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I have a question for the archtop makers out there; I was lucky and was presented with a beautiful piece of curly maple for an arch back, pretty much deciding my next project. I have a load of carving gouges and a 10 mm ibex plane radiused. Im torn between the Ibex palm plane and the D'Angelico planes. My concern is that with the open throat inthe D'Angelico does it tear out significantly on highly figured maple? Like most of us, I can really only swing one of them.
Thanks for your thoughts
- Frank

I have 6 of the contoured Ibex thumb Planes. Not one of them has what I would term a tight mouth. I don't think they were designed to, not in a super smoothing plane manner anyway. In that sense I doubt it will make any difference. Try to plane with the flame and/or use toothed blades.

I have used a japan woodworker oak chairmaking plane ,front to back and side to side curve to hog out a maple arch top back.Blade is vy sharp and vy tight mouth, better than my vlnmaking planes IMO.

Hey, Frank,
I appreciate your question, but don't forget that you can make your own--or as many of them as you need. It's not really difficult and it's not expensive. You can do it with scrap hardwood, some blade steel, and a grinder. I've made several, using old, cast-off industrial hacksaw blades for my irons. That was my solution when I found myself in your situation, asking the same questions. Here are a couple of mine. Obviously, one is very utilitarian and one is a little more refined. The cherry plane is a little more aggressive. The brass sided plane has a higher blade angle (not that this matters too much on a spoon bottomed plane that can be rocked) and has a wider blade radius. Both were made in my own shop and both work very well. I hope you'll try this. Whatever you choose, best of luck to you.
Patrick

Thanks for the replies I have been throwing around the Idea of making or modifying a plane for this project, one of the best parts of making my own plane is the inherent procrastination where I could obsess more.
I may try this out, thanks Patrick
BTW the brass plane is great looking I like a good solid utilitarian tool.

I have a dumb question for Michael about "planing with the flame" I carve wood but not figured wood, do you mean parallel to the "stripe" or perpendicular? I think parallel is what you mean, I do have a bit of tiger maple to play with.

And I admit to having a predilection for metal,planes, with a thumb screw.
Well I do have some thinking to do.

Thanks
-Frank

Yes parallel. Virtually always results in less tearout, at least it does on flat wood. I've done some Violin plate carving and I just went in the direction that gave the best result. You'll quickly get a feel for it.