Hi all,

The infill query yielded just two replies. One reader has his infill
shimmed to .008. Another user has a replacement blade which allows for
somewhere between .003 and 004.

A number of writers were curious with regard the possiblity of my
rehardening the old blade and/or shimming.

The really good old infill smoothers had blades which were custom fitted
to the plane. The plane and blade were actually stamped with matching
numbers. In addition to being too soft, the original Norris blade that
came with my smoother is not thick enough to create a small mouth. That
means it has two problems.

Rather than messing around with rehardening and shimming, I decided to
go for a custom fitted blade with really good steel in it. I'll be
writing Mr. Hock about taking a few thousandths of one of his thick
infill blades. I've decided to try to get a mouth of .006 to
.008--somewhere between the extremes of my two respondents. The original
Norris blade will remain with the plane for a future collector.

Randy Roeder Repaint houses, not old tools.

Lew Soloway wrote:
>
> GG's --
>
> Randy Roeder in his request for blade help with his infilled plane
> remarked (highly snipped)
>
> ... my Norris A-5. The plane is one of the later production models
> with a gaping mouth....
>
> Matt Turner then mentioned in his response (again highly snipped)
>
> ...I've got a Spiers infill coffin-body smoother that probably fits
> the description of "gaping mouth". The mouth itself is .313"....
>
> My question then being why would these "gaping mouthed smoothers" be
> so highly prized for final finishing in light of the our efforts to it
> as tight as possible?
>
> Thanks,
>
> Lew Soloway
>
> -- not wanting to start a holy war, just wanting an answer. I have one
> of those "gaping mouthed Norris A51's"
>
> --
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