What can you do with a dado plane

 Well, a combination plane in my case.

You can cut across the grain!

This is a 3/8" dado in 3/4" thick pine. 

It seats nicely, feels solid.

I found a light shaving is best for dados.  You can take deeper cuts for grooves (with the grain).

The nicker is just protruding from the skate here, below the right side depth stop.

The nickers score & cut the wood grain on the sides of the plane before the main bladed shaves off the wood between.  Without the nicker, you'd tear out the wood.

You could cut both sides with a knife and use a plow plane, but it would probably be faster to do the whole dado with a chisel.

From underneath.  The left side stop (on the right here) is much longer.

This box was made using the 1/4"-1/4"-1/4" method.

• A groove around the bottom on all 4 pieces for the bottom plywood to ride in.
• A dado on the 2 ends 3/8" wide & 3/8" deep
• A rabbet on the sides 3/8" by 3/8".  This is on the side opposite the groove.

The dado/rabbets on the ends and sides should be half the thickness of your stock (3/4" here)

This is usually shown with a table saw and with 1/2" stock.

It's quick, repeatable and strong enough for a drawer that will last for 100 years.  Not everything needs to be dovetailed.

Siegley Combination Plane #2

 I recently purchased a combination tool to do dados.

The popular one is the Stanley #45 but the dealer had already sold the one he had and this Sigley #2 was suggested.  They were one of the main competitors to the #45.  Eventually, Stanley bought them and because they sold well, kept making them.

They added the Sigley name when they did so.

These planes were made around 1920.

In order to make dados, a groove across the grain, these planes have nickers in the skates that line up with the edges of the blade.

On the Siegly, there is a hole drilled vertically through the skate.  The nicker is a round rod with a diagonal grind at the end.  If I needed to replace it, I could probably use an old drill bit

It came with all the blades.  There's a sash blade (for the bottom of windows), beading blades, a tonguing blade and the regular blades.

Unlike the #45, there is no notch on the end.  I can get blades for the #45 or the newer Veritas blades for their plough or combination plane.

I have the Veritas plough as well.  The Siegley is bigger and heavier.  The Veritas has a better blade advancement,

I don't find the Siegley to be that much harder to adjust.  It has depth stops on both sides and I think they're better.

The Siegley blades came in a plastic bag so I needed to make a box for them.  I have spalted maple and oak.

It took 3 tries to get the top.  The depth stops on the tongue and sash blades needed a dado inside the lid.

After 2 fell apart due to this & spalting (it is rotten wood after all), I decided to remove the stops.

And the back.