Plane Blade Camber

I’ve been busy lately doing some mods and fixes on our trailer, setting up a new computer for my wife, and various other tasks, so I haven’t been able to shoot any video lately. I looked through my video archive and thought this topic might be helpful.

Plane blade camber was often a confusing concept for my students. Why, how much, how to create it, and how to set up the plane were all questions that arose. I’ll try here to answer the first question.

Camber is the curve that is honed or ground into the cutting edge of a plane blade. It serves two primary purposes. When planing the face of a board, it creates very shallow curves as the plane removes material, eliminating the “plane tracks” or edges that would be caused by a blade that was sharpened straight across. When planing the edge of a board, it allows for the plane to be moved side-to-side to help in squaring the edge.

In this week’s video, I explain camber as it relates to planing the face of a board.

Watch it here.