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I'm about to make a batch of planes and am in need of a special purpose plane to deal with figured woods. Something in the bench / smoother category size 5ish. Strong curly maple and other like kind woods. In my research I'm discovering that blade angle is ALL OVER THE MAP. Some as low as 45 and some as high as 62.5 degrees. Lie Nielsen's site sells high angle frogs for a few of their bench planes that go to 55 degrees. All claiming superior results. My suspicion places the burden on performance squarely on the machining of the mouth. I have the ability and the tooling to make these to very exacting standards but I don't want to make these more than once. The O-1 blades aren't cheap.

I suppose one of my options is to pony up and buy one but I've been wanting to do this for a very long time. I have a Steve Knight 50 degree block plane and it's my favorite block plane in the shop. I like it even more than my Lie Nielsen low angle block plane.

If you have a high angle plane and use it can you tell of your experience? Anything you'd do different? Opinions on any aspect of this would be greatly appreciated.

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There is no difference between the man that thinks he can....and the man that thinks he cannot.

Chris what kind of plane are you making ? That isn't clear from your post. Wooden, metal, ? Are you making a plane to make other planes ? Are you making them out of curly maple or wanting to plane curly maple ?
For my wooden planes I haven't found it necessary to go more than 50°. Mostly I just use 45° and so does my friend David Finck author of "Making and Mastering Wooden Planes". Super sharp iron and a tight, tight mouth. Any more than 50° and they get really hard to push. If I can't get it done with my usual planes I go to a scraper plane. 45° isn't low at all, it is pretty much the standard all around angle. 42° is quite common on Japanese planes and they do work very well in soft woods at that angle.

Au contraire, you can make your own very easily and quite cheaply.

L.

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Cut to size.....Beat to fit.....Paint to match.

Have not tried one, but mujingfang chinese polishing planes are set at abt 60 deg and have a dowel to pull the plane . Cabinetmakers rave abt how good they are at dealing with wild grain. The blade is HSS

One of my most frequently used planes is a high-angle Bailey #6. I removed the frog, drilled a 1/2" hole through the cheeks so that the bottom of the hole was level with the top of the frog lands. I inserted a piece of 1/2" inch bar, peened it over and flushed it with the cheeks. Using longer, larger bolts, I bolted down the frog on top of the bar. This gives a 60 degree blade angle and I use the original adjuster. Works really well on really curly timber with standard blade sharpening techniques. 60 degrees gives you a type 2 chip. I don't see much point going less than 60 degrees if you're going high-angle. Wide planes (6, 5 1/2, 4 1/2) are no problem because the shavings you take are so fine it's never a big push. Pics in the usual place. Alternatively, there's the Veritas bevel up jack and you can choose your own effective blade angle up to ~66 degrees using the Veritas honing guide. Either of these planes will smooth just about anything. If you're building wooden planes, use the big G to check out HNT Gordon, in particular the palm smoothing plane.

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Trevor Gore, Luthier. Australian hand made acoustic guitars, classical guitars; custom guitar design and build; guitar design instruction.

http://www.goreguitars.com.au

I do most of the smoothing with a 50 deg LV Jack and it works fine in most cases. For localized problems spots I grab a 60 deg Mujingfang plane, it is a smallish rosewood bodied Chinese plane) and it clearly decreases the tearout. I also find it very useful for trimming down purflings, where you have all sort of grain orientations and you definitively don't want tearout. It is not that hard to push as long as the iron is kept sharp...

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Build log

Thanks for the input guys. I have quite a bit of experience with most of the common manufactured metal planes. I've always wanted to make a batch of really good performing 'woodys' for my personal use. I've gravitated towards them when I've used them. Like the Steve Knight planes I'd like to add adjustable mouths which shouldn't be a problem.

Two of these planes will be in the 12.5 inch length, one with a 1.75 - 2 wide iron, and the other with a 1.5 to 1.75 inch blade width and a higher angle iron. Something to pick up when the wood I am tackling has that 'I dare you' look about it.

I'll probably make a few smaller ones too but my main concern is getting this high angle plane right.

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There is no difference between the man that thinks he can....and the man that thinks he cannot.