TomD
Just curious, what is the evidence he didn't know how to use planes? If you dial this forum back to the level of knowledge it had when Hotley started, he might qualify as a super user.

I am not a fan of his planes, or of the overall concept, I think the Norris type was largely a misdirection anyway.

At one point I happened to write Leonard Lee when he was still in charge, and I mentioned that LV didn't at that point have a single chisel, plane or, saw that was capable of good professional work. It was a weird period when both Japanese chisels and planes had been dropped; German planes were out of the catalog, and the only goodish saw they had was a Japanese crosscut saw. He replied that they were on it, and not too long after that they certainly were. This was before the Independence saw was born, and FK said he bought several for himself, and one for each guy in his shop. Even so, it was probably 10 years or maybe 15 until LV brought out their saw. For a while around 2000 the best dovetail saw was a Japanese steel backed saw they sold for a very decent price.

FWW was creating demand in the 70s, it took at least 20 years before you could just buy a saw for dovetails. (well there were ones for astronomical prices from the Japanese sellers. I had a cheap one I bought around 1980, but I never saw a deal like that again, so I was scared to use it). It was bad back then.