Planing over knots

[Andrew DeMarco]

Okay, so "planing over knots" gets me all sorts of wedding planning stuff on Google.

Is there any trick to this? Do I need to sharpen my planes?

[buddyellis]

Very sharp plane, very shallow cut, and change directions with your passes till you find a direction that cuts 'better'. Usually difficult either way.

[Bill Snyder]

Are you using knotty wood in an instrument?
Knots themselves are very hard and difficult to plane, but also the grain around the knot goes in several directions and can lead to tearout. You might need to change direction as you plane.

[Andrew DeMarco]

The knot's eventually going to be cut out and the surrounding wood will be joined (at least that's the plan). It could also end up as the bottom of a frame on an aeolian harp, which I've suddenly gotten sidetracked into building.

Thanks for the input! I have been experiencing directional sensitivity along the whole board. This isn't AAA tonewood, haha. It's from home depot.

[billhay4]

Toothed blade. Do preliminary planing with a toothed blade and final planing with a regular blade.
Bill