Strange Plane; Questions

[Rob Paul]

At a local auction last week I picked up this strange transitional plane (cheap ! :) ) with brass castings instead of iron for the baseplate and frog, and also a nice brass cap on the handle. No markings on it, except that the cutting iron is a 2-1/8" wide "B Plane Pat Oct 22 1889". The lever cap and frog look similar to the Stanley 26/27, but I couldn't find any commercial Stanleys or B Planes to match this one, so its likely a custom design.
Does anyone recognize the baseplate shape that might have been used for making the brass casting ?? (its somewhat similar to a Stanley 35, but narrower around the front knob, different at the handle, and a different cutout around the depth adjuster screw)
The brass cap on the handle is held in place with a bent rod that is bolted through the baseplate. It's a nice design that would protect the handle from the common damage of a chipped horn (stylish too). Has this concept been used on any commercial manufactured plane ??
I cleaned up the plane and replaced the missing depth adjuster post and screw

[Jim Koepke]

If you search the patent date you will find this:

http://www.datamp.org/patents/displayPatent.php?pn=413300&id=8927


The Birmingham Plane Mfg. Co., of Birmingham, Connecticut made a line of "B Planes" that are usually marked with this patent date. The patent date is usually found on the blade along with the "B" marking. The B Planes were only made until 1891 when the company changed its name to the "Derby Plane Mfg. Co." As a result, they're fairly scarce. George Mosher is assignee on a later cutter adjustment patent 455957.

Most often when a brass casting is encountered it came from a pattern maker. It seems when ever they had a bit of spare time they were fooling around like many other workers in industry.

More research is in order to find if this plane was originally made of brass/bronze by the Birmingham Plane Mfg. Company factory or if it is a reproduction.

jtk

[Rob Paul]

Thanks Jim. I had done a brief web search of Birmingham and Stanley/Bailey transitionals, but failed to find a match for my baseplate layout in the models that I could find details for. (And its quite possible that the B-Plane cutting iron was just added to a custom plane build with no other connection to Birmingham Plane Co)

I'm hoping that someone might recognize some of the unique details of my baseplate shape, or the handle cap detail.
(maybe an uncommon B-Plane or Stanley model, or from some other manufacturer such as Sargent, Gage, Union, Seigley, ....?).
[I was thinking that it would be likely that a custom brass casting moulds would have been formed using existing cast iron pieces, (but that assumption may be wrong as a Patternmaker could readily modify those shapes to suit his own design).]

[Jim Koepke]

[I was thinking that it would be likely that a custom brass casting moulds would have been formed using existing cast iron pieces, (but that assumption may be wrong as a Patternmaker could readily modify those shapes to suit his own design).]

Copying something that already was produced is often how pattern makers made their molds to cast their own copy.

jtk