: The advantage of using a 'microbevel' of 1 to 5 degrees is that there is less
: material to remove when you need to resharpen the blade. 5 degrees of
: microbevel seems excessive to me.

: Increased blade angle tends to add a scraping vs. cutting component to the
: 'mix', it increases the amount of labor necessary to do the work, but
: reduces the likelyhood of tearout (in wood other than end grain). In end
: grain, a low angle is 'better'.

Thanks Aaron for the quick reply. You sound like a guru to me!

I spent a few hours putting an edge on all of my planes. The original edge from the manufacturer didn't seem sharp enough and I couldn't get the correct angle by hand so I bought a sharpening kit made by Gatco. I'm going to try the micro-bevel and see how it feels. The depth of the cut has been hard to adjust but I 'll put that down to inexperience. I only have problems keeping the blade parallel to the base of the plane regardless of the depth.

I'm not using the bead and cove method this time. Which is easier to fair B&C or planed strips?

Cheers
Jeff