So what do you fancy in the LV cat.?

Re: I can't lighten up

paul womack

>Breakthrough? Improving on a design that is centuries old? These are spoon bits, what kind of breakthrough do you expect?

In order that we can have them at all, I EXPECT Lee Valley to apply intelligent engineering design to bring a functional tool to market at the lowest cost.

Some aspects of spoon bits are an artefact of manual production.

Altering a machine process to emulate these would be crazy.

BugBear

Re: Why Not?

paul womack

>I know that it is charity but I am sure it would be possible to make 'exact' reproductions which could be of more use to living history museums around the World.

Indeed. But perhaps just taking them over the price threshold of the guy who fancies having a go a windsor chair, because he just read "make a chair from a tree".

BugBear

Re: Not fond of those either.

Chris Scholz

>Stephen,

I've got some of the finest blacksmith on standby. They usually are not too happy to venture down into the (from their perspective) nether-world of woodworking tools, we don't usually do reproductions either (in broad terms that policy is related to IPR), but if the circumstances are right we do make exceptions.

Ping me off-line if you get a chance.

Chris

---

Reproduction traditional handtools are difficult to find anyway, why don't the new makers just reproduce the old styles instead of the 'white man syndrom' that they can make it better. I don't wan't it better I want it the same! It is a shame, what a waste.

Re: So what do you fancy in the LV cat.?

Dan Donaldson

>Yes, at first glance it does look like that. ;-)

I don't believe that's Rob Lee's intent

Bill Houghton, Sebastopol, CA

>(full disclosure first: I own only one LV tool, and that only because it was generously given to me by a Centralian. I do drool over the catalogue, and am a happy customer, having purchased door/drawer pulls and some books from them, but the tool purchases await a day when the wallet's thicker).

I have found it refreshing that Lee Valley is not simply copying old designs, but taking a fresh look at hand tool use and coming up with tools that, often, recognize the virtue of old technology while introducing manufacturing efficiencies or new ideas that build on the old tools; and, usually, make them more affordable too. I love the look of the Preston-Record-Clifton medium shoulder plane (No. 410), just as I will stop what else I'm doing to watch a Morgan, old Jaguar, etc., motor by; but, if the day comes that I decide to buy a medium shoulder plane, it's likely to be Rob's, based on both the design improvements made and the lower price.

Stephen is correct that there is a place for true copies of old tools, but I think that market is not the same as the market for people who find hand tools efficient or pleasant or both but don't necessarily need to be reenactors.

Re: I don't believe that's Rob Lee's intent

ThomD

>I do think they have an ugly aesthetic for a lot of their planes. I thought it was intentional at first when they were trying to slide in between LN and Record. But they have sorta ramped up and away from that original postion, as far as I can tell.

It would be easy to dub the shoulders if that is all the complaint is about. It's obvious that a welded construction is potentially much cheaper. You can make just one shank design rather than milling them or forging them, or both, from a single blank. You can use cheaper stock for the shank

The spoon bit isn't a novelty item, it is one of the best drill bits there is and here there is a chance to get them out to lots of people, or at least some more people.

The charity coment aside, it's great that they are putting the old world craftsmanship where it counts, at the nose.

Sadly I can't coment on the success of the attempt as none of the stuff I wanted was actually in stock. When it comes in I will be spending my own cash, full price...