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Hey guys. It's hard to get perspective looking at those Ibex planes on the internet. What size is a good one for carving recurve? Hesh, which sizes are yours from this post?
viewtopic.php?f=10102&t=14582&hilit=ibex+plane

I also saw a thread where Otis Tomas was working his magic on a violin he was making. He was using a D'Angelico plane and an Ibex(I think). Which Ibex will compliment the D'A?

I'm not Hesh, but what recurve are you talking about? Are you building a violin familiy instument, an arch top guitar/mandolin/electric...?

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Rian Gitar og Mandolin

Hi Arnt. Sorry, I should have mentioned I'm referring to an archtop guitar.

Hi Jack,

I don't think Hesh makes archtops, I think he uses the ibex planes for brace carving.

I have what stewmac calls the palm plane (28mm blade) and one of the smaller finger planes, I think 10mm blade. The palm plane does most of the work, but the smaller plane works well in the waist area. The recurve is then refined with a curved scraper.

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Matt Jacobs

"Don't tase me bro"

Thanks guys. I gathered Hesh doesn't make archtops. I was just interested in which sizes his Ibex planes are from the picture of the link that I referenced in the original post.

Mattyeod, the Ibex Palm Plane is tempting but is not very ergonomic which would make long carving sessions torture! That's why I'm thinking of going with the D'Angelico. I want a smaller Ibex to take care of the finer carvings.

Hi Jack,
Hope you don't mind if I chime in. Here are three Ibex finger planes that I got from Pilgrims Projects. They come in two different styles. Round Soul for contour shaping violins and archtop guitars and Flat Soul for use as a standard plane. I just use them for lots of crazy stuff. Here's a few pics. Hope this helps with your struggles.

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"After forty-nine years of violin building, I have decided that the search for a varnish is similar to the fox hunt. The fun is in the hunt."
Jack Batts Maker and Repairer of Fine Violins

I have both the 10mm flat and round.

Since were on the topic I have two issues when using these. First I end up picking bunched up shavings out of these things non stop. I have to use the tip of a mechanical pencil to clean them out. Anyone grind off part of the front to make a bigger opening?

Second, The blade for the rounded sole dosnt match the curve of the sole. the ends stick out further. Is it supposed to be this way, or are you supposed to have to tune this little guy up?

They do accumulate shavings. After shelling out thirty five bucks I'M not gonna grind crap. I'll use the pencil...or just blow in 'em. I also have a 21" by 2 3/8" wide jointer plane I have to do the same thing with. I've noticed too that the round blades don't match the sole exactly. These planes are made more for excavating wood than for planing wood to be level, plumb, square and straight. Once you graduate the wood down close to your perforation marks you can use a gouge and then scrappers to blend your different thicknesses together.

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"After forty-nine years of violin building, I have decided that the search for a varnish is similar to the fox hunt. The fun is in the hunt."
Jack Batts Maker and Repairer of Fine Violins

They do accumulate shavings. After shelling out thirty five bucks I'M not gonna grind crap. I'll use the pencil...or just blow in 'em. I also have a 21" by 2 3/8" wide jointer plane I have to do the same thing with. I've noticed too that the round blades don't match the sole exactly. These planes are made more for excavating wood than for planing wood to be level, plumb, square and straight. Once you graduate the wood down close to your perforation marks you can use a gouge and then scrappers to blend your different thicknesses together.

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"After forty-nine years of violin building, I have decided that the search for a varnish is similar to the fox hunt. The fun is in the hunt."
Jack Batts Maker and Repairer of Fine Violins

Chuck, yes those Ibex planes need to be tuned up to work well. The blades are also not of the best quality, they are some sort of modern chrome vanadium I think. I actually like my shop made wooden finger planes with good carbon steel blades cut from regular plane irons better. But the Ibex planes can be tuned up to perform much better than they do out of the box. The the curvature of the iron, the seating of the iron, the frog etc all can be improved, and the curve of the bottom can be reground to suit your need.

Check out this tutorial by mandolin maker John Hamlett on tuning up an Ibex.

http://www.hamlettinstruments.com/repair_detail.php?ID=9

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Rian Gitar og Mandolin

Very nice link on tuning the Ibex! Thanks Arnt.

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Jim Howell
Charlotte, NC

If you don't mind a non-traditional approach, you could take the Mario route and use an angle grinder. After a couple of hours of carving, and sore arms and hands you'll wish you had one. They are actually easy to control, I start with a medium Kutz-all, and switch to a 36 grit flap disk, when I get "in the ball park" of final shape, I switch to the planes and scrapers.

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Matt Jacobs

"Don't tase me bro"

Sorry Jack my friend I have been traveling all weekend.

My two Ibex planes are 45/64's and 15/32nds and I would have given you the metric sizes but some idiot put self stick 120 grit on the bottom of his metric engineer's scale to use to for scribing butt wedges............

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Ann Arbor Guitars

I use an 18 mm blade Ibex to rough out the recurve and then a gooseneck scraper and shaped sanding block to refine.

I have the large Ibex palm plane which I love as well but use a glove when hogging wood out. On the smaller Ibex, I made a maple palm support with a groove that slides over the top of the blade. It works well and I'll likely make one for the larger palm plane one of these days )

I recently bought one of the new squirrel tailed curved bottom planes from Lee Valley. This thing is well built, works great for hogging wood and looks very similar to the D'Angelico to me at a much lower price.

Thanks all! There's a lot of food for thought here.
Chuck, thanks a million for those shots. Very helpful. At this point I'm becoming a little too obsessed with planes. I feel like buying ALL OF THEM!! The hard part is narrowing it down to which ones I actually need.

You can make them if you want. I made a bunch for the violin a couple of years ago. (Actually, it's hard to STOP making them, once you get rolling.) I used old 10mm &and 12mm files for blade material, ground into several rounded, straight & toothed edges (invaluable for highly figured wood) for each width. The smallest, shown in the middle, becomes invisible when covered with the last digit of your pinky! (The big one on the left I made for windsor chair seats many years ago, & use it now on the interior of archtop.)

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Dave
Milton, ON