Why are 4 1/2's so popular

Re: Why are 4 1/2's so popular

Roger Nixon

>In addition to the extra blade width, the extra weight helps on the harder woods. On most NA hardwoods, I use my #4's more often than my #4 1/2's but if I had to pick one Stanley smoother it would be #4 1/2.

Re: Why are 4 1/2's so popular *LINK*

walt quadrato

>I wondered the same thing until I found my 4 1/2 and 5 1/2. The added weight does make for more stable planing. My guess on availability is that the half #'s were more expensive, thus sold less..so there's fewer of them around now. I can see a cabinet maker with the half #'s but not Joe handyman working around the house.

walt q


brass city toolworks

Re: Why are 4 1/2's so popular

CBT

>Roger and Walt nailed it.

I was surprised with difference in the 1/2's. I have 4, 4 1/2, 5, 5 1/2. If I had to reduce my number of planes I would drop in order, 5 and then the number 4. I would hate it but if forced :)

CT

Re: Why are 4 1/2's so popular

David Linnabary

>My feeling is that it's partially supply (fewer made) and partially demand from the current proliferation of upgraded irons and discussion groups like this one. Once a greater number of people understood how to make them really perform well it became obvious to these folks how well the 4 1/2 size really finalized the whole surfacing process then the demand went up as it did for the Bedrocks and the infills/kits.

I'll bet my poor old jack is probably bitchin to the other planes about how he does all the heavy work and how much I fuss over my heavy smoother. :)

David

Re: Why are 4 1/2's so popular

David in Mangum

>So then is my one best choice a new, high quality #4, a 4.5, a low angle smoother, or one of Steve Knight's wooden smoothers? I need to know before I start on a table for my wife because the top HAS to be perfect.

Just to make your choice...

MikeL in SoCal

>.... more difficult David, there are some other wooden plane manufacturers with equally satisfied customers.

Speaking from my own experience, I had the initial perception that the iron planes are better due to their popularity. So I focused on getting old Stanleys. I've recently made some test runs with an old, craftsman-made (I think) razee style jack plane (made of rosewood, I think) with a ~100 year old E.A. Berg iron. Wow, this thing slices through wood like a hot knife through butter. Unfortunately, the tote is way too small for my hand so I'm going to have to fix that before I can use the plane for an extended period of time.

My point? Hmmm, I guess I didn't really have a point, I just wanted a chance to gloat about the plane. :-)

Cheers,

Mike

Re: Why 4.5's are so popular?

glh

>As for me, I like the additional weight.

Price differences may have been why there were more 4's than 4.5's years ago. It would be interesting to see an old price list and adjust the price differences in today's dollars.

My understanding is that Stanley came out with the Bedrock series in response to lost market share at the high end to Norris, Spiers, and others. There certainly are many more non-bedrock than bedrocks out there, but I don't think that means the oldtimers preferred the non-bedrocks. I'd say it had to more with price differences.

Re: No best choice

Ernie Miller Topeka

>I dosen't matter which you get you will still ned the others I don't have a LN but I do have a 4.5 and a knight and a #3 just the other day I had to get them all out just to get past a narley peice of white oak. Buy them all! It could be one was sharper that the others at the time. That could be another reason to have more than one.

Re: Why are 4 1/2's so popular

Moses Yoder

>The amount of time and money you have will have a major impact on your best plane choice. If you have plenty of time and not much money, I recommend getting a cheap #4 at a flea market or Ebay, and making it really work good. Until you understand and are good at sharpening and using a plane, the #4-1/2 will be more frustrating to use than the smaller #4 just because the blade is wider and it is more critical to have everything working together. You wouldn't think that a 3/8" wider blade would make a big difference, but it does. If you are only getting one smoothing plane and don't have time to mess with it I would recommend a Lie-Nielson or other good quality #4-1/2. I like the #4-1/2 just because it looks more manly. The wooden planes take more practice to adjust and work well than the iron planes, but here again is a matter of opinion I guess and if you started with a wood plane you might never buy a metal plane.

Re: Why are 4 1/2's so popular

Mike-in-Michigan(Richland, that is)

>Agree with wieght being a big advantage -- but the wider blade that is the same as other planes up the scale means you can have more sharpened spares that fit in your jointer planes.. saves sharpening time eh??

Suggestion

Bill Houghton, Sebastopol, CA

>As I commented on the recent thread on No. 10 planes, my 10-1/2 tote doesn't have enough room for my long fingers, so I kind of cup the tote in my hand (hold your hand as if you were going to wrap it around, say, a hammer handle; now put it on the tote, but don't close your fingers), so my fingers wind up on each side of the iron. It works surprisingly well.

In fact, I have an old coffin-shaped little smoother that I think is a Stanley 122 that, if I just had an iron and lever cap, would make a nice little plane; and that kind of cupping is exactly how you would hold it -- just like the old woodie smoothers.

Don't get too wired on the subject

Bill Houghton, Sebastopol, CA

>There's lots of good tools out there. If you have enough money to get one of each and spend time comparing them, you'll find one you like best. If not, pick one, learn how it works, and you'll find you can do fine work with it. It's kind of like trying to decide whether a Gibson, Martin, etc. is the Right Guitar. There's wrong ones, yes (like the cheap Sears I started on), but there's lots and lots of right ones.

Remember that the people who made the awe-inspiring furniture you can see in the museums used what they had -- and LN wasn't in business then. Every time I start to thinking that I HAVE to have something, I think of my grandfather, who made more furniture than I have yet in my life with a toolkit that a lot of people now would walk right past.

Re: Suggestion

MikeL in SoCal

>Bill,

The problem isn't lack of room in front of the tote; it's that the tote is too short so the horn jams into the web between the thumb and forefinger. I don't think the tote is original since it's made of a different type of wood than the body of the plane. Also, it's kind of crude looking; with a short, rounded horn. If the horn had a long, graceful sweep like so many older planes have, I wouldn't even be able to grab hold of it. I'm thinking of cutting off the top of the tote and gluing on something that's more appropriate. Unfortunately, that's item number 35,295,798,928 on my list of things-to-do.

Cheers,

Mike

Price

Todd Hughes

>Looking in my original 1920's Stanley catalog I see that a 4 1/2 priced at $4.90 cost exactly .70 cents more then a reg. no. 4 ,[.45 cents more then a 4C]...I can hear the people saying "why 70 cents in the 1920's was like $70 today" but will point out that a regular no. 6 plane cost $6.25 a $1.35 more then a 4 1/2. Don't know about you but I find that a no. 6 is a very common plane much more so then the cheaper 4 1/2. I think the reason you don't see many 4 1/2's is because the majority of wood workers just did not want them not because they didn't want to pay .70 cents more,[They had no trouble paying $2.05 more for a number 6]. Same thing with the Bedrocks which cost only about .50 cents or $1.00 more then most reg. Stanleys. By the way this was about how much those low angle,[62 and 164] planes that some wood workers get so excited about today cost over a reg. plane. I think most wood workers did not feel a need for all these planes probably because less strange hard to work exotic wood was used and also less access to people and writing telling them that they NEEDED these planes to do any type of good work.They were to busy actually working probably ! .......Todd, who will take a basket full of those $2.95 no. 1 planes now

Re: Price

Pam Niedermayer - Austin, TX

>Statistically we have much more leisure time than those in 1920, got to fill up that time with something. :) And you're right, PR and Advertising just wasn't as sophisticated as now.

Pam

Re: Why 4.5's are so popular?

glh

>In today's dollars (approximate), a #4.5 priced at $4.90 in 1920 would be worth $45.08 today, the #4 would be worth $38.64, and the #6 would be worth $57.50. Obviously, decent quality planes have gone up at a much higher rate than the cost of living index.

Don't know about that......

Todd Hughes

>since the last near mint no. 4 I bought I paid $17.00 for,[talked down from $20]......Todd

Re: Don't Know About That

glh

>You got a great deal. I guess I should have said it's impossible to find a "new" plane equivalent in quality to a 1920's #4 Stanley for $38.64 today.

Re: Suggestion

Bill Houghton, Sebastopol, CA

>You're only up to 35 billion on your list? You must be a lot younger than I am, or more organized.

Sounds like you should, indeed, consider a longer tote -- when you have finished the first 35,295,798,927 items on the list.

Re: Suggestion

Todd Hughes

>I have seen more then a few of these craftsman made razee planes that was made out of Lignum Vitea wood and if yours has a dark heavy body I would bet it is made out of it instead of rose wood a wood that would be pretty rare for a plane like this.Tradtionaly these Razee planes were popular with boat builders as was the use of LV wood of course.While I have seen Lignum Vitea body planes a good bit I don't think I have ever seen one with the tote made out of this wood so i wouldn't be so quick to jump to the conclusion the tote is a latter add on.Often these older planes have what seems like very small handles but you have to remember back then people were on the whole much smaller then today.....Todd

Re: Suggestion *LINK*

MikeL

>Hi Todd,

The plane very well could be Lignum vitae since I'm not very good at identifying wood types; especially exotics. There was a smoothing plane made of the same wood and a scrub with that type of wood on the sole in with the same tool set as the jack. These planes are at the left and right of the linked photo with the jack in the middle.

Cheers,

Mike


Razee jack

Re: Why are 4 1/2's so popular

Steven McKinley from Calgary

>Well the opinions are in. I think it's clear that for the average carpenter or handyman, the 1/2 series of planes was just above the price point that they were willing to pay.

The modern woodworker, professional and enthusiast, appears to like the extra weight. I guess with the amount we already pay for a good plane, we don't mind paying the extra for what we see as the 1/2 series' advantages.

Well that's it, I've been trapped in the car with an 8 & 4 year old for 3 hours and I'm going to bed.

Cheers!

Re: Why are 4 1/2's so popular

joel

>When I studied cabinetmaking with Maurice Frasier when we did planes he brought in a set of stanley and insisted that we comapre all the sizes to find what works best for each of us.

A great smoother has a short sole so it can go up and down the small hills and valleys of the wood, also it needs a good balance to be less fatiguing.

Unfortunately the very nature of the Stanley mechanism makes their smoothers longer than ideal.- the average wooden coffin smother or infill is under 8" long.

now I cottened onto a #4 - seems the right size for me. Maurice personally uses a #3, and the class mostly went 4 with maybe a few 3's - everyone, myself included considered the 4 1/2 too heavy, too long, and poorly balanced. I have a 604 1/2 but I never use it. Tried s few times- didn't do it for me.

I would suggest that the popularity of the size now may be due to the fact that the current crop are balanced differently, and that many people are using smoothers these days over machine milled surfaces which are more accurate to begin with and the surface following characteristics of a shorter plane are less important.

Of course I could be wrong.

Re: Suggestion

Bill Houghton, Sebastopol, CA

>Nice looking tool; it would be a shame to replace that graceful handle.

Todd's right, though, and it's not all that many years ago that handles were smaller. Pick up any of the shop electric drills from the 1950's "shiny aluminum" period, and you'll find the same meager handle problem.