Craig and Garry, I'm curious as to what such a plane looks like. I tried looking online but couldn't find anything. Does anyone know of photos or drawings online?
I've read that for a pre-industrial society, the easiest way to get thin wood is by splitting with a froe. That's how wooden shakes and shingles were made. I've used a froe to split logs into sections for drying and it does work amazingly well. To get thin pieces for lute backs I would think that you would need extremely straight-grained wood, however. Tim On Sunday, November 7, 2004, at 11:47 AM, Craig Robert Pierpont wrote: > Garry, > While not impossible, it seems unlikely as such a plane causes > considerable distortion and fracturing of the wood fibers. > > Garry Bryan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Dear Lutenists, > Is it possible that renaissance and baroque luthiers could > have used the predecessor of the Spelk plane (it produces Spelk. Spelk > is a > thin strip of wood used by the Shakers to make baskets and chair > seats) to > produce the ribs for lutes? A Spelk plane would be able to cut strips > of > wood that are both wide enough and thick enough to be used. I would > think > that it would have been quicker and more cost effective to produce the > rough > ribs using this method than by cutting up a thin board into strips. > > Thoughts? Opinions? > > Garry > > > --------------------------------- > Do you Yahoo!? > Check out the new Yahoo! Front Page. www.yahoo.com > -- > > To get on or off this list see list information at > http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html >
