Stanley No 78

A picture of a No. 78, but in better condition than mine.

My father in law gave me a Stanley No 78 to play with. It came from the same heirloom toolbox as the Record No. 5 plane, and is pretty much in the same condition as the No.5 as well. I can feel a little restoration project coming to me!

I wonder whether I can bring this "old rusty" back into a functional rabbet plane.  This made my day, on top of being probably one of the day that I spent the most time working in the shop ever... I've got cuts on my hands to prove it. These cuts are not even caused by my tools, but by the wicked hard edges that Hard Maple can keep on these through mortises cut across 3" of wild grained stock!

New tote for an old handplane

My father in law lent me this nice No5 handplane that once belong to my wife's grandfather. It didn't work very well and was covered under quite a bit of grease/dust/sawdust. The handplane guy at Lee Valley pointed me to a PDF with a template to make new Stanley/Record handplane handles. I used a bit of scraps from the loom project. The knob had to be improvised because I don't have a lathe. The results are fine, and now that the plane is clean, sharpened and tuned, it seems to work very well. On a test board, I got some nice and fluffy shavings and what appears to be on its way to a glass-like surface.

Here is a picture of the plane, after restoration:

Mackay heirloom plane with shiny new tote and knob.