds about right in the beginning, and I believe you can plane both sides together (a la Trevor Gore with a no.6 or no.7) and save some time there.
But I'm sure with practice and experience I could cut that in half.
Well, at least if I had youth on my side.
Mind you, have you seen José Romanillos thicknessing sides with a scraper on youtube?
Amazing skills.

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

No. What an odd comment. I've absolutely no idea how you have come to that conclusion. It was more a statement of fact, from my own personal perspective. I mean I actually started the sentence with the very word 'Personally'. I don't see how much clearer I could make things.
Nor do I see that anyone has been admonished for using a drum sander. If you can point out where that has occurred (in this thread) I'd be happy to set them straight. I think you'll have a hard time finding that comment though.

Wow this trhead has grown since I went to work.

While you guys were discussing Lutherie purity I was out in the street protecting your honor....

Since my last post I have billed over $450 which included a fret dress on a lousy Gretch and three set-ups on some very nice brand new Les Pauls and a 335.

In addition, and this was the exciting part.... one of our clients brought in his brand new Dana B. (don't want to misspell his name..) OM built with a torrified top. This is my first chance to listen to a torrified topped instrument and let me tell you that this guitar was VERY impressive. If you recall I was a hold out regarding torrification and still may be since Dana built this one and that could very well account for the superb tone and projection. On the other hand it could be the top as well or both. The guitar sparkled with the highs and had deep, penetrating bass with well balanced mids. It was also loud as can be.

Very impressive guitar in all respects, build quality, looks, playability, servicability, and most certainly tone. I would easilly rate it in the top 10% of guitars that I have every heard!

Wonder if Dana uses a thickness sander......... It kind of sort of sounded like it may have been sanded instead of planed......

Be back after making more money!

If you are planning on planing and you are buying your wood from a retailer that will thickness it fairly inexpensively, I would have them do it part way. I can't imagine planing it from 3/16ths! I have been joining my plates at about .020 > my target thickness. You need to be careful, but it is doable.

The OP says he has no intention of buying a sander, so we should probably just focus on planing.

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Pat

Pat
I think i may ask to have them thicknessed for me next time .. but ive got them now so going to have to persevere :/ wish me luck

Michael maybe I misinterpreted, but this knowingly or unknowingly smacks at every one that disagrees with your view of doing things by hand or how you think guitars are supposed to be made -- my comment only recognized that machines can save time which could be used to make more guitars and had nothing at all to do with the notion of associating efficiency with Asian made instruments.

"I suppose if it was a case of efficiency I could just order the wood pre sanded. My supplier offered to do that for not very much per set, providing I ordered enough sets. I declined. I could also order pre made rosettes, pre made purfling, pre cut fretboards, pre cut bridges, maybe even pre cut Necks. Maybe I would just go to China and order the Guitars complete!'

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Ken Cierp

http://www.kennethmichaelguitars.com/

Time gentlemen please!
Please, try not to take (or give) offence. I really enjoy my "hobby" and this forum is a source of inspiration to many of us.
Personally I'm trying to switch as much as practical to hand tools as my skills improve in that area simply because I enjoy using them more than I do machines, which of course have their rightful place in this craft for good reasons.
People will always rub against each other when they gather together, and we can make this a "easy/constructive" or a "difficult/divisive" process. I know which I would prefer.
We all get up on the wrong side of the bed some days don't we?

BTW, Cablepuller, all Michael N said, and beveling the far edge of the piece you are working on will minimize any blow-out when planing across the board.

_________________
The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.