My name is Ken Vaughan -- I am a recent addition to your group courtesy of
Tim S who advised that such an assembly existed.  I qualify as an old
fuppus, am trained as an engineer, used to be a rough carpenter, have done
gunsmithing, some metal work, work actively in Boy Scouts, Trout Unlimited
and live in the northerly end of of the US (Juneau, Alaska).  I have been
working to acquire some craftsman skills and have many more miles to go on
that path.  Have made my own finishes and so mix my own resin of exotic
bugs.  I use both hand and power tools, but have an affinity for hand tools
where they work reasonably well.  I whittle, hunt some, fish a bit, have
more wood than practical piled up in my garage, and have refurbished old
tools acquired cheap for years (I discovered that the term for that is
"bottom feeding").  I cast bullets for shooting and have dabbled a bit with
black powder firearms.  My wife assures me that I am better at ideas and
starts than at finishing things up ---

I have become enamored with wooden planes in recent years, building a couple
of simple ones, and acquired a few tired old ones that need a good friend
and some refurbishing.  Have also accumulated socket chisels that need
handles, some of which have had an abusive past.

On of the planes has had it's sole tuned a few too many times.  It is small
and has been used as a scrub plane --  looking for a source of lignin vitae
(about a foot by a couple of inches wide  maybe 1/2 inch or so thick) for a
new sole -- No source anywhere Southeast Alaska.  The options is to use some
Iron Bark, a tropical hardwood used on boats such as tugs, but LV is has
oils that result in a smoother surface.

There are no hardwoods here (some red alder and sitka alder is as close as
it gets) but I do have Alaska Yellow Cedar (4 by 6, 4 by 8 chunks), Alaska
Yew (AKA Pacific Yew) 1 inch flat sawn unsurfaced from Ketchikan Alaska ,
and a few chunks of Sitka Spruce Burl (not much for color and a bit of
patterning when stained) 2 inch thick unsurfaced  that I would be open to
swapping for some hop hornbeam or the like (need to turn a handle on a small
slick - if a slick can be called small).

As I saw in a recent message, I am also looking for sources of sizes,
tapers, and ideas etc for rehandling some of the old chisels -- many have
distorted sockets and I will be using the gunsmithing trick of glass bedding
the handles get tight fits.  I use mould release so the handles can be
extracted without heat.   Some of them were so badly abused that I went
ahead and reground them to duckbilled chisels and need to get handles so
they can be used.

I have made steel ferrules from steel pipe -- not really handy -- anyone
have a better process?

Have made a couple of floats from old files -- crude and nothing to brag on,
but lots better than throwing old files out and they do remove wood pretty
fast.  If anyone has small files to pitch -- they can be reshaped into
steels for flint and steel fire starting --- I let scouts do this so could
alwas use a few more.

Thanks for the enjoyment from the messages!!!