I love it when my patience is rewarded. After letting the LW soak a few hours, I snuck back into the shop this evening and tried the reluctant sideplate screw. It yielded on my first attempt.
My next task was to carefully remove the side plate whose posts had also been soaking in LW. All it took was some gentle persuasion and they gave up. I inspected the side plate and was rewarded when I saw what was there.
Yes, that is the November 1894 patent date. Stanley made these planes from 1895 until 1943. The type 1 planes have a lever blade adjustment and later types (post 1900) have the familiar wheel adjuster. So this plane was made sometime after 1900. But the early versions of of the later planes retained the patent date on the sideplate. I guess I need to inspect the blade to more closely date the plane.
There was some Liquid Wrench residue on the plane as well as old wood chips and loose rust. The LW slows down Evaporust so I decided to give the parts a bath. I put a stopper over the garbage disposer and used Dawn with a toothbrush and hot water to clean all of the parts. Then I proceeded back to the shop because I was eager to get started on rust removal. Today we will use Evaporust. Here are the dunk tanks I made from PVC pipe.
The large one will hold a #8 body while the small one will hold a Bailey #3 or a Bedrock flat side #605. I lowered the body into the dark liquid using a coat hanger.
The rest of the pieces fit into a large deli meat container.
So I will be sleeping tonight while the Evaporust is working. It’s kinda like having elves in the workshop. Maybe we can wrap this thing up tomorrow. Tune in tomorrow for more fun in planeland.