I visited my friend today. He owns 2000 plus planes. We were in his tiny workshop, and knowing that his fancy planes were at the house, I said, "So tell me, what is the coolest plane you have in this shop." I wanted to see what he really used. He takes two steps and pulls off the top of his tool chest a plane he had told me about but I had never seen. He once loaned a guy in Maine his No 9 Stanley to make a copy of. This fella he loaned it to owned a little-known tool company. He used my friend's No 9 to measure and what-not so he could create his version and in turn he gave my friend two prototypes. This is one of them.
Here is the kicker, and I did ask if that was original to the plane and it is; it has a hex-head screw! Look out folks, the Internet just blew up. Yes, you who complain when LN uses those evil slotted screws; this prototype had a hex screw for the cap iron.
Another cool thing is it had a trigger to adjust the depth of cut. Sadly, I did not get to check it out long. My hands were shaking when I took the pics.
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Also, for you that asked about Cuban Mahogany- here is an antique West Indian piece he is restoring. You can see where there was a chunk missing and he filled it in with a piece of mahogany. This is part of a real Cuban Mahogany piece from the early 1800's. Locally crafted from local mahogany.
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He he also pulled out a Norris smoother and a transitional plane that someone had cast a bronze body for and turned it into an infill. Also he had a LN No. 1 Bronze, a LN bronze shoulder plane, and an artisan made shoulder plane. All these were crammed into the top of an open tool chest. I love visiting him.
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Originally Posted by Patrick McCarthy
