A Truly Wood Plane

Words and photos: Etienne Meintjes

Here is the story behind behind the wood replica I made of my old Bailey No.5.

Recently I visited The Wall* in Tasmania and apart from the fabulous main event I was struck by the carvings of everyday objects, such as a workman’s glove hanging on the handle of a shovel and so on.

Since that visit to Tasmania, every time I do something in my workshop I think about making or carving some ‘everyday’ thing. I was making some plantation shutters for my house and using my Stanley No 5 to shape the shutter ‘blades’ and then I started to think: why not make a model of my much loved 50 year old plane. And so I did.

The letters for Bailey and No.5 where cut from 2mm thick jelutong. They were held together with clear sticky tape before being individually glued to the body with PVA. The tape was removed after the glue was dry. The word Stanley was made by carving out the waste around each of the letters and using a fine point Artline pen to colour in the black around the letters.

The body is jelutong, as is the lever cap and the frog. The two handles are red cedar and the chipbreaker is jarrah. The adjustment lever and the ‘bridle’ that the adjustment wheel fits into are blackbutt. Last but not least, the blade is made from good old radiata pine. The cam on the lever cap is pivoted and actually works as intended.

I made the plane over a period of time while also working on the shutters and found it to be a most pleasant and rewarding diversion.

* The Wall is a series of inspirational three metre high relief carvings in Huon pine by Tasmanian wood sculptor Greg Duncan. The Wall is located in Derwent Bridge, Tasmania and open for public viewing. Learn more at thewalltasmania.com.au