This will cover both things to look for and fettling of a Stanley shoulder plane. It will be easier to link this to both of those threads than to compose two separate articles. This also was cut into parts because of the picture per post limitations.
My opinion on shoulder planes is that this may be a good example of where the current offering may well be worth saving for, unless one's finances are limited. Don't get me wrong, the Stanley shoulder plane is a capable tool and can take fine, even shavings. The modern examples do seem to have the Stanley beat on ergonomics along with fit and finish.
I have not had the opportunity to handle the offerings of Lie-Nielsen or Lee Valley. I have test driven Bridge City Tools offering. It was awesome. Their shoulder planes are in the $600 - $800 range. My wife is not likely to let me get one for my birthday.
The Stanley shoulder plane can be tuned up to work well. I do not think it will ever work as well or fit my hand as well as the plane I test drove at a woodworking tool show. It is my advice that if at all possible, one should test drive a shoulder plane before buying to make sure it will not only work correctly, but that it feels and fits well in the user's hands. Of course, if you buy an old Stanley off of eBay, you will not have that chance. If you get a deal on a good one, it is likely that it can be sold without losing much and possibly making a gain.
The shoulder plane is useful for quite a few tasks. If one is doing; mortise and tenon, lap joints, rabbets or other joints, a shoulder plane can make clean up, trimming and fitting easier.
Shoulder Cutting Lap:dado.jpg
Here is my Stanley #93 being used to clear the waste from a lap joint in western red cedar. The sides were scored and chamfered using a chisel to avoid break out.
Left Side.jpg
There are as likely as many causes for chips and cracks with shoulder planes as with any other kind of plane. It all comes down to the same thing, a plane you do not want. My knowledge of the machining Stanley used to make shoulder planes is zilch. One thing that has been noticed is there does not seem to be any strict adherence to where the mating rails are located. The #90 and the #93 have some parts in common, but the machining of the top varies and may not allow for swapping tops without some filing to fit. This could mean the side would not be perfectly flat. Flat sides, square to the sole are an important feature of a shoulder plane.
I do not know enough about the different types to know if this is correct, but this example has a different type of lever holding the blade than I have seen on other Stanley shoulder planes. This may be correct for a type 1, but I do not know. With the cracked top piece and the rust on the adjuster screw, this one has me thinking pass. Besides, the bull nose makes the #90 difficult to register the plane to the work.
Open Shoulders.jpg
Notice the difference of the spacing on the guide rails on the two tops and bases in the picture. This makes the interchanging of tops a bit hit or miss. My thought is they put tops and bottoms together before lapping to make the sides square to the bottom. If this was the case, the fitting of the top was not critical as long as the parts stayed together. Mine will fit a little sloppy with the #90 top on the #93 base, but not the other way around. The #93 top feels like it almost wants to sit on the #90 base, but everyone should know by now what happens when you try to force cast iron to so something it doesn't want to do. CRAAAACK!!! To me, this means if the plane is not complete and/or cracked, it may be difficult to find a part that mates up correctly. I do not know, maybe some one else does.
Also note the small screw in either of the tops. This is for setting the mouth opening. When the top is put in place, this screw will rest against the screw that holds the top on. It is not as convenient as the mouth adjustment on planes being made today. According to Patrick Leach, this screw is often found seized. Replacements are also available from Stanley.
This picture also shows an almost used up blade and the two screws that hold the tops on the #90 and #93 shoulder plane, notice they are of different lengths. Also notice the piece in the casting of the top piece of the #93 that goes across the opening. This will be discussed later as the lever screw hits it and restricts the movement of the lever.
Also of interest is the lever and screw are still available from Stanley. The lever from the newer #90 will accept the new screw. The older lever from the #93 is of a slightly smaller size. The threads are the same, and it is only few thousandths of an inch, but the new screw will not fit in the old lever. The old screw will fit in the new lever. I wonder about Stanley and their proprietary threads and screw sizes at times.
Short Blade?.jpg
Notice the short area of blade left in this image. It is the highlighted edge of the blade. Where the highlight stops, so does the blade. There is still a bit of useable blade here. In this case, it is being saved with the plane as it is the original SW blade that came with the plane. Stanley still sells blades for their shoulder planes, hopefully they will continue to do so.
Also notice the lip at the back edge at the mouth. This needs to be square to the side and even across the width. Correcting one that is not could be difficult at best.
If you do have the chance to handle and inspect before buying, make sure all of the screws turn. The screw in the lever may be mushroomed where it presses against the blade. This is not a deal breaker if the screw has enough length left to do the job.
Remove the blade depth adjuster screw to check for condition. If the lever was set tight when adjustments were made, the threads could be damaged. Stanley does sell new adjusting screws and slides which is good if the body threads are not damaged.
The blades on shoulder planes are typically slightly wider than the plane body. When using my shoulder plane, the lever is not set real tight. This allows the plane to be pressed down on a piece of scrap wood to flush the blade to the side being used to register against the work. Not doing this can cause chips to the edge the blade rides against. Some of the modern planes have set screws to control the side to side movement of the blade. This makes flipping from side to side a bit more difficult. My thought would be to lap the blade to make it the same width as the plane body in this case. My tendency would be to lap equal amounts off of each side of the blade if this were being done.
Continued...
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Originally Posted by Danny Thompson
