Thread: My latest (and last) plough plane buy

After my latest acquisition I’m done buying plough planes.

When I bought my first one (a long time ago now) I found Alf’s excellent Combi-Plane central site (www.cornishworkshop.co.uk)which should be the first stop for anyone struggling with a plough/combination.

This post is not in the same league at all, just a description of my journey in the hope somebody might find some of it useful.

My first purchase was a Record 044, a basic plough with a few cutters. It worked very well and I cut drawer grooves easily and quickly. I was hooked, hand tools were so much cleaner and quieter than a router, I had to have more.

So I bought a Stanley 50, with the cross grain nickers I was all set to cut grooves as well as rabbets. It might have been my particular version but I was very disappointed. The depth of cut adjustment seemed crude compared to the Record 044, the nickers didn’t work very well and the whole plane seemed light and flimsy. Plus I now had two different sets of incompatible cutters, the 50 blades could be used in the 044 – but with a lot of backlash in the adjuster. The 044 blades wouldn’t fit the Stanley at all.

So I bought a Record 405. A lot to like about it, the size and weight made it easy to use. It proved sufficiently good for rebates that I sold a 778 rebate. I’m not a collector honest, just looking for good usable hand plane solutions.

However the tiny 3-bladed nickers in the 405 were still irksome, finicky to set and always the risk of tiny, tiny screws dropping into the sawdust.

So I bought a Stanley13-050. Even more to like about this one. It could use the same blades as the 405, the large sliding knife type nickers are dead easy to use, my go-to plane now for any cross grain rebates or slots.

In getting together a complete 13-050 I found myself in possession of three different bodies. There was quite a variation in fit and finish.
Earlier Stanley 50 planes had a threaded screw at the rear of the plane to help tweak the sliding section parallel to the main body. I’ve also seen this threaded screw on Stanley 12-250 planes I’ve seen for sale on e-bay. What was interesting was that two of my 13-050s didn’t have the adjusting screw and didn’t seem to need it, the standard of machining was good. The third 13-050 had a poorer standard of casting and did have the adjustment screw. Another discovery was that the 13-050 uses M5 threads for all bolts, none of the odd thread sizes which can be difficult to replace or recut on older planes
At this point I sold the 044 and the 50 plus the two extra 13-050s. At that time I had no intention of buying another plough plane.

My attention turned to making some more complex shapes and I bought some cheap moulding planes. Sharpening and adjustment was a pain. I’d read in the 405 manual about the special bases so I went looking for these. Complete ones are expensive so I bought a couple of hollow and round bases for the 405 without cutters. I’ve heat treated tool steel before so I thought I could make some cutters but then I got the chance of a relatively cheap complete Stanley 55. The fact that the Stanley hollow and round blades from the 55 would fit the bases for the 405 clinched the deal.

The 55 occupied me for some time cleaning it up and getting to grips with it. One of the often cited criticisms of the 55 is that it is more prone to tear-out than a wooden moulding plane since it has no foot pressing down in front of the blade. I found the 55 to be perfectly usable with light cuts and sharp irons. In a few experiments with the old cheap moulding planes I found it difficult to sharpen them consistently, the worry always was that any change in profile would mean that the iron wouldn’t match the body profile. I found the 55 irons easier to sharpen since small changes in profile weren’t an issue, just clamp them in the sort of angled jig described on Alf’s site and then it’s easy to work horizontally with slip-stones or dowels wrapped in abrasive.

Finally my latest and last purchase. I already had three excellent planes, all with interchangeable blades (the simpler ones anyway) but they’re all quite big. Usually size and weight are an asset but I found myself a couple of times wishing for tinier fences.

So I bought an 043 cheap with no blades - without an adjuster on this plane any of the small blades I have will fit it. A bit of faff to store without a blade in it since the holder won’t lock in on just the body, hence the bit of wood stuck in it in the pic. Lots of advice online about fitting deeper fences to an 043 but I want it as small as possible, if I have space to use a deeper fence on the workpiece I’ll use a bigger plane. Also following advice online I’m going to get some short bars for the 043, if I’m cutting at any distance from an edge then again I’ll be using a bigger plane.

Not a collector, honest.
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