Crooked slot in Stanley blade?

[Dan Hahr]

The latest plane that I have begun restoring is a #5 with the SW logo on the blade. Other than the pitting rust in places, the plane was relatively intact. However, the slot in the blade was very crooked, almost 1/4 inch out of parallel with the sides of the blade. At first, I thought it was a wider blade that was cut to fit, but then I cleaned the blade and saw the SW logo in the center, off from the slot.

Was this a common issue or did Stanley actually deliver planes that were seconds or this far out of whack?

Thanks, Dan

[Jim Koepke]

Dan,

I missed your post until just now.

I have mentioned a few times that the slots are not always parallel to the side nor are the sides always parallel to each other. This is a bit more than I have seen.

Quality control and quality assurance are often hit and miss operations. To pass a batch of incoming blades, supposedly random samples are removed and checked. If the bad blade was one of the random samples, the whole batch could be rejected. If all the samples were good, then all the blades in the batch are passed. Depending on how the line workers are trained or even how they feel on any given day, the blade may just be thrown in and the worker says, "well, quality control let it through, so it ships."

When I worked "in the field" repairing customer equipment, it was often convenient to ship parts directly to the customer. This would allow a part to be in place the next day to keep a machine out of service for the shortest amount of time. On one occasion, the receiving clerk was not going to allow anything out of his area without a QC approval. I had to go find his manager to get my part. Their QC department was not going to approve my part since they did not have a drawing to qualify it. That kind of bureaucracy probably doesn't have to happen to a line worker too many times before they decide it is just easier to "put it in the box and let it ship."

jim