Stuart Ablett
Member
- Messages
- 15,917
- Location
- Tokyo Japan
First off this was just a 15 or 20 minute look at this plane, not much more than that, but I think I got most of the info one would need to figure this plane out.
This is the plane in question.
My friend Sugita San brought it by the Dungeon, it is not his plane, a friend of his bought the plane and then could not make it work, and asked Sugita San to have a look at it. Sugita San was also left scratching his head, so he came to me looking for a second opinion and some advice.
Let me show you what we found.....
I could make a decent shaving, but, as you will see, something is amiss
Looking down the bottom of the plane, you can just see the edge of the blade, it is even and does pull a decent shaving, every thing looks OK.... right?
Well wait a minute, now looking down into the mouth, from the bottom of the plane.....
..... something don't look right here
I tell you, it was like a "Skew Plane"
That is how much I had to skew the blade to get it coplanar with the bottom of the plane, so forget adjusting the adjustable mouth nice and tight to get rid of any tear-out
Looking at the bed of the frog, it looks to me like it is not straight......
...... the machining is not as smooth as I would like it to be, not nearly as smooth as the machining on my Veritas DX60.
The other big disappointment was with the feed adjuster, the knob you turn to advance the blade forward, or pull it back in the body of the plane.
On Sugita San's Lie-Nielsen Low Angle Adjustable Mouth block plane, there is about 1/2 to 3/4 of a turn of play in the mechanism, from push out to pull back, on the Veritas Dx60 there is about 1/8 to 1/4 of a turn of play, on the Sweet Heart 60 1/2 there was 2 3/4 turns of play, yep, nearly THREE FULL TURNS of play in the mechanism
That is REALLY bad, you can see the threaded block is VERY loose on the threaded rod, VERY loose.
I have to say I was really disappointed in this plane , I was hoping these planes would be better, I mean for $99.99, if this plane was NOT messed up, I think it would be filling a lot of tool boxes. I'll hold out the hope that maybe we got a lemon, but man is it ever a lemon.
Some good points, the blade is nice and thick, looks like quality steel, and it was really sharp right out of the box. The plane itself is substantial, it has some heft to it, you would NOT want to carry this one around in your apron pocket all day! The castings look good and they are seriously thick.
I really do hope that this is just a lemon, and this this is not indicative of the level of quality that will come from Stanley, I hope we got an exception, but man does it suck.
Sugita San's friend has no choice really he has to send it back, and I very much doubt that Woodcraft will cover the shipping, which means, in the end he will be out a fair chunk of change and have nothing to show for it, but disappointment.
This is one reason I very much like to order quality tools from overseas, you have a much better chance of NOT getting a lemon, and if you do get something with a flaw, the company will stand behind it.
I'm not piling on Woodcraft either, they have been nothing but good to me when ordering stuff overseas, lots of companies in the US don't bother.
Well there you go, a mini review, for what it is worth.
Stu
This is the plane in question.
My friend Sugita San brought it by the Dungeon, it is not his plane, a friend of his bought the plane and then could not make it work, and asked Sugita San to have a look at it. Sugita San was also left scratching his head, so he came to me looking for a second opinion and some advice.
Let me show you what we found.....
I could make a decent shaving, but, as you will see, something is amiss
Looking down the bottom of the plane, you can just see the edge of the blade, it is even and does pull a decent shaving, every thing looks OK.... right?
Well wait a minute, now looking down into the mouth, from the bottom of the plane.....
..... something don't look right here
I tell you, it was like a "Skew Plane"
That is how much I had to skew the blade to get it coplanar with the bottom of the plane, so forget adjusting the adjustable mouth nice and tight to get rid of any tear-out
Looking at the bed of the frog, it looks to me like it is not straight......
...... the machining is not as smooth as I would like it to be, not nearly as smooth as the machining on my Veritas DX60.
The other big disappointment was with the feed adjuster, the knob you turn to advance the blade forward, or pull it back in the body of the plane.
On Sugita San's Lie-Nielsen Low Angle Adjustable Mouth block plane, there is about 1/2 to 3/4 of a turn of play in the mechanism, from push out to pull back, on the Veritas Dx60 there is about 1/8 to 1/4 of a turn of play, on the Sweet Heart 60 1/2 there was 2 3/4 turns of play, yep, nearly THREE FULL TURNS of play in the mechanism
That is REALLY bad, you can see the threaded block is VERY loose on the threaded rod, VERY loose.
I have to say I was really disappointed in this plane , I was hoping these planes would be better, I mean for $99.99, if this plane was NOT messed up, I think it would be filling a lot of tool boxes. I'll hold out the hope that maybe we got a lemon, but man is it ever a lemon.
Some good points, the blade is nice and thick, looks like quality steel, and it was really sharp right out of the box. The plane itself is substantial, it has some heft to it, you would NOT want to carry this one around in your apron pocket all day! The castings look good and they are seriously thick.
I really do hope that this is just a lemon, and this this is not indicative of the level of quality that will come from Stanley, I hope we got an exception, but man does it suck.
Sugita San's friend has no choice really he has to send it back, and I very much doubt that Woodcraft will cover the shipping, which means, in the end he will be out a fair chunk of change and have nothing to show for it, but disappointment.
This is one reason I very much like to order quality tools from overseas, you have a much better chance of NOT getting a lemon, and if you do get something with a flaw, the company will stand behind it.
I'm not piling on Woodcraft either, they have been nothing but good to me when ordering stuff overseas, lots of companies in the US don't bother.
Well there you go, a mini review, for what it is worth.
Stu