Otis Smith Fales plane

[JimReed@Tallahassee]

A few years ago, I acquired a box of rusty gold from Patrick Leach. It contained almost a hundred rusty parts for a Fales plane. Stanley released its #46 in 1873 and I guess the skew blade excited Amos Fales because he designed his own combination plane. It was patented in 1881 and put into production by Otis Smith. It was complicated and never sold well and was discontinued in 1917.

Anyway, I finally got around to cleaning up the buckets of parts. Each sole/blade combination is comprised of a fore sole, a rear sole, and a blade. The skew angle is not as acute as the Stanley #46.

This morning I took the 5/8" cutter for a test drive.




The plane was easy to set up because of the full width sole. It traveled down the board effortlessly and created piles of curly and fluffy shavings.




OK. I am now a fan. Too bad that these things are almost impossible to find. Of course, the patent documentation says that the user can make his own beds and cutters. Hmmm......

[JimReed@Tallahassee]

And here is the stuff I cleaned up.




That is a lot of pieces. I used little paper slips to mark missing pieces.

[Bibliophile 13]

Cool! That rear handle is something else. I never found the Stanleys all that comfortable in use. How does this one compare comfort-wise?

It looks like it works just as well, though.

[JimReed@Tallahassee]

Well, the handle needs a little work. Front screw is loose. Other than that, it is very comfortable. Even though it looks a bit strange, I would rate it a 9 out of 10 for comfort.

[blackhat]