Plane Repair

Stanley Part No. 12-005-8_3-1-03
Blade adjustment thumbscrew bolt

Thanks to my friend, Bob Bain, who provided the necessary bit from an old plane that was getting binned, my beloved Stanley #3 is back in action.

It's one of my favourites, being very light and handy: though too short and narrow for straightening boards, its diminutive size makes it great for getting into slight hollows, and being so small and light it's not very tiring to use.

It was the very first plane I bought myself, and it needed quite a bit of reconditioning then — it had obviously been pretty roughly handled at one time, and both handles had bits smashed out of them, which I patched.

Also, the blade adjustment screw bolt had had its threads munched up, and the brass adjustment thumb-screw itself was very stiff and difficult to use. I used it in this state for years before deciding I really should do something about it.

Stanley use a weird semi-proprietary format for this bolt: it's a left-hand 9/32" 24 TPI American unified form, for those who need to know that sort of thing. Good luck laying your hands on one of those at your local hardware shop, or a tap/die to make your own. Stanley do still sell them as a kit with the knurled brass knob, but they're not cheap, and by the time postage from the USA is taken into account, they're way too expensive. 

Fortunately, they're interchangeable between all Stanley (and Record, I believe) Bailey-pattern planes, and they're so common you're very likely to be able to pick up a junker second-hand for less than the price of the bolt/screw kit and cannibalize its parts. Which is essentially what I did, except that Bob provided the bits for free. Good man.

For what it's worth, I got the new (old) screw out of its housing by cutting a slot in its end with a hacksaw and just unscrewing it with a screwdriver. You could probably do it by grabbing it with vice-grips or something, with some kind of padding on the jaws, but I didn't want to risk damaging the threads.