Play Time – Parquetry Shooting Plane

After last year’s WW18thC soiree at Williamsburg I blogged about being fascinated with a parquetry shooting plane Patrick Edwards had in his arsenal, and I vowed then and there to make one for myself.

Then last summer I scored this little beauty at Martin Donnelly’s annual house cleaning auction in July, and I thought it might assuage my desire to make one myself.  Yeah, right.  It is exquisite but only cranked up the flame.

Last week in between some glue-ups for the Gragg chairs on the fourth floor I ran down to the studio to get going on that.  I wondered if Patrick’s plane was a reconfigured rabbet plane and decided that this was the path for me in my pursuit.  So at a tool flea market I bought three derelict 1-inch rabbet planes with irons for $5 each.  I would feel no remorse for trying and failing with landfill candidates like them.

Many years ago I had acquired some sections of bronze downspout from my local metals recycler, not for any particular reason other than it was neat and it was cheap.  I figured that it was the perfect raw material for some project, some time.  Well the project and time had come.

Stay tuned as I take you on the journey of turning a pile of junk into a sublime tool.