Homemade Transitional Plane

A while back in WOOD magazine, issue #236, November 2015, there was an article on pages 68-71 on "Make Your Own Transitional Plane." the basis for making this plane was to take an old broken/junk Transitional plane and make a new usable plane.

Fortunately, a friend recently gave me an old transitional plane, with the iron part of the body broken. 

The perfect donor.

Using the paterns in the magazine I made the pattern for the sides....

And the tote.

The sole was cut from hard maple and the mouth was made by drilling out the waste and cleaning up the sides of the opening with a chisel and a final fit after glued up.

I quickly progressed to the glue up as per the instruction in the Magazine.

And soon had a glued up body, with a block of wood in the slot for the tote, this was to keep the slot open to the right size during glue-up. For the front infill I had a piece of highly figured Walnut which was not nearly large enough for the rough size, so I glued up scrap pieces that would be cut away after glue-up.

The sides are made out of Birds Eye Maple.

Here is a look at the tote slot after cutting the body to final size.

And the notch for the Frog to fit into.

Here is the body cut to final size. Shaping the ends to come.

And then gluing the tote into the body.

Here is the finished plane, I gave the wood 4 coats of Danish Oil and 2 coats of Polyurethane.

View from the back.

And it does cut nice and makes nice shavings.

The iron is a NOS VINTAGE WARRANTED SHEFFIELD 2 1/8" PLANE BLADE W MARPLES SHEFFIELD STEEL. I bought this off of eBay from a gentleman at KIBWORTH DIY in England, he had a stock of these irons in the original waxed wrapper.

All in all very  happy with the results.

Home made Chisel Plane

I have no idea where this plane came from, I found it sitting on a shelf in my shop, the only marking on the iron  in a circle says "Damon Raikes & Co. Gernany with DARAIKE in the middle. The iron itself is 1 9/16" wide X  4 9/16" long.

Here is a little History: Damon Raike Co. DARAIKE Germany - was actually a business started by Damon Raike SR. in the early 1920's in Chicago, IL, but the tools were manufactured and imported from Germany (location unknown) Damon, a Mechanical Engineer, went to Germany on business a few times according to his son Damon Raikes Jr. 

Damon's father Louis Raike was born in Russia and was a Milliner himself back in 1900 along with his brother Isidore and cousin John Wineberg. Damon Sr was born in Michigan, served a few months as a Private during WWI and then started the Damon Raike Co and hardware business, shortly after starting the tool line he had to give it up because of the cost associated with the Fordney-McCumber Tariff of 1922 as it went into effect, which raised American Tariffs on many imported goods. 
By 1930 Damon Raike started a printing business, Schenker Co.

Damon Raike died in June of 1945 in Chicago Illinois.

Thanks to Geoff Raike for this information.

So this little plane came to me through a very narrow window, between the time Raike started importing tools in the early1920's and the time he shut down in 1922.

 This poor little block plane has had a neglected life as you can tell by looking at it.Out of no where came the idea to turn it into a Chisel Plane rather than just throw it away, above the red line shows the crack in the body and the proposed cut line.

So I plunged ahead and made the cut, then some grinding, filing and sanding.

After some cleaning of parts painting and sharpening of the iron. Here is the final results, a cute little useful plane,

This type of plane is good for flush cutting plugs, as shown above (see the plug in front of the plane)and cleaning up glue squeeze out in corners.

Front View

Side view. This was fun, I took this little broken plane and turned it into something useful. 

Now I believe I need to find a better Iron as the metal in this original iron is of pretty poor quality.

Low Angle Block Planes

I bought both of these at flee Markets, the 118 cost me $5.00, and the 60 1/2 cost me $10.00. Both slice through wood very good as purchased, once they are cleaned up I am sure they will perform very well.

This 118 is in fairly good shape, I will only clean the upper surfaces up

 and true up the sole and sharpen the iron.

This one comes with Maroon paint, looks like factory applied.

These block planes are not highly regarded as it does not have an adjustable mouth.

It cuts well as it is.

The sole has some surface rust, but no pitting, 

notice the iron is sharpened on a slight angle, it is set true in the body, meant to make it cut easier?

This 60 1/2 is in fair shape, I will give it a thorough cleaning

 and sharpening and polish. 

The sole has some minor pitting which I will polish out,

 this iron also has it's edge on an angle. The iron is true to the body.

Edward Preston & Sons Ltd.Bull Nose Plane late 1800

I picked this little gem up on eBay from Great Britain, it was a bit rough, but never the less was little used, the mouth was tight and the iron was hardly ever used.

With a little work on the body and the iron it turned into a good working plane, this is the original style wedge according to the catalog picture, I plan to replace this one with a rose wood wedge.

That's it in the upper left

Stanley #4 Wood Plane

Bad news, I had never paid much attention to my Stanley #4, which is 1892 to 1902 vintage until now, problem is the frog is broken. Will have to think about this. Is trying to fix this plane worth it or should I simply look for another #4.

                                                        Corrugated Sole is a nice feature

The frog is broken and a replacement frog for this particular plane is scarce

                           The cap and iron are pretty rusty, the iron says "Pat Apl 1892"

                              The Lever Cap has a chip, not a real problem as it is small

Stanley 9 1/2 Block Plane

As part of my Cardiac Rehab, I needed something easy to do to get moving again, as I plan to build a European Work Bench as soon as I get the kitchen done and use my hand planes, I decided to start rehabbing some of my wood working planes.
Not wanting to start on something too difficult, I decided to start on my Stanley 9 1/2 Block plane. Unfortunately I didn't take any before pictures.
That won't happen when I start on my Stanley #4 corrugated sole plane which is next on my list.

                          I didn't repaint it as the original paint is in pretty good shape,
                          I lapped the sides to make them reasonably flat.

I lapped the sole to make it perfectly flat, if you don't do this it will chatter even with the sharpest iron. This block plane had a low spot behind the throat and a spot at both the toe and the heel, plenty of work on wet or dry sand paper (wet, with lots of rinsing of the sand paper to keep it clean) 1st I used 180 grit, then 220 grit, followed by 320 and finally 400, with a good buffing. It is flat now!


                                            
                          Now I need to add some pictures with the resulting shavings.


Update 3-4-12: Sharpened the iron using my DMT Diamond plates. First I flattend the back, then using my Vertitas MK II Honing Guide I sharpened the iron, first I used the DMT Extra Coarse plate to true the blade up, then made a few passes on the Coarse plate before moving to the Fine, then to the Extra Fine, once satisfied with the edge I back beveled the sharpened edge and gave it a try, the picture below is the resulting shavings planing the edge of a piece of Quarter Sawn White Oak. It cut like butter.