Who was the customer for a plane like this in old England?

[D_W]

David, there are dozens of plane makers capable of building better planes than a Norris. Either by hand or with the aid of CNC. The value of a Norris lies in its name. Ditto an instrument played by any famous musician. It's value lies in being owned and/or played by a famous name.

Regards from Perth

Derek

I get what you're saying, but you asked whether the instruments had value. One of the vintage guitars that clapton has that's original would still be several hundred thousand dollars.

You also asked are they any better than other guitars....yes, they are. It's a bad comparison with this norris.

This is a collector/antique thing and not a matter of competence in use. And in this case, the tool was impractical from the start - that was the nature of my original question. The fact that it was impractical for planes instead of making the tool less valuable (which is the case for uncommon guitar goods that were expensive and not good from the start), it makes a tool more valuable. There are other parallels to this, like rare farm equipment - the odd factor makes the equipment valuable, and there is a market - retired farmers who have had the luck of amassing a huge farm and then selling the land - that drive the prices to stratospheric levels.

I could build a plane that would match the norris, but it would be impractical. I could build a functional plane that would match any ever made, even by holtey sans adjuster (no interest) and make it as flat as a starrett could show, and then add some hand biases that may not be in some of the more common boutique makers.....but I wouldn't necessarily have the patience or desire to really make every part of the plane photo perfect in surface finish in and out. That's a pain and that's the difference between sauer, holtey or norris (again, sans adjuster - karl is bonkers about trying to get a poorly designed adjuster made perfectly to cover some of the issues with them).

None of the boutique makers' planes are technically better than a norris with a ward iron, though. The norris may have moved a little over time, but that's minor with steel dovetailed planes and is something even I could correct without resorting to machine tools.

This is a similar notion to japanese chisels or japanese razors - there was no real market for aesthetically ideal chisels 60 years ago. The improvement in kiyotada's chisel aesthetics and all of the $600 per chisel makes that are around now are due to marketing to people from the US and western europe. This is the parallel with holtey's planes - the improvements would be not functional to even an intermediate woodworker. As far as the japanese chisel comparison goes, I have a new late kiyotada chisel. It is an excellent chisel. I have learned to heat treat that type of steel in the open atmosphere better than commercial schedule results, and the older chisels that I fish off of japan's ebay are in the same class as the prettiest of tools now.

This focus on aesthetics is a matter of selling to amateur markets by enterprising individuals, whether they're the seller or the maker.

 

[D_W]

Here's a different way of putting the guitar comparison.
* who is the market for the original fender and gibson guitars (they were relatively expensive compared to stock guitars now). Professional musicians and wealthy people who also played guitar. They were practical, new, better or unique. Much is made about how few gibson sold, but they sold 643 les paul standards in 1959. Not really that low of a number given the target market. The cost was around a month's wage for an average person when disposable income wasn't so plentiful, but the guitars were practical and heavily used and have been ever since.
* who is the market for original fender and gibson guitars now when a vintage guitar can get to mid 6 figures without provenance? Professional musicians and wealthy people who play or collect guitars -the best examples found their way to musicians.

can guitars be made to a more perfect micrometer spec now? Probably, but not in a way that matters, just as there's no functional improvement in any of the boutique makers planes now.

I tried to think of something made for professionals earlier today that didn't make sense at the time it was new, really wasn't unobtainably expensive, doesn't need provenance and is for sale now at high prices. I couldn't think of anything. There are other off models made by fender or gibson that are rarer than the guitars that are valuable now (as in, without provenance), and it's shocking to see something in a catalog that's expensive and then think "I haven't ever seen one of those". the answer to that is that if there was no professional appeal that lasted, nobody cares.

i'd be curious if anyone else can think of an item like this - the version mentioned here is impractical. However, the whole range isn't. Unlike guitars, the ones that are rare because few wanted them end up being the ones now collected. This isn't a response to derek, but a question for all.

Stretching the question to amplifiers with guitars, the ones that are super valuable now tend not to be the most complicated or expensive at the time - they are the ones that were functional for professionals.

 

[raffo]

Someone who reads large text to me, or it could've been steve voigt...I can't remember who...told me that the long wooden jointers were seen as a plane to be used to true a long edge and that's about it. Reference about why had something to do with physical strain, calling the 30 inch types of jointers "man killers".

That might have been me. Sometime ago I found online a trade magazine from early 1900s. In it there was an opinion piece, the relevant part was a thankful attitude to powered jointing machines. The author contrasted that with the case of a jointer who used a hand plane and was required to produce a given length of jointed edges per day. He referred to the jointer plane as a "man killer".

Ha! found the publication, page 66.

https://www.google.com/books/editio...MAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&pg=PA66&printsec=frontcover

 

[D_W]

That might have been me. Sometime ago I found online a trade magazine from early 1900s. In it there was an opinion piece, the relevant part was a thankful attitude to powered jointing machines. The author contrasted that with the case of a jointer who used a hand plane and was required to produce a given length of jointed edges per day. He referred to the jointer plane as a "man killer".

Ha! found the publication, page 66.

https://www.google.com/books/editio...MAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&pg=PA66&printsec=frontcover

the 28 and 30 inch planes would almost certainly be disabling over time. When I worked in a production cabinet factory, there were a lot of people doing things that weren't particularly straining, but just not ergonomically great - especially grip hand or forearm related. Surgeries and reassignment to other jobs was common.

When it's an issue for a hobby hand woodworker is blowing out the strap of muscle on the top of your forearm and then that part of your arm is tired for everything.

It's fairly easy to get an instantaneous idea of what it's like - holding a mini sledge hammer with upper arm straight up and down and hand out 90 degrees with the hammer held at the top of the handle. It's not that bad.

Spend the same amount of time picking up the hammer and putting it down holding the handle at 45 degrees so that it's forcing you to prevent it from tipping forward. You could build strength so that it wasn't so immediately fatiguing, but it's probably not healthy to do that long term.

 

[D_W]

For anyone here who is using a nose heavy plane like that, the fix is simple. You don't want to let the plane drag going backwards across the sole, because you're actually doing work to pull it across the wood (ignore the whole sharpening argument about that, it's not really the reason to not drag the plane).

the answer to dealing with a plane like that is to lift it off of a board but to let the tip of the toe drag so there's not much friction but you don't have to lift it.

 

[G S Haydon]

Mercedes-Benz 770K, with a certain owner in its history goes for more than a run of the mill Mercedes-Benz 770K.
Combining a rare item with something like a significant person from history will ramp up the value. Didn't think I'd be contrasting a Norris with no providence of a special historical users, Clapton's Guitars and Hitler's car!

 

[D_W]

Mercedes-Benz 770K, with a certain owner in its history goes for more than a run of the mill Mercedes-Benz 770K.
Combining a rare item with something like a significant person from history will ramp up the value. Didn't think I'd be contrasting a Norris with no providence of a special historical users, Clapton's Guitars and Hitler's car!

i was thinking cars might be involved. This really does get away from the topic - I brought up the Newman daytona watch. I like watches, but i'm not a rolex guy - a rolex guy could buy a few of these to go with a steel daytona. I wouldn't even be confident enought to ear a daytona...

....but it follows better what the excess value is with a clapton fender. An old daytona that's in working order is probably still worth a lot. Newman's daytona's price is almost unbelievable. When people say they would pay $10MM for a partially modified hendrix strat, then I also think that's bonkers, but like the daytona, the the guitar itself has a ton of value.

Oddball ag equipment fits in the collection if large corporate farmers who retire - those folks probably have non-profit foundations set up that they donate their money to and then the foundation "owns" the collection.

Embedded in all of this is my snark from learning the hard way that everything that I bought that was uncommon was kind of a cowpat for real use, but in some cases, I could think of a specialty use. If this norris plane were $1500 new in 2022 and someone had a shop where they made something complicated and very precisely struck a couple of edges here and there, then fatigue goes out the window.

In my case, as I have moved along working by hand as a fat man, figuring out how to plane, saw, file, etc, continuously is a noticeable thing. If you can't do it continuously and then do it the next day, something is wrong. Shoveling, using an axe, all of those things have some element of this and certain things don't fit.

Here's another example...why would people buy wooden shovels and forks for scooping or forking after metal versions were available? The answer is that they were probably doing a lot of work with loose hay or loose feed and the shovel that we pick up and say "oh, that feels light" allows the person using it to get more work done and feel better the next day. To us, if that's 10% more, we wouldn't care. To the person doing all of their hay or feed work by hand, 10% more is extremely easy to notice when you do the same task over and over and count time.

These are not things absolutely needed to dimension wood, but if you are in my boat where there is a draw to doing the work at more or less a brisk walk pace mostly upright, all of these things make a huge difference. the difference between planing and sawing rough wood for half an hour vs. 3 hours, and feeling less sore with the latter. And ultimately getting more done.

 

[G S Haydon]

I can think of a situation of hand tool working, not woodworking but similar to your point on the most appropriate tool.

When I was a child I would spend time on my Grandparents farm. It was a small hill farm. Farming was their life and my Granddad was one of the most content people I ever met.

The steep group would need the weeds cutting, the tractors were primitive and they only had a finger mower attachment for such work. So we did it with a scythe. We're talking 1990's.

I used something akin to a sickle with a long handle. Grandad would use full size sythe with the two handles. There was an aluminium sythe or a traditional ash one. The ash one was always left in the shed due to its considerable weight. Even as a young child I could just about use the aluminium sythe.

There was always a rhythm to the work, pausing to sharpen and working along steadily. I'm unlikely to witness that kind of hand work again.

 

[Derek Cohen (Perth Oz)]

i was thinking cars might be involved. This really does get away from the topic - I brought up the Newman daytona watch. I like watches, but i'm not a rolex guy - a rolex guy could buy a few of these to go with a steel daytona. I wouldn't even be confident enought to ear a daytona...

David, watches are another illustration. What is your Grail watch? Clearly, not a Rolex.

My son, who is a watch guy, says he wants to buy me one. I have a few nice watches (my daily user is a Tudor Submariner, which I have had for 45 years), but would not call myself a “watch guy”. I said to him I like the Omega Speedmaster with the original wind up movement which went to the moon, but only the vintage version, not one of the new ones. Clearly, I align with the history of the watch. That is the same as those wanting a Norris (which I do not desire).

All this is the stuff of romantic hearts.

Regards from Perth

Derek

 

[Ttrees]

It's nearly big enough to be used as a coopers plane.

 

[C.R. Miller]

Bill Carter has made one (or two?) dovetailed jointers at 36 inches. I followed suit and made one back in the day, but it was a bit over the top. Can't remember how long it took me to make in actual hours, but I could turn over a 26 inch (actually they were 25-1/2 inch) jointer in around 45 hours if I buckled down. All hand tool work - save for the chain drilling of the sides (using a drill press) and grinding/sanding work (using a linisher). Oh, and of course a saw bench, bandsaw and drill press for the woodwork.

 

[Jacob]

I can think of a situation of hand tool working, not woodworking but similar to your point on the most appropriate tool.

When I was a child I would spend time on my Grandparents farm. It was a small hill farm. Farming was their life and my Granddad was one of the most content people I ever met.

The steep group would need the weeds cutting, the tractors were primitive and they only had a finger mower attachment for such work. So we did it with a scythe. We're talking 1990's.

I used something akin to a sickle with a long handle. Grandad would use full size sythe with the two handles. There was an aluminium sythe or a traditional ash one. The ash one was always left in the shed due to its considerable weight. Even as a young child I could just about use the aluminium sythe.

There was always a rhythm to the work, pausing to sharpen and working along steadily. I'm unlikely to witness that kind of hand work again.

I use a scythe quite often for long grass, weeds and verges. It's the old bent ash type. Weight doesn't matter too much as its mostly swung along the ground, but it would be heavy to attack a hedge with it. Rhythm is essential - you have to get into the swing of it, literally!
Sharpen at regular intervals - stand it on end, three strokes on the bottom edge, one on the top - it's effectively "bevel down"!
Plenty of people still at it - it's a very useful tool.
Scythe Shop - Scythe Cymru
Austrian Scythes for sale.
For me it is just practical but there is a new generation of enthusiasts
The Scythe Association – Stay sharp!
and why not indeed! Much nicer to use than a horrible noisy strimmer and often quicker and more practical.
Have used it since about 1959 when we moved to a house with an orchard which need scything. It's the same tool still, probably 100+ years old. One new blade. A very pleasant summer job working through the long grass and the head height cow parsley and nettles on a sunny day - though best cut after a bit of rain.

 

[Jacob]

Norris, Spiers planes were expensive novelty planes of their day, most work being done with woodies. Later the Bailey pattern replaced them both, mainly due to vastly superior blade mech and ease of sharpening. Norris adjusters were always just another of those many "good ideas" which just didn't work too well.
30" jointers would have been impossibly heavy I imagine, let alone the price, whereas a 30" woody would be quite practical. I use a 26" woody on rare occasions when dealing with long lengths too cumbersome for the machine. Get one face flat/straight by hand and then pass it through the thicknesser over a couple of rollers.

Re "long wooden jointers were seen as a plane to be used to true a long edge and that's about it."
Slightly more to it than that - a long wooden jointer also useful for planing a long straight arris on a long timber. This gives the one straight line from which to plane the faces and edges.
I discovered this when faced with planing some 14ft 4x4" newel posts; one face and edge by hand the others by passing through the thicknesser. Once the straight arris is established (by sighting down it) you can plane a face with a normal plane, 5 1/2 etc. using winding sticks, then square up the other face.
PS perhaps should explain; straightening just an arris on a long thick timber (not the whole face or edge) is relatively light work even with a 30" woody jointer.

 

[D_W]

i was thinking cars might be involved. This really does get away from the topic - I brought up the Newman daytona watch. I like watches, but i'm not a rolex guy - a rolex guy could buy a few of these to go with a steel daytona. I wouldn't even be confident enought to ear a daytona...

David, watches are another illustration. What is your Grail watch? Clearly, not a Rolex.

My son, who is a watch guy, says he wants to buy me one. I have a few nice watches (my daily user is a Tudor Submariner, which I have had for 45 years), but would not call myself a “watch guy”. I said to him I like the Omega Speedmaster with the original wind up movement which went to the moon, but only the vintage version, not one of the new ones. Clearly, I align with the history of the watch. That is the same as those wanting a Norris (which I do not desire).

All this is the stuff of romantic hearts.

Regards from Perth

Derek

Actually, I like a rolex watches in some cases, just not the whole trendy thing.

I'm not really a watch guy either and have only one "good" watch and a bunch of other mechanical watches that aren't expensive. I started wearing watches again about 10 years ago after getting annoyed that checking time on a phone sometimes turns into 10 minutes of something else and never remembering to check the time.

The "good" watch is a black faced titanium spring drive, and I hope to wear it out wearing it. It sounds stupid, but I got it when they were widely panned, lightly used from a guy who ran into money problems and I have gotten a thrill about 2000 times looking at the sweep of the hand, because it is continuous. I read some about watches and just wanted to have one watch that was made well, not too flashy and actually made in house.

As far as the norris planes go, if one shops around to find a user, it's not that difficult to find one. I don't know what was going on in england - I've never found a norris plane that's a better user than a cleaned up stanley, but I like the early ones that have a little wear and can be bought reasonably and just used. They are very practical, especially if the smoother adjuster isn't really needed. The puzzler with the jointers, but maybe not surprising when they often show up with very little use with a long original iron and only a matter of rust or dropping determines if they're still "nice" is more a curiosity of the human side - what would cause someone 100 years ago to buy something impractical like that.

It's a curious thing, not a skeptical thing. Maybe something like 10% of buyers were well heeled relatively and thought they'd be a good idea, and maybe some other % were given as a gift of extravagance to someone retiring by a successful friend. Whatever the case may be, panel planes and smoothers are everywhere. Jointers, especially beyond 22 inches or so in infills, are exceedingly rare.

 

[G S Haydon]

Nice to hear you're at it Jacob, the Grimsdale Reaper The Grimsdale Method

 

[D_W]

Nice to hear you're at it Jacob, the Grimsdale Reaper The Grimsdale Method

15 minutes to remove a chip and get a working honed edge! Ouch. I give myself less time than that to get an iron out of tempering ready (which includes back work and cutting of a full new bevel and honing).

 

[Jacob]

Nice to hear you're at it Jacob, the Grimsdale Reaper

The Grimsdale Method

Forgotten all about that! He hasn't quite got it. The (optional) handle thing is supposed to be much longer to enable much more pressure and control if you are freehand grinding to remove a nick etc. Just a useful little wheeze. I put a knob on my example as it just happened to be available. Similar little wheezes for small blades such as spokeshaves - a saw kerf in a bit of 2x1". But simple honing a big blade or chisel doesn't need it of course.
Funny that he sees it as a "method" - it's just how everybody used to do it - the thousand and one "methods" came along later!

 

[D_W]

Forgotten all about that! He hasn't quite got it. The (optional) handle thing is supposed to be much longer to enable much more pressure and control if you are freehand grinding to remove a nick etc. Just a useful little wheeze. I put a knob on my example as it just happened to be available. Similar little wheezes for small blades such as spokeshaves - a saw kerf in a bit of 2x1". But simple honing a big blade or chisel doesn't need it of course.
Funny that he sees it as a "method" - it's just how everybody used to do it - the thousand and one "methods" came along later!

yes, the old way - aluminum oxide sandpaper. Way older than the sandstone wheel.

 

[Jacob]

yes, the old way - aluminum oxide sandpaper. Way older than the sandstone wheel

As I said - he hasn't quite got it.
He gets closer in part 2 The Grimsdale Method, part 2 but seems to be spending a lot - not something I'd ever recommend!
Just going to look at part 3.
Had a peek. The Grimsdale Method, part 3 he's gone round the houses and overthought overbought everything but I guess he's got there.
Just needs to dump some of his excess kit and keep it much simpler i.e. just one or two stones, some thin oil and a few oily rags and he'll be back to basics, doing it just like the old timers did, back to the stone age!
Not that old, to be realistic - the 1001 "methods" came in only recently, 1980s and after. Before that the only diamonds in the woodwork business would have been just single ones on glass cutters.

 

[D_W]

As I said - he hasn't quite got it.
He gets closer in part 2 The Grimsdale Method, part 2 but seems to be spending a lot - not something I'd ever recommend!
Just going to look at part 3.
Had a peek. The Grimsdale Method, part 3 he's gone round the houses and overthought overbought everything but I guess he's got there.
Just needs to dump some of his excess kit and keep it much simpler i.e. just one or two stones, some thin oil and a few oily rags and he'll be back to basics, doing it just like the old timers did, back to the stone age!
Not that old, to be realistic - the 1001 "methods" came in only recently, 1980s and after

I don't remember the guy that well, but I think he quit this method not long after this post, anyway.

Not that it's a surprise, but people who follow the method discussed in hasluck or holtzappfel will be far ahead. It's just a matter of the degradation of work standards and demands has followed with the introduction of jigs and rounding over freehand bevels.