Cutter for #75 Bull Nose Rabbit Plane?

Jim Reed

Frank D. in Montreal

>Jim Reed, who participates regularly here, makes replacement cutters for all types of planes. He might chime in...if not just use the archives to search for a post of his, and send him an e-mail.

Could be a Millers Falls #4

Denis Ch�nard, Orl�ans, Ont.

>Not a specialist, but from what I could see they're basically the same, except for the MF logo on the cutter, which wasn't visible on mine until I cleaned up the plane with electrolysis.

St. James Bay Tool Co. sells a reproduction #75 iron for $8.50 (don't know about shipping).

DC

Re: Cutter for #75 Bull Nose Rabbit Plane?

Ernie Miller

>I have one that cam of a 90 that might work I can check tonight. Other then semental value I don't thing it is a rush out and must have plane. I don't remember ever using mine.

Re: Cutter for #75 Bull Nose Rabbit Plane?

Derek Cohen (in Perth, Australia)

>Hi Dominic

I am not sure that I would go to the trouble, even for sentmental reasons. The #75 must be one of the worst designed planes ever made. It is painful to hold and difficult to adjust. Yet Stanley sold these by the bucket load. I guess because they look cute. Does anyone actually use one?

Regards from Perth

Derek

The Patrick Leach school of thinking...

Scott Burr in Ben Lomond CA

>To quote B&G

"I found it very useful when cleaning up years of grunge and paint within the window frames of double hung sash."

Even being a bear to hold it does remove old paint and crap quite well. It actully makes for a good beater rabbit plane.I know Bill Houghton would agree, he used it on his kitchen remodel.

DOH! This should be under Derek's post

Scott Burr in Ben Lomond CA

>

I used one

Jim Reed @ Tallahassee

>One of the first planes I rehabed was a little #78. I worked really hard on that thing and had it tuned like a new Porche. During the test drive, I noticed that it hurt to use it. My hand felt every bump. Yeouch! There is no way to hold that plane without stabbing unless you wrap it in a shoprag.

Re: Cutter for #75 Bull Nose Rabbit Plane? *LINK*

Bill Houghton, Sebastopol, CA

>Stanley lists a 12-332 iron (or cutter, as they call it) for a 12-975 plane - that might be the right one, and looks about right from the picture online. Listing and carrying aren't necessarily the same with Stanley, though.

Three or four years ago, they employed an absolute goddess of tool parts, Lori Goucher, who was always cheerfully willing to help. Her e-mail in 2003: lgoucher@stanleyworks.com.


Parts catalogue

Two notes *LINK*

Bill Houghton, Sebastopol, CA

>The link in my previous message is a bit out of date: they've gone higher-tech since then. More current link below.

Also, my experience of recent Stanley plane irons is that what you'll get will not be very high quality - likely to look as if it were ground by being dragged over a gravel road from Lubbock to Abilene, and kinda soft too. If Jim Reed's got one available, you're likely to be better off - but, obviously, your buddy's got to look at cost/benefit tradeoffs.


try this one

They can be made to work *LINK*

Bill Houghton, Sebastopol, CA

>A couple of years back, inspired by the same concept that led to the ball knob on the back of a block plane, I modified my No. 75 into a not-painful plane. It's still limited in its usefulness, but is miles better than the original.


Here's how

Re: Cutter for #75 Bull Nose Rabbit Plane?

MikeW

>I had one when I was young. Cannot remember what happened to it. Cannot remember what I used it on, but do remember I did use it. I don't remember any real issues that have scarred my memory--unless it was so bad I blocked them out [g]...

Still, a Preston or Record is a far more comfy and better built plane...and I do use it occasionally.

Take care, Mike

Incidentally (some length, no pictures)

Bill Houghton, Sebastopol, CA

>Not too many people know the story behind the development of the No. 75.

Anyone who has ever encountered raccoons is aware of how hand-like their paws are. I can testify to the fact that those little paws can undo knots in half the time it took to tie them (the incident involved food and a campground).

In the early years of research by animal behaviorists into tool use by animals, one group at a small, well-funded Midwestern university studied whether raccoons could learn to use more complex tools, and commissioned Stanley to build a set of woodworking tools sized to fit them. The No. 75, the first tool developed, was intended to be held like a coffin smoother, thus avoiding the questions of how many fingers wrap around the tote, whether to grip the front knob in a fist or just put the thumb behind it and wrap the fingers around the sole, etc. The raccoons, however, persisted in dunking the plane in the stone pond, rusting it into uselessness; the researchers gave up.

Stanley, eager to amortize its R&D investment and well aware that raccoons don't read advertising (only the fishing report), marketed a tool originally intended for 10-35 pound animals to the unsuspecting human public for the next 94 years.

LOL!

Dan Donaldson

>

So Bill...

Scott Burr in Ben Lomond CA

>If I leave one or two out on my pack porch they would work on my window sash's in trade for the cat's food and water.

Did Stanley do any testing with Possims or Skunks?

There is also a rumor

Bill Houghton, Sebastopol, CA

>that the plane was developed to settle a bet with P.T. Barnum, something to do with "born every minute," but this is considered apocryphal, though possible, since it would have required the production and sale of 2,966,414,400 planes, an unlikely number in spite of how many of them continue to trip up newcomers to the trade.

Trade? Why would they trade?

Bill Houghton, Sebastopol, CA

>They've already got a good deal, why mess it up with work?