Old Planes

James Brown

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8
I am not well versed in old planes so have a question. I have two old planes that belonged to my step-father, both are "smoothing" type. One has the name "Handyman" and the other has no markings except "made in usa" cast into the sole. I have cleaned and sharpened them and they seem to work fine. Just courious if anyone has any information on them. Thanks, Jim.
 
Handyman was Stanley's "homeowner quality' line - generally considered to be of somewhat lesser quality than their regular line. That said, I've tuned several Handyman planes to work at least as well as any other Stanley. They're pretty nice planes, actually.

To help with identification:
There ought to be a number somewhere forward of the blade - usually right at the toe. It'll be a 2, 3, or 4 for a smoother (or maybe 4½).

Larger planes are numbered behind the tote - a 5 for a jack, 6 for a fore plane and 7 or 8 for a jointer.

On some (not all) older planes, there may be some patent dates behind the frog, but in front of the tots (handle). If there are any there, tell us how many and what the dates are.

Get back to us with that info, and we can perhaps be of more help.

Oh, and by the way - Welcome aboard!
 
Sorry it has taken me so long to get back with information, between working, blowing snow and all the other things I have to get done today was the first time I could get down to my shop. I checked both planes for numbers and on the Handyman blade is; No. 1204H, it also has a red colored frog. This is all I could find on that one, the other has no numbers I could find and I have them both working well so I don't want to take them apart to look for more markings. Both are 2 7/16 wide and 9 1/2 long and both have blades aet at 45degrees.
Many thanks to all and to Don and Steve for the information sites, I just need to find more time to read.
 
.I checked both planes for numbers and on the Handyman blade is; No. 1204H, it also has a red colored frog. This is all I could find on that one, the other has no numbers I could find and I have them both working well so I don't want to take them apart to look for more markings. Both are 2 7/16 wide and 9 1/2 long and both have blades aet at 45degrees...

Both are Number 4 sized smoothers, and as I said in an earlier post, brand makes little difference, just so long as the plane can be tuned to work well. Obviously, both of yours fit that description.

I don't blame you for not wanting to take them apart - it wouldn't have helped much (if at all) with identification. But...sooner or later, you're gonna have to at least remove the blade for sharpening, and that'll require a bit of time to get everything back exactly right so they're working well again. Don't worry about that, though - it gets easier each time, and after a couple hundred time, you'll be an expert at it! :D:D
 
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