043 plough plane help

[Jim Koepke]

Measuring it with my caliper I come up with 4.60 on the metric scale and 3/16 on the normal fraction scale.

3/16 is the nominal size of a #10 screw.

I was also under the missguided idea that England converted all their measurements to metric. When I was more inclined to making a living working on bicycles and automobiles it was all the rage. But that seems to have been forestalled for now. Europe was less unified in things at that time and some of the different countries used different thread standards on some parts.

jtk

[Scott MacLEOD2]

If you find it is an oddball thread and you cant find a replacement please don't tap the body. I'll make you the custom screw.

Did you pull out one of the other screws and see if it fit into the tapped hole?

Scott

[Marv Werner]

Robert,

I have a Stanley No.78 rabbit plane that has a thumb screw that holds the fence on the rod it slides on. Your machinist friend was close. The screw I have is a 3/16 or #10-28. I have screw gauges for checking screw pitch. This is not a standard American thread. If I were you, I'd take Scott MacLeod up on his generous offer to make you one.

[Alice Frampton]

I was largely joking about tapping it - although I have form - but contend it's not really "sacrilege" anyway. There are thousands of these planes around and their value is in being useable, not collectable. But if you can save the trouble and get a like for like replacement made anyway, no worries. No way are you going to get a 10-24 to fit that 28 tpi thread, that's for sure.

This has been interesting and highlighted a couple of things for me. Firstly, it's slightly amusing that, on one of the rare occasions Record came up with their own design of plane, they still had to copy Stanley by using an oddball thread on it. And secondly and more importantly, to make sure I don't lose those screws!

Cheers, Alf

[Marv Werner]

Hi Alice,

Do you know if all Stanley planes use the odd-ball screw threads or did it start when some of their products were made in England? I'm guessing that a #10-28 is a limey thread. I used to ride Triumph motorcycles and had to buy Limey tools to work on them. As far as I know, the Limey system is different from metric. Perhaps if we give it all a little more thought we could come up with something even more confusing and complicated.

[Jim Koepke]

Do you know if all Stanley planes use the odd-ball screw threads or did it start when some of their products were made in England? I'm guessing that a #10-28 is a limey thread.

Stanley is notorious for using their own threads. 28 per inch is pretty common on the different sizes. They also liked 20 threads per inch on things other than a 1/4 inch shaft.

If my memory is working, depth adjusters on the bench planes use 27 threads per inch.

The posts on a #1 bench plane and the #98 & 99 side rabbets use 30 threads to the inch.

At one time I wanted to make a chart for different makers and threads used, but could not get anyone else interested.

jtk

[Scott MacLEOD2]

I have a circa '90 ish Record 778 plane and for sh**s and grins I checked the fence screws and they were also a 10-24. The rest of the plane has some other sizes 1/4-20 (UNF) AND 1/4-28 (UNF). So it looks like at that time Record was using standard size threads.

Brownells sells a good selection of screws for this type of stuff here:

http://www.brownells.com/.aspx/pid=3...HEAD_SCREW_KIT

and there is a good page on thread sizes and pitches here:

http://www.smithfast.com/msthreaddims.html

Scott

[Marv Werner]

Robert,

I stand/sit corrected..... did some checking..... #12-28 is an American Standard thread. But it's not a common size.

[Robert Culver]

I did get out today and pick up a 10-24 and a 10 -32 the 10-24 is way off. i can turn the 10-32 in 3 times then it gets snug that tells me no. Its got to be a 10-28 if I could get a few of these made I wouldnt turn it down thats for sure...... infact I would probably lock the in a bank vault or something.

[Mark Baldwin III]

I believe that 10-24 and the Whitworth 3/16 are the same. Found out a lot about threads building my Triumph chopper. If the previous owner was determined enough, there would be metrics or standards jammed into whit's. That gets real frustrating when you check a bolt...see that it's 1/4-28, then go to fit it, just to find out that it was really a 27. Even better is the fact that during the late 60's and early 70's, the Brit mfg's were converting from whit to standard and used whit's until they ran out. Which means that the same machine would have whit and standard threads throughout.

[Alice Frampton]

I believe that 10-24 and the Whitworth 3/16 are the same.

Almost. I believe the thread angle is different though; 60° vs 55° iirc. You can bodge it okay thogh, I understand. (Actually that's a good point - I believe the screw in question is 60° if Rob gets one made.) Anyway, it seems the whole "divided by a common language" thing also applies to the language of threads. Then throw in the switch to metric which, as Mark says, was not an overnight complete change by any means, and it's confusing enough without non-standard threads as well. Bless you, Record, for making our lives just a little bit more complicated then they were anyway.

Cheers, Alf