Rosewood Tote/Glue

[Mike Hutchison]

I might attempt to repair the broken off horn on the tote for my
No. 8 plane. Will TiteBond yellow glue work well here?
Should I rough up surfaces and wipe down with a solvent?
My first thought was to get a flat surface on the tote's top and
then rough shape my repair piece and come up with a mini-biscuit
or spline to join the two.
Have spent a little more time on rust "triage"
The sole is pretty flat; no major pitting.
One other question: on the pre-lateral No. 8 is 25 Deg. the correct
primary bevel?

[steven c newman]

Get both parts to a no-gap joint....then clean the joint with acetone.

Stanley used a 25 degree for almost all their plane iron bevels...as did most of the other makers. Some even marked the angle to be used right on the iron.

easier to glue a block onto the tote, so that clamping the two parts together will be easier....THEN after the glue has cured a day, or so..shape the repair part to suit.

[Tom Stenzel]

Get both parts to a no-gap joint....then clean the joint with acetone.
.....
easier to glue a block onto the tote, so that clamping the two parts together will be easier....THEN after the glue has cured a day, or so..shape the repair part to suit.

That's how I did mine except I didn't clean the joint with acetone. The glue held fine anyway. I don't remember what glue I used but it was whatever was on sale at the store when I was there, might have been Gorilla wood glue (not polyurethane) but more likely it was Elmer's wood glue.

-Tom

[Charles Bjorgen]

I’ve always used epoxy with an initial cleaning of the mating surfaces with acetone. Last one I fixed the break was at an angle and I used the screw in the handle to tighten the joint while the epoxy cured . It slipped just a bit and I had to do some shaving at the joint to fix the unevenness. I like Steven’s idea of evening the break and gluing in a new block then shaping afterwards.

[Jim Koepke]

Epoxy has worked best for me. Clear is my favorite. it can be mixed with some rosewood sawdust to help it blend in.

Cleaning with acetone or other lacquer thinner helps to remove the natural oils.

Rigging up a clamping method helps, especially with non-epoxy glues. Epoxy can fill gaps, yellow glues (pva glues) do not. Mine is a piece of 1/4-20 all thread with a couple of wing nuts and washers holding a couple blocks of wood cut and drilled to hold a tote together.

If the break is bad, the pieces can be cleaned up by sawing and if need be make a shim to fill the gap. This was done to one of my totes. It is on a #5 plane that is used a lot. It is a bit taller than all my other plane's totes and doesn't cramp my hand.

The shim gives it a look of having a muted racing strip since it is a piece of red heart.

jtk

[Richard Line]

"The shim gives it a look of having a muted racing strip since it is a piece of red heart." Wow, a plane with a racing stripe, how cool is that!

[Bill Houghton]

I've used Titebond II, without cleaning the rosewood, and it's worked fine for me. A rubdown with acetone won't hurt - it's so volatile, it will have flashed off by the time you set the parts down.

[Hasin Haroon]

I've glued rosewood totes back together without using any acetone or specific surface prep. Both epoxy and yellow glue seemed to work just fine, and the totes have held up in use.

[Brandon Speaks]

I had a cracked tote, I just pulled it off broke it clean and glued right back together with TB 2 or 3 (whichever I had on hand, I dont really recall) and it has held up for a year with quite a bit of use and no sign of an issue. Acetone could not hurt though.

[Rob Luter]

I used gorilla glue after a wipe down with DA. It’s invisible.