What is this "Morticing Machine?"

[John Neel]

In his book, Woodworking Tools 1600 - 1900, Peter Welsh quotes an 1827 list of tools by Amasa Thompson. The most expensive tool listed is a "Morticing Machine $10.75". I have found a reference to a carpenter/joiner being paid $8.00 a month plus board and then being raised to $12.00 a month in 1830. In any case, such a morticing machine represents quite an investment for a woodworker at that time - a set of bench planes is listed at $6.00 and a hammer at $0.50. Does anyone know what that machine might have been?

[ I found Welsh's book available for free download at Gutenberg.org in several formats. The HTML format has much better images than the Kindle version. The price beats that of hard copy at many stores.]

[Dave Anderson NH]

Hi John,

My guess would be that it is a timber framing mortising machine. They were quite common up until almost 1900 and are still used by timber framers today to remove the bulk of the waste from a mortise. They are mostly wooden with gears and a hand crank mechanism similar in setup to the foot cranks on a bicycle. While I don't know of any of these machines being made new today, they are still common here in NH. I'm at work so I can't dig up a photo for you. Maybe someone else can??

[Mike Siemsen]

http://findgoodtools.com/toppicks/chisels.htm shows a picture of one. There are foot operated machines as well with large wooden springs. Basically a mortise chisel goes up and down and a place to hold the wood. http://www.americanartifacts.com/smma/advert/ay102.htm

Mike

[Andrae Covington]

http://findgoodtools.com/toppicks/chisels.htm shows a picture of one. There are foot operated machines as well with large wooden springs. Basically a mortise chisel goes up and down and a place to hold the wood. http://www.americanartifacts.com/smma/advert/ay102.htm

Mike

I found a US patent for one in 1827, so it appears they were commercially available here at least that far back. According to various sources, the "self-acting mortising-machine" was described in a 1793 patent by Sir Samuel Bentham, then Inspector General of the Royal Navy. These were produced for the British naval yards particularly for making the wooden blocks of block and tackle rigging.

[Jim Belair]

Never seen one of those before. I thought Dave was referring to a beam drill and if so wondered how it could possibly be more expensive than a set of bench planes.

Very

Jim B

[John Coloccia]

For anyone that has a subscription to FineWoodworking.com, there is a wonderful video of our own George Wilson explaining how they mass produced some replica hand planes. Somewhere in that video is this machine with a chisel chopping out the bed of the plane. It's definitely worth checking out. This is slightly off topic but when you see the machine you'll see that it's slightly on topic as well

[wayne Jepson]

Coincidence....saw one advertised today. I had never seen one before this.

http://ontario.kijiji.ca/c-buy-and-s...AdIdZ258314679

[Johnny Kleso]

The coolest old school morticer I seen had a curver blade that cut on the ends and would swing back and forth like a pendulum with stops to limit the lenght and was all hand powered..

It left a biscut jointer type slot but wider..

[Rob Young]

Barnes made them for a long time. http://www.tooltimer.com/barnesmort.html

And maybe Jr. will post a picture of the foot powered mortiser he made...

[Pam Niedermayer]

Barnes made them for a long time. http://www.tooltimer.com/barnesmort.html ...

I bought one of these, previous owner had put a motor on it, but I removed that. Then I bought a lot of chisels for it. Works great.

Pam

[tico vogt]

I've used this for timber frame work. It was a bit rickety when I frist got hold of it, but after some tightening it has worked pretty well. There is a release bar such that when you've reached your desired depth it can climb back out in reverse. There is enough vertical play in the mechanism that can allow it to wander by the bottom of the cut in deep mortices, so I use it to hog the bulk of the waste inside the lines with a bit that's smaller

than the finished morticeResized Morticing machine.jpg.

[jason thigpen]

For anyone that has a subscription to FineWoodworking.com, there is a wonderful video of our own George Wilson explaining how they mass produced some replica hand planes. Somewhere in that video is this machine with a chisel chopping out the bed of the plane. It's definitely worth checking out. This is slightly off topic but when you see the machine you'll see that it's slightly on topic as well

I watched that same video. That machine is amazing!

[Dave Anderson NH]

Tico's picture shows exactly the kind of machine I was talking about.

[David Weaver]

I watched that same video. That machine is amazing!

Anyone who doesn't know george plays guitar will be totally freaked out about that video and wonder what's going on in that shop when they see his fingernails!!

[John Neel]

Thank you to all who replied. The collective knowledge available here is always impressive.

John Neel