Tilgear Grant G4 Hi res pic and 1st impressions.

[patrick]

Please see follow up thread "opinion on Grant Toolworks G4" after reading this


I am going to keep this brief. Hi res pictures should help you make up your mind as should the next paragraph whilst simultaneously casting me into the wilderness as a savage philistine!

This plane will need to be fettled a little but not by much by the look of things. I have bought an after market blade for it, sorry Tom!

The blade it came with was 3mm thick but was cupped and bowed. The short time I wasted showed the steel to be soft. While trying to hammer it into shape I broke it. It was cast, no laminated forging here then. Serves me right for pandering to crappy rips offs.

Aftermarket blade installed with no additional honing and it works. Seems like a good un, no #4 blade on Ebay just yet. Will tune up this w/e I hope. Here are the facts.

Great heft, 2.5KG! Same weight as my 604 1/2.

Sole seems ok. On a surfacing plate a .002" feeler manages to sneek under much of the right side but not a .003".

Sides unsquare but just. Could be hand lapped. I was warned by Tilgear about this and have no intention to shoot with the plane.

Mouth tight but slightly out of square.

Unsquare grind to frog but it squares up to the mouth, look at the pics for the lop sided grinding. Frog does not have the guide grooves found in Stanley bedrocks so it can move side to side like a Bailey pattern.

Look at the lever cap latch union, see anything odd?

Handles stained beech with matt finish. Comfortable to use.

All screws and threads very good. Fit of bedrock pins tight.

Projetion adjustement has fine thread for precise adjustment. 3/4 turn back-lash.

Modern thick chip breaker that seems to fit thus far.

Here are the pics

http://www.cig.canon-europe.com/ph/OPA/ ... KKnK0a.jpg
http://www.cig.canon-europe.com/ph/OPA/ ... KKnK0a.jpg
http://www.cig.canon-europe.com/ph/OPA/ ... KKnK0a.jpg
http://www.cig.canon-europe.com/ph/OPA/ ... KKnK0a.jpg
http://www.cig.canon-europe.com/ph/OPA/ ... KKnK0a.jpg
http://www.cig.canon-europe.com/ph/OPA/ ... KKnK0a.jpg
http://www.cig.canon-europe.com/ph/OPA/ ... KKnK0a.jpg
http://www.cig.canon-europe.com/ph/OPA/ ... KKnK0a.jpg
http://www.cig.canon-europe.com/ph/OPA/ ... KKnK0a.jpg

Patrick has posted very large pictures, Wizer has resized them and they are down the thread a bit. I have turned the pictures into links here so if you want to look at the hi res ones you can.
DaveL with his Mod hat on.

 

[patrick]

Just thought I would add that I only bought this plane due to the offer price currently available, anticipating a blade change. I would not have even considered it at the original price and don't think its worth it's original asking price.

It is unfortunate that the plane is a slavish copy. Different materials and colour scheme would have been more repectful.

 

[John. B]

Well, The plane didn't exactly make me wet my pants.
I think though, your photography is first class.

John. B

 

[Ironballs]

Photography was good though unfortunately I don't have a 36" monitor so could only look at a small section a time!

 

[matthewwh]

If you block LN out of your mind for a moment and judge this tool on its merits I reckon they've done a pretty decent job. If this was the first modern Stanley copy we'd seen I reckon everyone would think they were the bees knees. Not sure about the benefits of the thin slot in the middle of the cutting iron though! Even if the irons do need replacing, you can still get a hell of a lot more work done with four or five of these than you can with one of the others for the same money.

I have seen most of the 'bads' that you list on LN's too (all replaced/refunded in a heartbeat I hasten to add.), so it may just be your specific tool - I'm sure if you stripped a dozen of them and picked the best fitting bits you'd come up with a real beauty. This is the benefit of a hand assembled plane as opposed to a mass produced one, they have an engineer do exactly that with all the bits at the factory where he's got heaps of them to choose from and makes sure that everything fits together sweetly before it goes in the box.

It's a shame that they have just copied the LN without making any actual improvements other than price. Nonetheless, good effort Grant Toolworks and I'm sure Tilgear will shift a few of them.

I'll be stickin' with ma Cliffies though!

 

[Green]

Thanks for the review, I almost bought one of the block planes just to see what it was like.

You will have all the fanboys going mental with this thread. :lol:

 

[wizer]

please can you crop and resize the images down a bit

 

[pedder]

The blade it came with was 3mm thick but was cupped and bowed.
The short time I wasted showed the steel to be soft. While trying to hammer it into shape I broke it.

Not sure about the benefits of the thin slot in the middle of the cutting iron though!

:lol:

Patrick thank you for the big pictures!

Cheers
Pedder

 

[Tony Zaffuto]

Any name markings on it to indicate it is not an L-N to an "unwary" buyer? Any "Made In India" markings? If no, I can imagine seeing these start to show on certain auction sites.

T.Z.

 

[ByronBlack]

Photo's are massive, seriously, can we have some smaller ones with maybe links to the larger ones for those who have a 52" inch screen?

 

[woodbloke]

Agree...pics are to big, going to get another Dalwhinnie :wink: - Rob

 

[wizer]

:roll: :wink:

 

[Ironballs]

Never let me be the one to say you have too much time on your hands Tom

 

[patrick]

Sorry if the image size caused a few probs. I have never posted pictures with html but my intention was to give larger than 1:1 high res images as if under the microscope per say. Many thanks for resizing Wizer.

I live close to Tilgear so I could take the thing to pieces before I bought. I hope my brief review helps those of you on a tighter budget make more of an informed decision on where to spend your hard earned. I will update after a fettle of which I don't expect there to be much as I will not be squaring a side. Machining seems on a par with period bedrocks. My only concern thus far is that the casting seems rather soft but this is largely unsubstantiated as of now.


I am trying to make money out of furniture and don't really use a #4 so this was more of a whimsy to satisfy my bedrock fetish, but if it tunes up well, I may well be looking down my nose at my 604 1/2. To be continued.....

 

[Vann]

Ductile iron body, or good old breaky grey iron, do you think?

Vann

 

[patrick]

Grey iron, just like planes of yore. Man at Tilgear said so.

I would like to stress that I have no known associations or affiliations with Tilgear what so ever.

1st impressions of unfettled plane with honed (aftermarket) blade really rather good. I think affordable (at sale price) mid range plane would be a fair description.

 

[ByronBlack]

Thanks tom for the smaller pics, It's look pretty decent, quite similar to the stanley's to my eyes, but if it takes less to fettle it could be a decent option. what steel is the blade?

 

[bugbear]

what steel is the blade?

Gran padano!

BugBear

 

[bugbear]

OOh! Cheap lateral adjust lever!

BugBear