A Steep-Angle Wooden Spokeshave

Posted on December 20, 2012 by David Finck

One of the most empowering things I learned as a student at the College of the Redwoods Fine Woodworking Program many moons ago was the idea that first you think of where you want to go and then you figure out how to get there.  As woodworkers we are often limited by our tools, whether it’s tuning them up to work properly or not having the correct tool for the job at hand. Perhaps it’s a specially shaped knife or chisel or hand plane that’s needed to do something well. In my case, as I mentioned in the last post, the red oak I was shaping into table legs was giving me fits.  It had a stringiness that resulted in tear-out no matter the lightness of the cut or the sharpness of the blade when I attacked it with my spokeshave. I had one of these little cheap-o Indonesian hand planes laying around and gave it a try on the red oak. The 65 degree bed angle did the trick beautifully allowing for nice shavings without a trace of tear-out.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I decided to attempt a spokeshave using the same general layout.  This was venturing into territory I had not previously explored. First I had to wrap my mind around the layout so I drew it out on a scrap of maple. I lined up a side view and top view so I would know were to place my cuts.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I reproduced this same layout on my blank and chopped the openings. There is a brass wear strip inlayed into the front of the throat opening (it is indicated in the sketch above as a cross-hatched area at the tip of the blade). The ends of a strip of 1/8″ brass were beveled to 45 deg. on a disc sander.  I knifed the outline into the sole, chopped out the waste, and press-fit the strip into place. Then I shaped up the handles:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here’s the finished tool along with the templates used to layout the handle shapes. This tool was made from persimmon:

Here’s the brass wear strip inlayed in the bottom:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The finished spokeshave worked like a charm!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Until next time…
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6 Responses to A Steep-Angle Wooden Spokeshave

  1. Elizabeth Clark says:
    September 6, 2017 at 12:01 pm

    Great post! I read your article and I learn many things on the planer blade.actually, I shared this on Facebook and my followers really enjoyed it.Keep up the amazing work!

    Reply
    • David Finck says:
      September 6, 2017 at 4:39 pm

      Thanks Elizabeth — I am glad you enjoyed it. Keep an eye out for the December 2017 issue of Strad Magazine — I have a photo essay coming out on making a small, steep-angled, wood hand plane without a cross-pin for use in shaping violin and viola fingerboards. I’ll put some version of it up here too once it has been published.

      Reply
  2. Mike Cornwall says:
    January 27, 2019 at 8:32 am

    Did you sharpen the blade to the same angle as it would be on the 151? Or does the 65• bed angle require a different hone? Thanks!

    Reply
    • David Finck says:
      January 27, 2019 at 4:48 pm

      I used a 30 degree angle. Because of the steep angle it takes a little more force to take a shaving. A steeper bevel angle adds to that difficulty without much benefit in edge toughness..

      Reply
  3. Dale says:
    September 15, 2019 at 3:56 pm

    This looks like a great way to keep a good spokeshave blade in service. I have a broken but poorly repaired Stanley #53 with a good blade. Your method for using a wedge with a flat Stanley-styled blade is pretty unusual. Thanks for sharing.

    Reply

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