Hand Plane Restoration

[HRRLutherie]

Hi Everyone

A while back I acquired a No. 5 Jack Plane. There's a lot of rust on the blade, chip breaker and lever cap, and a lot of surface rust on the sole. The rest of the components seem to be in reasonable working order. It's been sitting in my house for a while and I want to do something about it. It's a Footprint plane, but the lever cap is from a Record SS plane.

I see three ways of doing this:

1. De-rust all parts and put to use
2. De-rust all parts but replace lever cap, blade and chip breaker with Quangsheng replacements
3. Buy a brand new Quangsheng No. 5

Which do you suggest?

Also, I think the main problem with the plane body and frog is saw dust and dirt. How would I go about removing it from all the little nooks and crannies?

Thanks in advance

 

[Blister]

3. Buy a brand new Quangsheng No. 5

:wink: :mrgreen:

 

[Vann]

It doesn't matter that the plane is Footprint and the lever cap is Record. No need to go spending hard earned money on that.

First, find out if the plane has potential, or if it's a basket-case. Grind the iron, derust the sole and try planing. If you can get it to make reasonable shavings then it has potential. Then you can give it a bit more TLC and decide if a new iron or cap-iron is worthwhile. If the damn thing won't make shavings, and you've exhausted all known cures, then look at a new one (or another older one).

There's plenty of info on how to go about doing up planes on here, but full clean-up, new irons and lever-cap, on an untested second-hand plane is not the way forward - IMHO (do I have humble opinions? probably not :mrgreen: ).

Cheers, Vann.

 

[jettagreg]

does it have a record blade with a 2 piece cap iron? you could probably sell the lever cap for £10 if its really nice condition.

 

[Dodge]

3. Buy a brand new Quangsheng No. 5

:wink: :mrgreen:

+1 -buy the Quangsheng

 

[Racers]

Hi,

Flog the Record SS leaver cap on E bay and put the money towards a Quangsheng.
I don't think its worth restoring they aren't good planes to start with, it the SS leaver cap was a 4 1/2 I would have had it off you.

Pete

 

[Unib]

I've fixed up a number of Record basket cases that now cut perflectly – I like bringing these things back to life. The steps I take are:

Take the whole thing apart and check everything is there that's s'pose to be.
Spray with degreaser and clean up with Scotchbright/rag/pointy thing to get into the corners to get the gunk out.
Check the components to make sure they're going to work, particularly the sole, if it's badly out of shape, give up.
Dunk all the metal bits in Corro Dip for about 16 hours - this stuff is rather magical and will remove all the rust.
Rub the web parts over the Scotchbright
Put the plane back together and flatten the sole
Take apart again and clean up as much as you see fit. Flatten off frog mating surfaces.
If the blade's good keep that, sharpen up. If not, replace with Quangsheng (you'll probably have to remove a bit of the mouth with a file to fit it in)
Replace cap iron with Quangsheng
Clean paint of handles (there's always paint!)
Put back together

Don't give up on it until you've had a go - it's a great way to get to know your plane and just because it's got rusted up doesn't mean it can't be a great plane again!

 

[bugbear]

Also, I think the main problem with the plane body and frog is saw dust and dirt.

That's NOT a problem - just brush it off, using a washing up brush, or toothbrush if you want to play at being an archaeologist. If it's super stubborn use swarfega or similar.

BugBear

 

[Jeff Gorman]

HRRLutherie wrote:

A while back I acquired a No. 5 Jack Plane. There's a lot of rust on the blade, chip breaker and lever cap, and a lot of surface rust on the sole. The rest of the components seem to be in reasonable working order. It's been sitting in my house for a while and I want to do something about it.

Perhaps a look at http://tinyurl.com/yby9sne will help in evaluating the work that could be involved. I imagine that much could depend on the intended use of the plane - figured stuff with wild grain or planing the edges of chipboard panels?

Jeff
http://www.amgron.clara.net

 

[SurreyHills]

Having fettled a few planes, following advice on here, I would say if it is just light surface rust then it should take too much time to clean it up and might be worth doing. But as Vann says get it to a stage where you can try it out to assess whether it will perform well before spending too much effort on trying to rescue a basket case.

If it looks like too much trouble go for a Quangsheng.

 

[HRRLutherie]

Thanks for all the quick responses!

I think I'll go with Vann's advice and clean it up before I put any money towards it.

If that fails, I suppose I may as well fork out on the Quansheng; if I look after it it ought to last a lifetime!

 

[JohnCee]

Thanks for all the quick responses!

I think I'll go with Vann's advice and clean it up before I put any money towards it.

If that fails, I suppose I may as well fork out on the Quansheng; if I look after it it ought to last a lifetime!

Alternative; ready fettled Stanley/Record from Ray Iles. Very good value. Alternatively he will surface grind your existing plane for a price that makes it hardly worth taking the trip to B&Q and buying the sandpaper. Unless you enjoy messing around with planes, which is a perfectly valid pastime!

 

[HRRLutherie]

Could you give me a link to the Ray Iles Stanley/Record restoration, please

And Unib, could you tell me where I can get some Corrodip

Thanks again for all your help

 

[JohnCee]

Could you give me a link to the Ray Iles Stanley/Record restoration, please

And Unib, could you tell me where I can get some Corrodip

Thanks again for all your help

Ray Iles "website": http://www.oldtoolstore.com/

You'll have to phone him for prices etc.

 

[Harbo]

Yes he is not very good with emails etc?
best to phone him.

Rod

 

[Scouse]

Got a couple of restorations on the go at the moment, one of which I've posted here

w-s-5-1-2-restoration-t60438.html

to give an idea of what can be achieved with relatively little, but enjoyable and satisfying work.

El.

 

[Unib]

you can get Corrodip here: http://goo.gl/Z36rX

I know it's not vastly cheap but you can use it over and over again (just think about all those rusty planes waiting to be restored)

Could you give me a link to the Ray Iles Stanley/Record restoration, please

And Unib, could you tell me where I can get some Corrodip

Thanks again for all your help

 

[HRRLutherie]

I know it's not vastly cheap but you can use it over and over again

Ahhhhhh

That explains the prices

I'll give it a go, thanks!

 

[jimi43]

I know it's not vastly cheap but you can use it over and over again

Ahhhhhh

That explains the prices

I'll give it a go, thanks!

CORRO DIP in action.....

Before....

During....

After....

Cheap....safe...and re-useable

:wink:

Jim

 

[HRRLutherie]

Wow, impressive!

So do you just keep it in a tub?