Being a user, collector and lover of hand planes I’m always keeping my eye out for rare or unusual styles. When recently surfing around the Japan Woodworker Online Catalogue I discovered some wooden bodied, Hollows and Rounds that are being manufactured in China.
China? I thought…Why not, every thing else is made there so I decided to take a closer look. I’ve always wanted a nice old set of hollows and rounds; I’ve searched e-Bay, online and local antique tool dealers but always found that most you come across are over priced old planes that you’ll need to spend a lot of time refurbishing to get them back to a user friendly state or are simply nice old tools for someone to put on a shelf and look at. I wanted something I could use and hopefully not have to spend a small fortune on.
After reading the description and studying the photos of these planes I decided to order a few select sizes. They’re manufactured in China and arrived well-packaged in cardboard boxes with a borg logo on the side. (no Trek-ie affiliation as far as I could tell)
The description on the Japan Woodworker web-site said the planes have been manufactured in and around Hong Kong for the past 20 years by Mujingfang. They decided to begin producing these high quality Chinese Style Planes seeing that previously, it was a cottage industry with little or no quality control. Furniture makers in and around Hong Kong use hollowing and rounding planes to create moldings and for shaping pieces of furniture. The plane bodies are hand made from well aged Rosewood and are nicely contoured to fit the hand. 
They are 6-1/4″ long and width varies according to size. The blades are high carbon steel and although needed honing and sharpening on arrival, the extremely reasonable price made it worth my while. They are sold as a set of one hollowing and one rounding plane for each width. I went with the 1/4″, 1/2″, 1″ and 1 1/4″ widths. After using these planes for the past six months I’m very pleased with the quality and performance; as for the very-affordable prices all I can say is…Resistance is futile.
4 Comments
Hi Tom,
I came across with your blog while looking for information about these Asian H&R planes that now are also available at Lee Valley. How do they compare to the traditional H&R planes? these Asian planes are smaller but they also look different, I was wondering if you can also reproduce almost any moulding with these Asian planes. Woodworking is a hobby for me and I work almost exclusively with hand tools so I want to get some H&R for ocassional use, should I get these Asian planes or I should start to save money for those from Clark & William or Phill?
Thanks
Alejandro
Montreal
Alejandro,
thanks for the comment-
if you onlly want them for occasional use and small runs of mouldings then these planes are very capable. The shape is also nice in hand- most H & R planes are the tall, thin rectangular variety so these will feel closer to a bench plane. They did need some work but for the price I'd say you can't go wrong. If on the other hand your doing alot of moulding work then you may want to spend the money and buy some from Phil or Clark & Williams.
Hope that helps!
Tom, I appreciate your review of these planes. I have your book Made By Hand and have really enjoyed it and the DVD. You do some beautiful work!
I am a hobbyist woodworker and enjoy making reproduction and Shaker furniture. I am considering buying the Asian planes from Lee Valley, but I read in another great woodworker’s post that one may not be able to make the kinds of moldings typically found on colonial and reproduction furniture with them since their thickness may not allow them to reach into sharp corners well as the thinner traditional American and British hollows and rounds do. Have you found that to be an issue with the Asian planes? I notice you have more recently bought a half set from Phill. Thanks for your time in responding.
Hey David,
thanks for the comments and question. I do still own the Asian molding planes but find I use my Philly moldings planes on a more regular basis these days. For my hands, the larger body on the traditional shaped, English planes are more comfortable in use-especially when working with long molding profiles.
The comment on the Asian plane not being able to work into tight corners sounds a little strange to me- I haven’t found that an issue as the width is pretty much the same as the English variety. Maybe in extreme cases when the molding had a very tight curve but I think it’s more an issue of comfort in design than plane profile. If you like the traditional feel of molding planes then stick with them- if you’re indifferent, then these Asian planes are a great value and will make molding for you.
Once you start ‘sticking’ moldings by hand, you’ll quickly realize the molding planes do very little work other than the final rounding or shaping- it’s the rabbet, plow, moving Fillister style planes that do the bulk of the work before hand. My advice would be to try out both kinds before buying. Hope that helps!
Cheers~