New Lee Valley "Little Victor" #51 block plane...

Tried one last week

Denis Ch�nard, Orl�ans, Ont.

>And it works very well (I tried it in the planing mode), as well as you can expect a LV plane to perform.

My problem is that I can't find a use for it, with the type of work that I do. Glad that you found a purpose for it.

I might end up buying one out of principle :-)

DC

Re: New Lee Valley "Little Victor" #51 block plane

wayne anderson

>Though Christopher Schwarz already did a fine report on the plane, I will chime in... It is first class. The sole is unbelievably flat, as is the iron. It works like a precision instrument right out of the box. It's a fun little plane to use. Darn fine pencil sharpener too.

-wayne

Re: New Lee Valley "Little Victor" #51 block plane *LINK*

Derek Cohen (in Perth, Australia)

>Hi John

I posted a review here about two weeks ago.

Below is a link to the article.

Regards from Perth

Derek


"Little Victor" review.

Re: New Lee Valley "Little Victor" #51 block plane

paul womack

>Though Christopher Schwarz already did a fine report on the plane

link to review

BugBear

Re: New Lee Valley "Little Victor" #51 block plane

Rob Lee

>Hi John -

Couple of reasons for the color.

Firstly - we didn't want to use black, as Veritas already makes planes in black. Blue is Record, Dark Green is Clifton, light green is Kunz... we chose a burgundy similar to what the Yankee North Brothers screwdrivers were... always liked that color!

Having a dark color is important for a number of reasons. Firstly - lapping is a messy process, and it's easier to get a dark color clean enough (dark is a good choice for hand contact as well).

Since this is just one of many tools being made under this as-of-yet-unannounced brand, we needed a color that would scale - one that would also suit much larger products.

BTW - the paint is a baked polyester-base powder coat...

Cheers -

Rob

Re: Bedding?

paul womack

>I suspect this is a purely hypothetical point, since with a thick blade in a tiny tool, it's going to work quite well - the reviews certainly say so.

But...

Unless the lower "bed" surface is perfectly parallel with the lower surface of the "lugs", and offset by exactly the thickness of the blade, the bedding will be a single "line contact" at the arris of the bevel.

A "full" bedding sounds rather difficult to achieve in this design.

The normal bedding system, of having a single (possibly discontinuous) bedding surface, that can be machined at a pass seems much better.

There is no need for precision in the down force mechanism.

Indeed, the down force may well force the blade to conform (slightly) to the bed.

BugBear

In 100 years

Bill Houghton, Sebastopol, CA

>do you suppose there will be discussions in the Galaxynet about how to renew the "baked polyester-base powder coat" finish on someone's just-found-in-the-wild no-it's-not-an-LV Little Victor II plane?

I had the same thought

Bill Houghton, Sebastopol, CA

>though I suppose it's still better bedding than the Stanley 101 that seems like its closest competitor.

Re: Bedding?

ThomD

>"Unless the lower "bed" surface is perfectly parallel with the lower surface of the "lugs", and offset by exactly the thickness of the blade, the bedding will be a single "line contact" at the arris of the bevel."

Both surfaces are cut by a fly cutter type deal that cuts inward like a router with a slot cutter, this levels the bed and cuts the lugs in one process, leaving a kerf not much thicker than the blade.

There is still an issue because the actual bearing point above is the rear edge of the lug, and therefore some component of the bearing is based on the rear rounded edge of the casting. I don't believe there is a second cut that produces a fully machined knuckle, for a fully machined bearing point.

Anyway, given the extremely low angle of contact to the machined upper surface/fulcrum, the geometric intrusion of any casting eror would be very low.

In practice the thing seems to lock up like a bank vault door.

Couldn't resist temptation.

Charles R. Smith n Victoria

>I couldn't resist temptation. In saw this thread a few minutes ago, while visiting my sister in Vancouver, so slipped out to the nearby LV store to see if they were in stock. Like the others have indicated, it's a neat little plane at an attractive price. The fit and finish are superb. I'm not sure what it will get used for, but I expect that I will find lots of small tasks for which it is the perfect tool. I could easily become a fan of reproduction tools in baked-on burgundy.

Charles (who's waiting for his own Lee Valley store in Victoria)

Flux capacitor

jim reed @ tallahassee

>I can see the discussion now. Do you refurbish your planes with their original baked polyester-base powder coat, or do you use your ion-plasma sprayer?