In 2001, I had just graduated from college and my Great Uncle proposed we go stay in Sweden for a few months with our family there. I realize this wasn't exactly backpacking through Indonesia for six months with a passport, a backpack and trail of furtive hostel hookups, but it was an amazing trip.
A memento of it is the sketchbook I kept. I didn't have a digital camera, so when I would get sick of lugging my ancient Nikon, so I would just draw. At the museum where the sunken and raised warship Vasa is kept, I drew several of the discovered ship's carpenters' tools, among them a little smoothing plane:
And just last month, I came across a series of entries on Peter Follansbee's blog examining the Gerfschaaf - the Dutch version of the little horned plane. Since I use a 20th century horn plane that I bought in Sweden nearly every day, the notion of experimenting with its formal ancestor was intriguing. I thought I would make one based on a photograph Follansbee posted.
I actually have had a need for a new plane, as well as this curiosity. I've been worn out of trying smoothing these big planks of curly walnut with 45 degree planes. The higher the pitch angle of the blade, the better the plane's ability to manage reversing grain without tear-out. Over the 20th century, nearly all planes were made with irons bedded at 45 degrees, but steeper angles were once the norm for planing hardwoods and an increase of ten degrees to 55 makes a tremendous difference. Try back-beveling the iron in your smoothing plane 10 degrees, seriously.
It isn't perfect yet, but it has potential and a Swedish steel iron.
