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Lee Valley Veritas
Block Planes
by ALF
June 9, 2004
Those marvellous fellows at Brimarc 
asked if I'd like to review the range of Veritas planes on behalf of the members
here, and after pausing long enough to pick myself up off the floor, I said
"oh, all right then". This is part one of the result. With luck and a
following wind I'll get the rest done before they have to go back. If you're all
very good, the next review won't be as long either... 
So hold tight please, here we go:
Lee Valley Veritas make three models of block plane; a small ”Apron” plane,
and adjustable mouth Low and Standard Angle planes.
From left to right; Apron, Low Angle, Standard
Angle
All are made with ductile iron, so they should survive any trips to the floor,
although I did not test this.
All three are available with A2 steel , 1/8th" thick irons, with an option
on a High Carbon Steel blade with the Apron plane, which is the one I had for
review. They also have the same “Norris” style combined depth and lateral
adjustment in common. Packing consists of those fold flat cardboard boxes and
wrapping in rust inhibitor paper, a la L-N. The instructions are clear and
comprehensive even including information about shooting boards - to see them for
yourself, visit the individual product pages on the L-V
site and click Instr. But enough of what
you can read elsewhere
, what were my personal impressions of these planes?
First of all the general appearance is a little modern, and does take a certain
amount of getting used to at first. The very
shiny black lever caps look good, although the reviewer who had them
prior to me had managed to scratch one already, so maybe you’d need to take
care of them to ensure they continue to
look as good. The soles, sides and areas where the blade beds are nicely milled,
and no nasty sharp edges. The castings themselves are left pretty rough where it
doesn’t effect function, almost small scale pebbledash, but the paint on them
is sound. I was a little surprised by the rough quality of the casting on the
Low Angle; there were noticeable dinks out of the top of the wings and the bed
has had to be milled on the skew to get it correct. The finish over the top of
these rough areas and so forth is fine, it is just a rather coarse casting. As
long as it works this isn’t really a problem I suppose, but I think if I’d
bought the plane I’d have some concerns, although the box proclaimed it was
checked for quality control, so obviously it’s well within manufacturing
tolerances as far as L-V are concerned.
 
Left; Low Angle bedding compared to Stanley #60
1/2. Right; Apron plane compared to L-N bronze #103
I’m not a member of the Flat Sole Society, but for the purposes of review I
put a straight edge along the soles and sides, and a square too. All the planes
have been designed to allow use on a shooting board, so squareness of the sides
to the sole is an issue. By dint of holding them up to the light and squinting,
I was just about able to make out that they were all slightly concave along
their length, the Apron and Standard also slightly across the width, while the
Low Angle was marginally convex across the width. I must stress, these are tiny,
tiny amounts and only the hopelessly Sole Fixated would be getting out the
lapping kit. The adjustable mouths were both level with the rest of the sole.
Regrettably none of them had sides exactly square to the sole, although again it
was marginal amounts and easily dealt with by minor lateral adjustment. I was
going to try and use feeler gauges to see if they were within tolerances, but
when I came to look I see no figures are given for that! Very cunning. 
The blades are quite finely finished, all with a second bevel included. On the
whole I’d sooner put my own secondary bevel, but that’s personal taste. I
was going to try them “straight outta the box”, but as the previous reviewer
had already done so, even to the point of leaving the gunk on the blades, and as
I had no idea how much they’d been used, it seemed fairer to hone them as I
would do usually. All the blades had a tendency towards Japanese-like hollows in
the back, which I like. Beats a convex back any day for a start, and made
sharpening quick and easy. On the Apron and Standard I did a full back and bevel
treatment from coarse DMT right through to a polish with Autosol on MDF. It took
5 minutes to get a workable back and bevel on both the A2 and HCS, which is
excellent. On the Low Angle I did a DC ruler job, which wasn’t much faster in
all honesty.
All three blades bedded down solidly in the plane; I was particularly impressed
with the fit to the top of the adjuster in all of them.
That's not a gap, just the shadow created by
the bevel on the top of the adjuster pivot
The Apron and Low Angle were very easy , but the Standard has room for the
adjuster to twist, so you need to take care in replacing the blade until you get
the knack of keeping the pin upright while you slot the blade onto it. The
adjusters themselves work very well. I
was a little apprehensive as the original Norris ones weren’t actually
particularly good, nor the GLT or Calvert Stevens subsequent versions, but these
are smooth and precise. There is some backlash though, but this is covered in
the instructions (a piece of honesty which I applaud!). The only difficulty I
had was a tendency to adjust laterally when altering the depth without meaning
to, but that’s probably down to practice. The lateral adjustment on the Apron
plane was very smooth, but on the others the grub screws made it a little jerky.
Probably I hadn’t quite set the latter correctly. The grub screws themselves
are either side of the iron near the mouth, and pinch the iron in place. This
stops the sideways slippage you otherwise tend to get when you use lateral
adjustment, and it really does work. From an old tool junkies perspective
though, I wouldn’t fancy having to deal with them if they got rusted in. 
The adjustable mouth is a simple matter of loosening the front knob and moving
the mouth to where you want it; no cam lever required. The Apron plane has a
fixed mouth, more or less identical in size to the one on the L-N.
Now, ergonomics. This is a tricky area, because what I might find comfortable,
you might not and vice versa, so keep that in mind. The Apron is a bit bigger
than the nearest L-N equivalent, and I found it more controllable with two
hands.
Apron plane taking end
grain shaving
I tend to prefer that anyway, so in a way having more room for them was much
better. The Low and Standard Angles are again bigger than the L-N equivalent;
more like the Record in width. Two hands worked best for me here too, but I felt
in control of the Low Angle plane all the time. The Standard Angle I had more
trouble with. The low profile lever cap must make a difference in how high your
grip has to be, but it just wasn’t low enough for my hands. As I, er, perspired
that shiny lever cap got slippery, and I found my hand sliding down towards the
toe and inevitable loss of control of the plane resulted. I must stress, this is
just what I found, and I’m sure many would not find it a problem, but perhaps
something to bear in mind if you have small hands or short fingers.
When it came to using them, I tried a variety of woods; beech, ash, poplar, oak
and so forth. They all dealt with end grain very well leaving a glassy surface,
and whispy shavings. The Apron and Low were fine on long grain too, but I wasn’t
terribly chuffed with the Standard. It took rather more effort to whiz along
than I expected; but perhaps my trouble with the grip had more to do with it
than anything else. To be fair, a large standard angle block plane is one of the
few planes I don’t have (Gasp 
), so I can’t base my observations about it on previous experience of other
makes. When it came to shooting I was pleasantly surprised. On a couple of
occasions I’ve been using my L-N bronze block and wanted to just shoot a small
section of moulding or whathaveyou, and been thwarted by its curvaceous sides;
the Apron solves this problem, and for small stuff it’s really very good.
Apron plane shooting end grain poplar
The other two also performed well, and their extra weight meant they could power
through slightly larger stuff. You wouldn’t want to be shooting the ends of
carcass sides with these planes, but for trimming mouldings, fillets etc, they’re
a handy solution.
Finally I also tried the front knob and ball tail attachments for the Low Angle.
No mainstream manufacturer has offered a ball tail since Stanley many years ago,
as far as I’m aware, so this really makes the Low Angle stand out from the
pack. They’re both made from beech. The front knob simply replaces the brass
one, while the tail is attached using two machine screws provided; a 5 minute
job, tops. I have to say, it makes planing end grain a doddle. You can really
get some power behind the plane and your control and grip is secure. The front
knob was also pretty handy on the shooting board I found. In effect you get a
small low angle smoother. If you have a young Galoot In Training who wants to
plane “just like daddy”, this might be the solution. After all, if you GIT
loses interest, at least you still have a jolly useful plane to use, as opposed
to buying him/her a #1 or #2.
However, there is a downside. The adjustments are trickier to get to with it
fitted, and the price. It puts the cost over the £100 mark, which I fear would
put a lot of people off. I think they’re extras worth having, and I’d
certainly suggest anyone considering the Low Angle try out the ball tail and
knob as well, if they can. A bizarre aside; the tail is made in Canada and the
knob in the USA?!
So, the verdict. These planes are just about mid-way between the Stanley/Records
and the L-Ns in price, but much, much closer to the L-Ns in performance. In fact
the ease of adjustment could arguably just give them the edge, even if their
looks aren‘t everyone‘s taste. The low angle ones I particularly like (maybe
you could tell? 
), and at the price the Apron plane is an absolute bargain. As soon as Rob
organises himself to come over for Tools 2000&when?, I’ll be buying one
and getting him to sign it to go with my signed L-N
But I’d also make a plea for a lower price on buying the Low Angle with the
ball tail and front knob as a set… If you’re in the market, take a good look
at them. Yes, they are a bit different, but in a good
way.
Apron Plane HCS blade £52.25 and £58.00
with A2 blade
Low & Standard Angle Block Planes
£88.25 each
Ball Tail £16.00 Front
Knob £4.50
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