No. 4 Plane Review: Part IV - Record Stay-Set 04 1⁄2

While this one isn't technically a No. 4, it does have a number four in it's name, so we'll go with it.

Record Stay-Set No. 04¹⁄2

This beautiful old plane came to me by everyone's favorite auction site in England again. It really wasn't in too bad of shape when I got it.

Before I "rehabbed" it.

There was one glaring issue that kept the price on this one down from what many collectible Stay-Set planes are going for these days:

Not pretty.

The seller mentioned in the description there was a chip on the sole that didn't affect the plane's use. I decided to take a gamble since the price was low.

The chip is pretty big, but it really doesn't affect the plane in use that I can find. Likely it is the result of a casting error that wasn't seen until much later when the plane was already in someone's hands.

From what I can tell, the only difference between a Stay-Set Record plane and a regular Record plane is the "SS" cast into the lever cap, and the two-part Stay-Set chip breaker. I hadn't ever seen a Stay-Set chip breaker up close, so I was looking forward to this one.

Stay-Set 2-piece chip breaker.

Theoretically the advantage of this chip breaker is the possibility to leave the upper part of the chip breaker firmly set on the iron, and the lower part can be removed. Thus once it is sharpened, the front of the lever cap can be replaced and the blade assembly is ready to go again with no adjustment required.

I think the idea is a little silly, given the way I work. Re-attaching a chip breaker to a freshly sharpened iron is really not hard. In fact, I would say it takes just about as much effort to attach a regular chip breaker as attaching the second piece of the Stay-Set chip breaker to the blade assembly.

In my opinion the real benefit of this chip breaker is in the increased mass of the chip breaker. I've long thought that the single best upgrade you can make to a vintage Bailey type plane is to add a heavier chip breaker. This one definitely has more mass.

There are some other differences between this plane and the previous Record No. 04 that I reviewed. Let's take a closer look:

The new to me Stay-Set No. 04¹⁄2 next to my other Record 04.

This Stay-Set No. 04¹⁄2 comes from an earlier vintage than the 04. From what I found, it was manufactured between 1935 and 1939, which puts it in the more desirable pre-war class.

A close up of the cap iron.

The fit and finish of the plane (other than the giant hork in the sole) are much finer than in the later model, which I date at late 1960s or early 1970s.

Much better attention to detail on the older plane.

It also has a nice, flat frog. Something which many people really like, but I have come to think doesn't really make a difference in the functioning of the plane.

I went a bit wild with the rehab of this plane. I don't really like to "brand-new-ify" really old or somewhat collectible planes, but this one isn't particularly rare, and it also has a giant defect in the casting that will never allow this plane to fetch top dollar. 

Brand-new-ifying it is.

As good as new.

I chose to take the rusty bits on this one to a gentle wire wheel to clean, then I lapped the frog and the casting on 80 grit sandpaper on a glass plate.

Before and after.

I'm surprised how much I liked this. It was quick and easy, and stripped everything back to brand-new. It even stripped the rust off of the lever cap while leaving the nickel plating that was stable where it was.

The knob and tote on this older plane were rosewood. I stripped them with a scraper and gently sanded them back. I finished them with some of my linseed oil followed by a coat of shellac and some paste wax.

I can fit it in my honing guide this way. Why? Because I can. That's why!

Once everything was fettled and tuned to my satisfaction, I turned my attention to the blade. I was pleased to see that the blade was practically brand new. In fact, I was able to lap the back like I would a brand-new blade. There was no need for the ruler trick on this one. Usually I just skip lapping and go right to the ruler trick because I don't like hours upon hours of lapping a blade flat.

The most difficult part was the chip breaker. It's usually a pretty simple thing to sharpen the underside of the leading edge to ensure a tight fit, but with this short cap iron, I found it difficult to hold for that purpose. I'll have to think about this and try something else. I did the best I could, but it isn't perfect.

Luckily, it seems to work just fine.

Beautiful wispy shavings.

The plane cleaned up and seems to work beautifully. I've never used a plane this size before, and I look forward to getting to know it.

My first impression is that I now know why many people really love the 4¹⁄2. It is a little longer than the No. 4, and has the same width as a No. 7. I think my favorite part about it is the extra mass in this plane. It feels very solid. I think it weighs about a pound more than the others:

Type 12:  1632 grams
Record 04: 1670 grams
English Stanley:  1680 grams
Record Stay-Set  04¹⁄2:  2272 grams

The extra weight is both a blessing and a curse. It's a nice, big, beefy plane that I'm sure will make you tired faster after a lot of use than a regular No. 4.

As far as the blade goes, I didn't get the same warm-fuzzy feeling with this steel that I got with the later Record blade. Perhaps I need to use it a bit more to get used to it. It's good, but not as fantastic as the one that is on my later model.

That's all pretty subjective. In the end, it seems to work just as perfectly on the wood as the others.

I think it is a beautiful plane.

So far I haven't run across a plane in my testing that isn't worth buying if you can do a little cleaning up to them. I'm thinking that much of the mysticism regarding Bailey style smoothing planes mostly runs down to personal preference.

Peter Schickele, the voice of P.D.Q. Bach said about music, "If it sounds good, it is good."

Perhaps we could change this saying a bit to suit smoothing planes:

If it works, it works.

Part I Type 11 Stanley
Part II English Stanley
Part III Record

More to come... (Sigh)

No. 4 Plane Review: Part III - Record

Here's my third Number 4 smoothing plane. A Record made in England during the late '60s or early '70s. I'm not really too knowledgeable about this brand of plane.

Here's what it looked like when I got it.

As you can see, it arrived with in pretty good shape. I think the seller tried to clean it up some, and also tried to make the handles look better. You can see in the above picture that the stain was sanded away in one spot on the base of the tote.

This was my first look at the frog.

I used to not have a good opinion about frogs that had cavities like this in them. I thought it was the manufacturer trying to cut corners. After my experience with the English Stanley, I have a bit more open mind. What I don't like is it looks pretty rusty.

The blade and chipbreaker.

The blade and chipbreaker didn't come in very good shape. I think they were superficially cleaned, but they weren't sharp or tuned at all. I didn't even try to make a cut with it yet.

The front knob. At least it's wood. Notice the front of the casting.

The finishing touches on this casting have a little to be desired. I thought I'd give it due diligence, however. I did have to run the casting and the frog on sandpaper on a glass plate.

The casting. I don't like there being Japanning on the parts that touch the frog, but I left it for now.

One thing I really did like was the design of the chipbreaker. Below is a picture of the blade assembly from the Stanley as well as this one.

Blade assemblies: English Stanley on the top, Record on the bottom.

The chipbreaker on this Record is much beefier than any stock chipbreaker I've seen in the past. Experience tells me that a solid chipbreaker is a fantastic upgrade to any plane. This one came from the factory with a chipbreaker that I would say is an upgrade over the Stanley design.

To tune this up I ran the edge on my stones until I had a nice flat all the way across,

Then I rounded and polished the front of the chipbreaker to make it easy for the shavings to glide past it.

Perfect!

I decided to give the same shiney-up treatment to the brass on this plane as I did the Stanley. This time, I started by letting the brass sit in some salted vinegar for a minute. This was a good time saver. Most of the gunk and "patina" just wiped off. It was then an easy job to polish the brass with toothpaste. This step saved a lot of time over starting with the toothpaste.

Left - after the vinegar and salt treatment, right - before.

The blade adjustment wheel shined up nice, too.

The handles were pretty easy. They were in decent shape. I just sanded them down to a fine grit, then I waxed them with my homemade wax, and I finished up with a coat of shellac. It's the first time in years that I've used shellac, and I think it is perfect for this job.

Shellac looks nice.

After the shellac dried, I went over it with a maroon scrubby and gave it another coat of my soft wax.

Here is how it turned out.

It isn't the most beautiful plane I've ever seen, but it does have a nice character to it.

The other side. The blue Japanning is growing on me.

Enough of the rehab. How does it work?

Wispy shavings.

Wow!

I have to say it again.

WOW!

This plane really surprised me. It works fantastic.

I expected it to work well after my experience with the Stanley. But I was expecting the blade to be of lesser quality, or for it to chatter or something.

None of that.

I was a bit worried about the blade being in bad enough shape that shavings would get under the chipbreaker. I did have to resort to using the ruler trick to avoid spending two days lapping the back. That didn't happen, however. It is as good of a blade assembly as any I have.

This next part might sound a bit snooty and wonkish, but if you use oilstones to sharpen you will know what I mean:

The steel in the blade is superb. A lot of what I base that on is how it "feels" on the stone, as well as the sound it makes. Both when sharpening and when planing wood. This is one reason I don't like A2 steel and waterstones. Not because they don't work well, but that "feel" isn't there.

The Stanley blade feels course. Even on my finest stone. And when I plane wood, it gives a raspy, hollow sound. It works great while it is sharp, but it must be sharpened often.

The Ray Iles blade I have is superb O2 steel, and it sharpens up very nice. It sits very solid in the plane and the noise it makes is very satisfying. I must say that I didn't try this blade in the Record yet.

The Record blade has a really nice, slick feel on the stones. It sharpens up to a razor edge in no time, and it seems to stay sharp a long time. I would guess longer than the Ray Iles blade. It's amazing! And paired with that beefy stock chipbreaker the blade assembly is fantastic. The sound the plane makes when cutting wood is very satisfying.

I used this plane to get to know it exclusively during my humidor build. After that I finished a shelf and started another project. I've had my choice of three No. 4 smoothers to use for these projects, and I found myself reaching for the Record every time.

Stanley type 12, English Stanley, Record.

I'll certainly have to do some more playing around with these planes to see which one winds up permanently in my tool chest. But I wouldn't be surprised if it was this Record.

I'd love to hear what you think of your Record plane, or any plane for that matter.

I've looked at three planes so far, and you can find my thoughts on the Stanley USA type 12, and a Stanley made in England.

Will there be more?

Perhaps.

No. 4 Plane Review: Part II - Stanley Made in England

English made Stanley planes seem to be less desirable then the US made ones. Why is that? Are they inferior?

Let's find out:

My new Made in England Stanley No. 4.

Before writing this blog, I tried to do a little research on when this plane was made. There really isn't a proper type study of Made in England Stanleys like there is with the US versions. The best I could come up with was this link by Time Tested Tools which calls this plane an English type 3, produced from 1945-1972 (Stanley first started making planes in England in 1937). To my eye it looks newer than that, but I'm not an expert. Please comment if you know anything about when English planes were manufactured.

It looked like this when I got it. Not too bad! Only the tab on the lateral adjuster is missing.

I'm still getting to know this plane, but so far I'm impressed. I was led to believe that the flat frog of the older Stanleys is superior to the newer one, with half the center hollowed out. Could it be that Stanley figured out what was really needed in the frog? I haven't found this plane lacking in anything, yet. On the other hand, it is still new to me.

After a little tune up it seems to work well.

I used this plane exclusively on a recent project with great results. I think the number one thing in getting a plane to work is making sure it is sharp.

Just as fine as my type 11 Stanley.

Let's get down to it and compare side by side. Overall, the fit and finish of the type 11 is much finer and far superior to the English one. All surfaces on the old one are smooth and crisp, where there are spots on the new one that look like they finish sanded it with asphalt in the parking lot during a cricket match.

Other differences are that the new one has a tall front knob and the type 11 has a low one.

Front view.

The rear totes are different, too. The type 11, however, has a user made tote that may or may not be the same shape as the original. I've been meaning to make my own tote for it, but haven't gotten around to it yet. The English No. 4's tote is comfortable in my hand, so perhaps I'll make a new one similar to this one.

Rear view.

I had assumed the English Stanley had a wooden tote. It looks like wood with a thick coat of some kind of muddy lacquer. It doesn't feel like plastic. It turns out that it is some kind of manufactured material.

The knob and tote are made of some kind of injection-molded composite material.

The other difference I noticed is the English one is just a tiny bit wider than the type 11. The new one is too wide to fit in the fitted compartment of my tool chest intended for my old one. The thickness of the walls of the casting look to be about the same, however.

Weirdly, they both are No. 4Cs. C is for corrugated sole.

Also, the mouth on the type 11 is finer. This doesn't really make a difference to me, though. Since I've learned to set the chipbreaker farther forward on the blade for fine shavings, I've not noticed a need for a fine mouth.

Today I decided go a bit more in-depth with my rehab of this plane, and work on the cosmetics. The first thing I did was polish up the brass with toothpaste and a gray scratchy on the parts that needed it.

After and before.

I don't often do this on old planes, but I figured this plane didn't look particularly old so it might be fun to make it look new again. I think the shiny bits turned out nice.

My time in the Army taught me that raw brass needs to be polished every day or it will start to tarnish and look muddy in a very short time. I thought I'd try an experiment and dip the newly polished brass in shellac to see if it would prevent the brass from oxidizing. I'll report later if it works or not. I only did this to the knob and tote nuts, not the blade adjustment wheel. I figured it was more important for me that the wheel felt right.

Here is the plane broken down (without blade and chipbreaker) after making everything pretty.

When using this plane, I would have to say that it works just as well as my type 11. The original blade and chipbreaker were in nearly new condition, so they weren't messed up and I didn't need to replace them. The original blade, however, does tend to need sharpening more frequently than my Ray Iles aftermarket blade.

The original blade sounds and feels a bit different. For lack of a better way to explain it, it has a dry, raspy note to the sound. I've noticed no difference in it's performance, as long as it is sharp.

To complete the comparison, I thought it only fair to give it a try with the Ray Iles blade and Veritas chipbreaker that are in my type 11. This was a nice upgrade. Although I can't say it cut the wood better, it certainly sounded and felt better. In addition, it was very secure when mounted in the plane. I usually tap-adjust the blade with a small hammer, and I really had to whack this blade to get it to move laterally.

That's good. I don't think the blade will shift in the plane in use easily.

After market goodies mounted in the plane.

In the end, what really matters is the surface of the wood. I find knots in pine can be difficult to get a nice, smooth surface on, but this plane did a superb job.

Knot too shabby. Har-har.

In conclusion, I don't think one has to feel ashamed of their late model Made in England Stanley. This plane can definitely hang with the big boys.

My guess is many other planes can, too.

Next up: Record No. 4

If you haven't already, read my post on the Stanley type 11.

No. 4 Plane Review: Part I - Stanley Type 11

I think I have a problem. My problem is I love planes. I have more planes than one person needs. In fact, I've recently bought a pair of #4 smoothing planes when I already have a great one in my tool chest.

Oh, no! What am I going to do?!!!

I'll tell you what I'm going to do: I'm going to compare and contrast them over a series of blog posts.

Here's my current go-to user. A Stanley type 11. Or maybe a type 12.

First up is a plane I got in a batch several years ago. I was very excited by it, as I've never had a type 11 Stanley before. Since I had never rehabbed a plane up to this point, I thought I'd practice and rehabbed a Sargent 409 (Sargent's version of a #4). It turns out that the Sargent worked a million times better than I ever thought it could, and I used it for a long time and the Stanley sat waiting.

I brought the Sargent to Spain with me, but a couple years ago I took it back to Germany and swapped it out with the Stanley. I did a very mild rehab to it. I don't normally go crazy shining up and polishing planes, unless there is a problem. This one cleaned up very nice, and I've been using it ever since.

How do I know it's the coveted type 11?

Type 11s and 12s have three patent dates cast into the body.

Normally a type 11 has a small one inch diameter adjuster wheel, and the type 12 has a larger one.

Mine has the larger one. A type 12?

However I'm also led to believe that a type 11 has a low front knob and the type 12 has the high knob. Mine has a low knob.

Stanley sometimes used up old parts on new designs of the plane before completely switching over. It's also possible that parts of this plane didn't leave the factory together, but were cobbled together at a later date.

Whatever happened, I'm happy with the plane. I think it is a type 12, though.

Look at the glorious frog!

One reason that many people love Stanleys of this vintage is because these older planes have a smooth frog. Later, Stanley and other plane makers have routed out some of the metal on the face of the frog. I think they must have done this to make it easier (and cheaper) to flatten the frog, and keeping metal where they thought it was needed.

Who knows?

All I know is that this plane works well for me.

Strangely, the only place this plane says "Stanley" is on the blade, which I have swapped out.

I once thought that upgrading the blade and chipbreaker on a bench plane was pretty much necessary to get it to work nice. I don't believe that anymore. I will upgrade if the blade and/or the chipbreaker are in bad enough shape that spending money on new ones is less pain than rehabbing the old ones.

Old blades like the one that came out of this plane have awesome steel that is easy to sharpen and stays sharp. In the other hand, I'm not such a big fan of chipbreakers from this era. They seem to be easily bent, and most of them I see (listen to me trying to sound like an expert!) have something wrong with them, and they don't lay perfectly flat across the blade.

I often will upgrade the chipbreaker on an old plane. If I can, I'll add it to the original blade. My favorite chipbreaker is the Veritas one, because it seems to be a little more affordable than most of the other premium chipbreakers. I think if you really want to upgrade something on your benchplane, before buying a new blade try adding a new chipbreaker first. You might find that's all it takes.

In this case, the original blade was pitted and in bad shape. I looked for a replacement, and found that Ray Iles makes one. I ordered his regular blade for this plane, but I've seen that he also makes one that is the original thickness. I haven't seen any of the premium blade makers make one in the original thickness. I think it would be great if they did.

My after market blade and chip-breaker.

One thing I love about this Ray Iles blade is the face is hollowed out a little, so lapping it is a snap. Only the very front of the face of the iron gets polished on my stones. The steel is very good and it takes a very fine edge. Money well spent if you are more interested in using your plane rather than collecting them as an investment.

Someday I'll have to fix this.

The only thing that I really don't like on this plane is the rear tote. I think someone over the years replaced the original tote with a home-made one. Besides being a little bit funny in shape, it is cracked at the base. I've been meaning to make a new tote for it one of these days, but in the meantime I've just been using the snot out of it.

I suppose this makes it a #4C, as it has corrugations on the bottom.

The sole is corrugated. I haven't really figured out what the benefit is of this, other than if one wanted to lap the sole there is a lot less material there so that job should go faster. But, how often does one need to do that? I find they get in the way when you're trying to run the plane on the edge to make a chamfer. To do that you really have to skew the plane or the edge of the wood falls into the grooves.

So here's my take on this plane:

I honestly love this plane. As a smoother, it works like a monster. I really like the larger adjusting knob.

With a fresh stropping and the chipbreaker set very close to the edge, it can take an extremely fine shaving.

Why on earth would anyone buy another smoothing plane when one has this one?

Well, I thought it would be fun to test them out against each other. It can be difficult to find a plane like this. Can other planes perform as well? Let's test some and use this wonderful plane as a control.

Next: my new Stanley "Made in England" #4.