» Listings for June 2020

1. Thomas Norris Plane high pitch setting device

   Posted on 3:15pm Sunday 28th Jun 2020

   

   An elusive and very rare accessory, if ever it was actually produced!!!!

   Whilst talking to a knowledgeable tool collector (who appreciates all things made by Thomas Norris), he mentioned that he had never seen, in all his years of searching, an item that is shown in the 1914 Norris catalogue.

   Namely, the " high pitch setting device". (page 11)

   According to the description,

   " with the aid of this ingenious device, the user can sharpen a plane iron in such a manner as to convert an ordinary plane into a higher pitched plane giving 'most satisfactory results' on hard or curly grained material.

   To be attached to plane iron as shown while setting. Printed instructions for use given with each device."

   Presumably, For use on a bevel down cutting iron. It appears that the device would get bolted onto the flat side of your iron, to run on your oil-stone, sharpening and creating a uniform back bevel. Thereby, increasing your cutting angle or pitch.

   Has anyone else seen one? Or, even a photograph of one?

   If so, please tell us where, as we would like to know if they were actually made and sold.

    

    

2. Whoever said 'setting up an on-line shop is easy' has never done it!

   Posted on 5:30pm Thursday 25th Jun 2020

   It is not just a case of taking a couple of photos, adding a price and then by some miracle, it all appears on the internet.

   Sorting and cleaning stock items, then working out how to photograph them and how many angles to take of them. After that, come up with an interesting and catchy description of the item. What about size and weight, after all an online shopper will probably want it shipping by courier or posting. Before that can happen, how can the payments be organised. Card processing and/or Paypal. or old fashioned way of cheques in the post?  What if teh customer wants to collect and pay cash? 

   Once thats all done, how to get the search engines like DuckDuckGo and Bing or Google, to notice my website, and respond to searches for products that I offer!

   Well, the good news is, that I have sorted all the above out and dealing with the mammoth task of populating the shop with stock. Only several thousand tools and assorted paraphanalia to list.

   Got to the stage that, the on-line shop is now live. Yippee!!! finally got there!

   Lots of vintage woodworking tools for users and collectors will be listed over the coming days.

   Metal and infill planes by Norris or Spiers or Matthieson. Stanley, Record or Preston. From a brass violin makers plane to a Bullnose or rebate plane. Or, maybe, something larger like a Jackplane or Jointer. Or even very large in the guise of a Coopers' plane?

   As usual, it is always worth asking if an item is in stock, since the on-line shop will always be a few days behind

   Regards for now...