Thread: Small brass rebate plane

Originally Posted by IanW

Lappa, what you're seeing is the top/end of the block that the wedge bears against. Look at the second pic, the two angled rivets above & behind the blade arch are what's holding it. The other end is flush with the back of the blade arch.

Cheers,

I was talking about this area marked red. What timber did you use as it’s much lighter - that’s why I thought it was brass.

14645F43-27F9-405C-AC94-14A02CFD4560.jpeg

Cheers

Originally Posted by hiroller

Lovely work Ian.
Could you have reduced the risk of misaligned sides by pre-drilling the holes with both sides together before fitting the bed?

My suggestion would be to mark the profile on the stock then put two bolts in the waste area and drill all the holes together before cutting the profile. All should align perfectly and be easy to hold for drilling.

Nice work as usual Ian.

Clockmakers use tapered pins to align parts. They are usually the same material as the parts they are aligning. When you have finished you peen and sand them and they disappear. You will need to make/buy a tapered broach though.

You can reuse pins as many times as you need to check alignment before cutting off.

Regards

Dane

Originally Posted by Lappa

I was talking about this area marked red. What timber did you use as it’s much lighter - that’s why I thought it was brass.

14645F43-27F9-405C-AC94-14A02CFD4560.jpeg

Cheers

That's 'cos it is brass. It's a wedge-shaped block that is riveted into the body so the wedge has something to bear against, There is wood infill in front of that (from the same scrap of ring-gidgee the wedge is made of). I suppose I could have just used wood all the way, but it's traditional to have some sort of metal infill for the wedge to fit against....

Cheers,

Originally Posted by DSEL74

My suggestion would be to mark the profile on the stock put to bolts in the waste area and drill all the holes together before cutting the profile. All should align perfectly and be easy to hold for drilling.....

Yep, that's a good idea, Dale, I'll file that for the next one.
Thanks,

Originally Posted by Jestar

Clockmakers use tapered pins to align parts. They are usually the same material as the parts they are aligning. When you have finished you peen and sand them and they disappear. You will need to make/buy a tapered broach though.

You can reuse pins as many times as you need to check alignment before cutting off.

Regards

Dane

Thanks also, Dane. You can see I'm not an experienced metal worker. I guess there are many methods that were worked out by people who had to do things to fine tolerances that I'm ignorant of. I'm slowly learning a few of the tricks of the trade, but have a very long way to go....
Cheers,

Originally Posted by IanW

Yep, that's a good idea, Dale, I'll file that for the next one.
Thanks,

Check out Clickspring on Youtube. He shows the pins in a lot of his videos.

I was thinking a bit more about it on the way home. With both pieces pins and clamped (or even superglued) together you could the majority of your shaping done while they are together, including your dovetails if the pieces are orientated the right way.

Just a note. You only need a couple of dabs of glue. All you need is a little heat to release them. But test it out on a couple of scraps first.

With some marking fluid you could even scribe you bed and wedge angles on both pieces and they should match up easier.

Originally Posted by Jestar

Check out Clickspring on Youtube.....

Yep, took a look at this video on making a skeleton clock. There's some good tips in there, & those tapered pins for registration are neat. But I think it will be easier for me to use Dale's suggestion of screws for registration. By putting them through an area that will become waste, I can use small counter-sunk screws into holes tapped on the opposite piece and keep the faces flush, for sawing & drilling etc. Don't know why I hadn't thunk it up for myself before, but sometimes the obvious stares me in the face & I don't see it!

Worth watching something like this video if you've never worked soft metals before. You'll see how easy it is to work with brass - 'specially with a bunch of machines like he's got! But even doing it all by hand, it's not that difficult, just takes a little longer.......

Thanks again,
Cheers,

Ian, here is a few more pictures of the original , plus its mate, and the story behind them.
I got them with a few other planes . Two wooden coach makers rebates and a user made Infill smoother . All Were stamped with the owners name T G Bell except the flat sole rebate you copied. It may have been stamped like the curved sole one at its back end but its received so many hammer taps from blade adjustment its been peened out. Because of the Coach makers planes I assumed T G Bell may have been a coach maker Or staircase builder ? The Two brass planes are cut from solid brass . And the flat sole one has a steel base soldered on .

I do brass work at times, No Planes yet but lots of other furniture related things, and whenever I do I just cut it out on my band saw , the small one I have , roughly 20" wheels, with 3/8 blade for wood work . I find I can cut as much as I like and go back to woodwork after that and the blade is not the slightest bit changed. The only issue is the rubber Tyre band saw wheels need a good cleaning with a wire brush because the brass fine cuttings dig in and stay stuck . It makes quick work of shaping brass plate if you have a band saw.
Rob

Thanks for the back-story, Rob.

I reckon carriage-maker would be the most likely trade for T.G. Bell, alright, can't think of who else would use a curved rebate often enough to invest the time to make one from a chunk of solid brass. When do you think they were made, 1920s or 30s? From the stories my uncles told, a lot of blokes made some pretty impressive tools during the Depression era - they had lots of time on their hands & no spare cash so some put their downtime to good use!

It would be quite a job to broach the blade bed/wedge holes through the solid like that, so I assume it was all he had to work with. It's much easier fabricating it from separate parts! I presume he drilled a good-sized hole then resorted to lots of patient filing. I notice he wasn't too fussy about the non-functional surfaces - those blade cutouts could've been smoothed a bit more, but I imagine he'd had enough by the time the blade bed was flat & true . How I wish we had videos of those old blokes using their tools, I reckon it would be quite a revelation to see seemingly crude tools do amazing things in highly skilled hands....

Surprised your bandsaw blades take brass in their stride. Bandsaw blades usually have positive rake & it's usually recommended you use negative rake for metal-cutting circular saw blades. Sometimes when I'm planing down marking gauge beams I get a bit careless & snick the brass tips. It always means a trip to the sharpening stones, sometimes by way of the grinder to remove a chip - plane blades definitely don't like brass!

Cheers,

Not sure when they were made but could easily be 20s or 30s or back a little from that possibly .
Yes cutting the blade holes and shaping them with a file would be to much for me to give a go . I cant stand lapping or flattening stuff by hand , takes to long . If the angle grinder cant do it then I'm off doing something else more interesting , lol . Makes me wonder how Stanley flattened all their planes. I don't think they were precisely ground ? Were they ?
I wondered if they had long sanding belts back then ? I needed to flatten some planes once and I have a large E C Lacey belt sander or stroke sander as they are called. The belts are about 20 feet long x 6" wide and you push a flat pad down on the paper as it passes under it on the job . We did a lot of Antique extension table sanding on it years ago . So for the planes I reversed the belt so the rough side was running on the wheels and I lay a slab of marble on the sliding table under it . The smooth side ran across this . It made fast work of cast planes !! And wasn't perfect, just like a Stanley .

Ive read about negative rake for brass and do it on my drill bits . It works with the band saw blade though . Quite well .
I made these Oak and brass shelves for someone a few years ago . I ordered all the brass flat bar stock and sheet from George White , those four S scrolls , two top and two bottom are around 4 or 5 mm thick and were cut on the band saw out of flat sheet. The wood blade was kept on the saw for ages after that cutting . Once cut. all the brass was brazed together, aged and fitted into the Oak shelves. I really liked those shelves but they took a lot longer to make than I thought they would. Pete gave me a hand brazing . How fantastic it was to be shown the finer delicate points of brazing and silver soldering when I needed it to be better than I had ever done before by a Jeweler.

Rob