Help with old Stanley planes

[Robby Tacheny]

I recently went to an antique mall with a great collection of old hand planes, spokeshaves, chisels, and many other tools. The brands of metal planes are sargent, stanley, and a few others I don't remember right now. They also had many wooden ones.

There are are some pictures I took on my phone below...

I picked up my first "real" planes this weekend and plan on cleaning them up and making "user" planes out of them. I have done a little research online and have found:

One is a Stanley #8 which looks to be from around 1910 - 1918 and type 11? It has three patent numbers and "Bailey" on the front. The cutter has the "V Shaped" logo. However it has a broken handle top and the lateral adjustment lever is bent on at nearly a 90 degree and parallel to the body right at the "thumb rest". Otherwise it is in good working condition with no missing parts

The other is a Stanley #5c which is pretty well worn. It has the "kidney" shaped hole in the lever cap, and "made in USA" and "Bailey" on the body. It looks to be a type 19 from 1948 - 1961. I believe it has a "sweetheart" iron, but it is pretty worn. All I see is the "]" on top from the logo and an "A" from Made in the USA.They are spaced far enough apart for the heart to be there and the a is as small as the bracket. It is also in good working condition with no missing parts.

My questions are:


Will they make good and usable planes if cleaned up?
What could I use to clean them up that comes from an Advanced Autopart store and an ACE Hardware store?
Is the #8 valuable if the handle and horizontal adjustment lever are replaced with parts from another old #8 and maybe the handle and knob of an old #5?

I am not really too worried about value, more about usability. I just don't want to ruin the #8 if there is a chance I could keep it more original.

Thanks,

-R

[Bob Easton]

A lot of us would like to find stores like that in our neighborhoods. The last time I saw a place like that was up in Maine.

From the pictures, it looks like you have a couple of good buys, especially if you want "users."

EVERYTHING you need to know about rehabing the planes can be found in Bob Smalser's excellent article on this site. See it at: http://sawmillcreek.org/showthread.php?t=5771&highlight=rehabilitating+planes

I go for "users," so I won't venture in advice on maintaining the value of the #8. I'll leave that to Mike Henderson or Jim Koepke.

Enjoy your finds, and the slide down the slope.

[scott spencer]

That bent lever looks plenty fixable...have you tried to straighten it?

Check out RexMill.com (http://rexmill.com/)- handplanes101/Handle repair section. There's an excellent tutorial about fixing a broken handle.

[Jim Koepke]

Well, I am not sure there is much to add to the above. Looks like you have received good advice from Bob and Scott.

If you do not have a sharpening set up, Google scary sharp. The finer grades of sanding abrasive can be bought at any auto parts store that carries supplies for refinishing. Some of the chains do not carry fine grit sand paper, some do. If your local hardware store carries marble or granite tile, that is a good surface. You might also be able to get a piece of scrap marble or granite counter top.

This will help you through the learning curve of sharpening until you decide what kind of set up you want to buy.

The lateral levers are pretty much the same size from plane to plane. I removed one the other day and had to file the mushroom off of the rivet holding it in place. An auger file is good for this as they have smooth sides adjacent to the cutting sides. This keeps you from cutting into surfaces that you do not want to be damaged.

In your case, I would not worry too much about the bent lever. At most, I might take the frog off of the plane and try carefully using my small drill press vise to straighten it out. Other wise, a couple of crescent wrenches would be used, one to hold between the frog and the bend and the other to straighten it. Look for cracks and weakening before doing this. If it shows signs of weakness, leave it as is.

One of the cardinal rules of working on things is to take stock of the situation and understand what may or may not happen before proceeding.

If you want to refinish the planes, rexmill.com does give good advice on the process he used. There are as many ways to do this as there are to paint a house.

Steel wool and 100-220 grit sand paper are good for getting rid of light surface rust. Do not worry about the dark blue or gray rust. Just get the red rust off. The others are a patina that help to keep the red rust from forming in normal conditions.

Getting a piece of rose wood or something else should not be too difficult in order to repair the tote. A replacement tote is likely to cost $20-$40 for a good rose wood tote. If a newer hardwood painted tote is OK, those can be had much cheaper, $5 and up.

Have fun and ask more questions, we not only will be happy to help, our only charge is for you to post some pictures when you are done.

Of course, my suggestions are for user planes. If you want display planes, that is a different story.

jim

[Robby Tacheny]

I have read the sticky on restoring planes by Bob Smalser. I am going to try a few changes and use the #5 as the guinea pig.

I think I'll start by rubbing everything with mineral spirits if we get a warm day. Then I'll de-rust.

A little more research further shows that I can find "Prep and Prime" at Home Depot, Ace, or other building stores. Another agent that apparently removes rust is vinegar. I might try the vinegar first on the #5C as it is much cheaper for a gallon of vinegar.

After that I'll try buffing, but it will have to be all by hand since I don't have a wheel.

Are the other steps protection or kind of personal prefence sort of things?

Thanks for the kind advice so far.

-R

[Johnny Kleso]

I would say your No.8 is worth about $60 in the condition you state and a No.5 is worth about $25 + or - a few bucks...

Refinishing blades is a lot of work and as I look back might be a much better way to go than what I have and still do now...

You ca pick up new Stanley blades here..
http://www.stanleytoolparts.com/beplcu.html
Double Irons (Blade and Cap Iron) might be your best bet unless your blades are in very good conditon which is often rare..

[Robby Tacheny]

The #8 blade is actually in very good shape. I feel like I could just sharpen it and make some shavings now, believe it or not. I forgot to mention that I have a scary sharp setup for sharpening and have all my grits of sanpaper stuck to a piece of marble tile. I do "ok" free hand, but I think I am going to get a VeritasII honing guide soon.

The #5 iron may not be worth fixing, but it is pretty long so it may have a bit of life to it. I haven't measured them to see how much is left yet though. I have lapped some cheap Stanley contractor grade planes, so it can't be much harder! ;)

I've been reading the RexMill site for nearly an hour. It has great ideas!

Thanks!

-R

[Jim Koepke]

The #8 blade is actually in very good shape. I feel like I could just sharpen it and make some shavings now, believe it or not. I forgot to mention that I have a scary sharp setup for sharpening and have all my grits of sanpaper stuck to a piece of marble tile. I do "ok" free hand, but I think I am going to get a VeritasII honing guide soon.

-R

Being a free hand sharpening kind of guy, it never occurred to me to buy a honing guide. My hand sharpening is on water stones, but sometimes use scary sharp. My power system has 5 blade holders. One night, I turned a wheel from a wooden dowel for the holders just on a lark. I have found with a guide the blades can be worked much faster. My plan now is to buy a piece of acrylic or some other plastic and turn a more stable wheel for the holders.

My preference when sharpening is to try and do blades in batches. Not always possible, but often when one plane has a dull blade, so do some of the others or maybe a few chisels.

The pictures of the shop look like you have found the mother lode of old planes.

jim

[Joe Cunningham]

I do "ok" free hand, but I think I am going to get a VeritasII honing guide soon.

Thanks!

-R

I have the MkII and a cheap-o $5 one. I prefer the $5 one for honing plane blades. It has such a narrow little wheel that I can camber the iron just using pressure--thx to David Charlesworth's technique as shown in excellent articles and DVDs.

I use the MkII on chisels and on my shooting plane blades when I want a dead-straight edge with no camber. I suppose I could buy their camber wheel, but haven't felt the need to after trying Mr Charlesworth's technique.

[Christopher Dowie]

I can tell you that Vinegar is the way to remove rust. I discovered this last summer when I was rebuilding an old rototiller. Presently I am removing rust from an old brace I found amongst my souvenirs that needs a little TLC.

Just submerge the rusty part in vinegar and leave it over night. next day you can take it to the sink and scrub off the rust with a tooth brush. I have one of those little wire brushes with brass bristles that I use for stuff with deeper pits. The vinegar dissolves the rust, given enough time, and you can simply wipe it away. Cleans out all rust, even from the deepest pits.

Be sure to completely dry the item after washing off the rust in the sink or else surface rust will form right away. I dry with a cloth and then stick it in a warm oven or hit it with a blow dryer for a few seconds to be sure it's completely dry. A light coat of WD40 will stop it rusting, but don't put this on if you plan to paint.

My first post. So there you go. :cool:

Sure wish I had access to that shop you found. What a neat place.

Christopher