The fore plane is a type of

woodworking Woodworking is the skill of making items from wood, and includes cabinet making (cabinetry and furniture), wood carving, joinery, carpentry, and woodturning. History Along with stone, clay and animal parts, wood was one of the first mate ...

bench plane typically used for preparing and flattening rough workpieces before using other planes, such as the jointer plane and the

smoothing plane A smoothing plane or smooth plane is a type of bench plane used in woodworking. The smoothing plane is typically the last plane used on a wood surface, removing very fine shavings to leave a smooth finish. When used effectively it quickly produc ...

. The name fore plane is sometimes used synonymously with the

jack plane A jack plane is a general-purpose woodworking bench plane, used for dressing timber down to size in preparation for truing and/or edge jointing. It is usually the first plane used on rough stock, but for rougher work it can be preceded by the s ...

, but the fore plane is usually longer in length, making it more effective at levelling larger workpieces.

Description

Under the Stanley Bailey numbering system for metal-bodied planes the #6 fore planes are long, longer than the #5 jack planes and shorter than the #7 and #8 jointer planes. Historically, wooden-bodied fore planes have been long. As with other bench planes, fore planes were first developed with wooden bodies, before the introduction in the 19th century of metal-bodied and transitional planes.

Terminology

The name fore plane dates back to at least the 17th century in Britain, and was named ''fore'' plane because it would be used on a workpiece ''before'' other planes. The name fore plane is sometimes used synonymously with the

, while in 17th century Britain the term fore plane was used more by joiners or cabinet makers, and jack plane by carpenters.

Use

When used, the fore plane is either the first plane to be used on rough sawn timber, or is used after the jack plane. The fore plane is able to quickly remove material and level the workpiece before the woodworker moves on to using a jointer plane or

. Often fore planes are used perpendicular and diagonally to the grain, and are set to remove larger shavings. The iron can also be sharpened with a slight camber to aid this. For the rough preparation and levelling of stock fore planes have largely been replaced in modern workshops by machinery such as jointers and thicknessers.

References

Planes {{Woodworking