Richard Wilson wrote:
 
~   New born galoot Aaron Ionta exposes his chest (toolchest)

~   >1 Record Technical Plane -
  
~   Hey,  this here galoot has a *technical* plane - Now you'll have to get a
~   shooting board and donkeys ear made....

This is a plane originally intended for school use. It is 13" long,
with a reinforced sole and an extended wing with its crest parallel to
the sole that seems to look a bit like those bedrock thingies that
some people go on about. 8-). The handle screws into a tapped hole
going into the frog support bosses. I don't think it was a commercial
success.

But has Aaron's got a handle? Record's Planecraft book shows one. It's
shape is misleading since one would get the idea that for use on a
shooting board, one just grabbed the entire handle and tried to use it
that way. I think this must have been the original intention of the
genius (sarky, 8-)) who thought this up, but wiser counsel might have
eventually gained because in the sixth impression, 1954, page 39, they
show it used by a schoolboy with the thumb hooked round the base of
the handle, the index finger on the wing and the remaining fingers
covering the blade.

This makes sense, since to use a plane on a shooting board some nifty
wrist action is needed to obtain the necessary scooping action that I
doubt could be effectively applied from a grip on a small diameter
round handle, rather like a file handle.

Incidentally, in this position it is rather easy to jam the top of the
thumb rather vigorously against the stop. How do I know? Well I don't
have a handle but managed to fit a salvaged front knob instead (the
thread is a wierd specification). That's how I found out!

As a matter of interest, has anybody got an earlier version of
Planecraft (first published 1934) with perhaps a different
illustration? It would be interesting to know why the hand was thus
shaped.

-- 
Jeff Gorman - West Yorkshire
jeff@m...