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Thread: El Cheapo Plane - Why Bother
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8th October 2013, 04:14 PM #1
El Cheapo Plane - Why Bother
Good Morning Y'All
I keep saying that the biggest wood working mistake that I made is buying crap tools - repeatedly. I have done it again. Last month, at a flea market, I could not resist a $10 hand plane.
It is a plastic handled Stanley #4½ 'made in England' and the iron looked like it had never been sharpened, ever. All nicely rounded. A quick sharpen, and it did not cut very well at all - lots of chatter.
Stripped down and discovered the following anomolies:
- frog was not parallel to the mouth by about 2mm,
- no frog adjusting screw or provision for one - just the two frog tightening screws on top,
- machined face of frog (where iron sits) not perfectly flat,
- machined face of "claw" on frog that sits just behind mouth not close to flat,
- top of body of plane where frog mounts was unevenly japaned, not machined,
- back of iron was convex in both longitudinal and cross-wise directions,
- chip breaker "wavy" on edge where it presses behind sharp edge of iron,
- sole is concave cross-wise,
- longitudinally, sole is "S-shaped" - ridge about 20mm from each end and concave between these ridges,
- I measured the concavity at 0.18 mm,
- steel in plane body is rather grainy,
- I do not like plastic handles,
- And it cost $10!
IMHO, it is not worth the effort of attempting to fettle it.
Fair Winds
Graeme
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8th October 2013, 04:56 PM #2Senior Member
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Interesting, now I'm actually a little relieved that I didn't buy that plastic handled 4 1/2 I had my eye on a while ago..
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8th October 2013, 05:10 PM #3
I cant stand the 4 1/2 Stanley size . I think it's the only Stanley I don't want.
It could have been worse though , you might have picked up a cheapo new smoother POS the one thats similar size to a 4 or 4 1/2
They make me feel like this.
Lloyd Christmas dry heaving - YouTube
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8th October 2013, 07:05 PM #4no frog adjusting screw or provision for oneWe don't know how lucky we are......
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8th October 2013, 07:30 PM #5Jim
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Sounds like a Stanley handyman I got my son years ago. it was unfixable. I know where is, hidden out of the way in someone else's shed where it won't be used and so can do no harm.
Cheers,
Jim
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8th October 2013, 07:42 PM #6
You've probably missed that little Y adjusting lever that connects to the adjuster knob. On mine (Given to me by the next door neighbour) it is made of two pieces of pressed metal and the pin holding it in place is a piece of soft bright wire. Any turn of the adjuster nut just bends the pin rather than moving the blade.
I was about to toss mine until I had an epiphany when out of desperation I put one of the thick Stanley replacement blade mongrels into it. I finally found a body suitable to the blade! The mouth was so wide I had a plane that I didn't need to do major surgery on to use it!
At the moment I'm using a hammer to do blade adjustment by tapping. Works a treat.
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9th October 2013, 02:26 PM #7
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9th October 2013, 02:36 PM #8
Thanks Fuzzie
If you mean that little Y-shaped adjuster that cradles the adjuster knob and moves the blade up and down, then it is there and it works - a little sloppy, but workable.
I was refering to the screws underneath that adjuster knob which normally and precisely move the frog back and forth to align it appropriately to the mouth. There is just nothing there.
I thought of the possibility of adding a good quality replacement blade and wooden tote and knob, .... and the many hours of straitening/flattening virtually all surfaces. It just ain't worth the effort. Conceivably, I would finish up with a crap plane with a good iron and good handles, but still a crap plane.
Fair Winds
Graeme
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9th October 2013, 02:53 PM #9Jim
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Sell it on ebay Graeme. Tell the truth, admit it's crap and there is sure to be someone out there who knows better and will try to prove you wrong.
Cheers,
Jim
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9th October 2013, 03:06 PM #10
I know what you mean. I just happened to have three unusable things that came together. I had already replaced the plastic handles on mine with timber ones off some Russian monstrosity that I can't remember where it came from. (I am a reformed rust collector, but I still have a box of misspent parts) The original plastics on my 4 1/2 had both started bleeding some sort of oil and had shrunk alarmingly. I then happened to have a still unusable plane and an unusable blade lying around that met on a blind date. I wasn't recommending spending real $'s on an upgrade.
I think you must have one of the Handyman line of planes, they didn't have frog adjusting screw. I think they might have also come with a dark brown paint job.
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9th October 2013, 05:33 PM #11
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9th October 2013, 05:35 PM #12
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9th October 2013, 05:41 PM #13Jim
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9th October 2013, 07:08 PM #14
You could drink Windex......you'd be clearer then*.
I've never heard of (or noticed) a Made in England Stanley plane that didn't have the frog-adjuster screw......doesn't mean they don't exist.....but it does mean that that doesn't sound right.
It's freezing here at the moment, I know there's a junk 4&1/2 in the shed somewhere, I'll check tomorrow.
*Joke. Don't drink windex, that wouldn't be funny.We don't know how lucky we are......
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9th October 2013, 07:55 PM #15
Came across a Stanley 4 1/2 with plastic handle at work. No blade though.
After reading this and other reports, I think it will be stored in a big (scrap) bin never to be seen again.
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