Why don HNT Gordon planes have a chip breaker?
A chip breaker’s purpose is to break off the wood shaving before it has the potential to tear the grain prior to the blade cutting it cleanly to leave a smooth surface. To achieve this the chip breaker is designed to increase the angle at which the shaving is bent up against the front of the blade. On a Stanley plane this is about 60 – 70 degrees. Therefore, a plane with a 60 degree blade angle achieves the desired effect of a chip breaker. Another point here is also the fact that a 60 degree cutting angle has an element of scraping which decreases the strength of the shaving lessening the requirement to break the shaving off before it tears the grain. Also, the more I get to know about planes the more I think a chip breaker does little to prevent tearout. I have personally seen a low angle (LA) smoother with the same effective cutting edge as a standard Bailey pattern plane with a chip breaker and the LA smoother with no chip breaker caused less tearout on some cranky red cedar. Aren’
