Customer Reviews

Stanley 12-960 Contractor Grade Low Angle Plane

5 star:		(15)
4 star:		(19)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(8)

 

 

I'm a carpenter's apprentice and as I purchase tools to add to my collection, I always consult the guys on the job beforehand. This block plane, without a doubt, received their absolute recommendation. It's a great tool to have around, as I learned, for hardwood flooring. When cutting the last few pieces in a field, it is imperitive to have a block plane that is up to snuff and this one is and then some. It's also an invaluable tool for doing basesboard when you need to scribe the 2 by lumber to the floor. This is a tool of professional quality that will be enormously helpful to those who are pros and those who are the regular family handyman or weekend warrior. 5 stars!!!

I bought one of these for light duty planing tasks - relieving corners, cutting dowels flush and etc. You do have to hone the pre-ground edge before you use it the first time. It is ground to 25 degrees and recommended final angle is 30 after honing. I used a Veritas honing guide and a Japanese water stone to do the job. It only took about 5 minutes with the right tools!

The mouth is easily adjustable with the front knob to regulate the size of your curls. The blade is easy to adjust with the brass knob at the back. It is easy to grip and use. I look forward to getting may years of use out of this well made tool!

I'm overall very happy with this plane, being able to take shavings of less than a half a thousandth of an inch across the width of the blade.

But some tuning was required.

First of all, the throat adjustment plate must be removed and the inside cleaned out, especially the milled contact points. It appears that grit and ground metal from surfacing the sole of the plane may have found their way in to this area and, as a result, the adjustment plate was jammed and wouldn't move. It was easy enough to get it unstuck however (don't use pliers like someone suggested, that's a really bad idea!) by gently tapping straight down on the brass adjustment knob on the front after unscrewing it a little. The plate will come loose and you can then unscrew and remove the brass knob to remove the bottom adjustment plate for cleaning. In addition to removing the grit, I ran some very fine grit sandpaper along the milled surfaces inside the plate receiving area and the sides of the plate itself: just a couple of light passes with the paper wrapped around a 90 degree edge to smooth it out a bit. Blow the dust away and reassemble.

I also found the back edge of the adjustment plate was rough--it looked like the raw cut edge from the manufacture hadn't been ground straight. This is the edge of the plate adjacent to the blade so I felt it was important to dress it straight by rubbing it against some sandpaper on a smooth surface.

Next I sharpened the blade. Use the scary sharp method if you want, I used waterstones to 8000 grit to get a nice polish and razor sharp edge. Check it with a square, you can either grind or hone it square or live with a slight cant to the blade if it's a little off square (mine wasn't.) Sharpening the blade like this is important if you want fine shavings.

Finally, I only dragged the plane across some sandpaper on a Grade A surface plate a couple of times before stopping, because it was obvious from the grinding pattern that the bottom of the plane is very flat, and required no tuning. If you must do this put the blade in the plane and have the cap mechanism properly tensioned before starting, so any distortions of the plane body introduced by that tension become part of the grinding pattern. Just make sure you have raised the edge of the blade above the mouth of the plane!

With this procedure completed I could adjust the mouth of the plane to a very fine opening, and align the blade to get an even cut across the edge of the blade. I used a piece of scrap wood to test the alignment.

The plane is hefty, stable, and strong. I've been using a cheap block plane from the orange borg and the change to this one is a welcome step up.

I love the feeling of a sharp plane slicing through wood. Stanley has been making planes for a long time and they really know what they are doing. You might veiw this as a plane kit. When you get it you will have some work to do on it. First you will probably need to lap the sole,and the back of the iron.This will remove the grinding marks from the factory. Then you will need to hone the bevel on the iron. Depending on the wood you are planing the angle might be right. Since this is a low angle plane 25 degrees is good for hard woods. You could even go as low as 15 degrees for soft woods. If you spend a little time tuning this somewhat rough tool up you will be rewarded by that feeling of slicing through the wood like it was butter. I prefer my Lie Nielson block planes over these.They are works of art and they perform like they are. But they cost several times more than these perfectly adequate stanleys.

Ok, this is no Lee Valley, Lie Neilsen plane etc, and the title marks it as contractor grade anyway (not fine cabinetmaker) so I wasn't expecting a perfect tool. out of the box the product seems strong and quite well made. The sole is as flat as it needs to be for the type of work the block plane is used for. All adjustment features seem to work well, although a little stiff out of the box until you use them a little more, then they start to free up a little and are easier to adjust etc.

The blade itself is ground at 25 degrees and mine actually had a bit of a ding in it out of the box, however, the manual states the blade should be honed to 30 degrees anyway, so after about 20 minutes with a diamond sharpening stone and plane blade sharpening jig, I was able to remove the ding at 25 degrees and then hone a nice sharp edge at 30 degrees. A few quick tests of the product and it worked great.

The secret is in the sharpness of the blade. Hone a very sharp edge on this block plane's blade and it will work just as well as a block plane costing 10x as much. The block plane makes a great addition to any contractors/carpenters kit bag, or even for the fine woodworker too as long as you are prepared to spend that 20-30 minutes tuning it up to shape straight from the box.

Is it a Lie-Nielsen, ahhh, nope... Could I buy 5 of these for 1 Lie-Nielsen, ahhh, yep... I have a few old Stanley planes (from Ebay) that I have tuned and have an excellent Veritas low angle jack that came ready to use right out of the box (except for the blade). I say this because I'm somewhat familiar with the performance of some planes. I don't have a high-end Lie-Nielsen block plane to compare this plane with but here's what I perceive the cons and pros would be in comparison to a more solid plane:

Cons:
Blade locking mechanism is somewhat sloppy
Blade is cheap (as expected) - if using a softwood, it's probably good enough. If planing regularly on hardwood, probably need a quality replacement blade (Hock, Lie-Nielsen).
Sole needs flatting... By flattening the sole, you ensure an even distribution of the cutting edge into the wood.
Blade needs tuning - no surprise - even some of the best planes need blade tuning.

Pros:
To me, the plane's weight, balance, and size makes the plane feel good in the hand.
Cheap. Cheap. Cheap.
Even though the blade locking mechanism is sloppy, it seems to hold the blade well enough, as long as the locking screw is not too loose.
Produces reasonably thin even wood shavings (after tuning, that is).

Bottom line is that I believe it functions quite well as long as the blade isn't challenged. With a $35 dollar blade addition, I believe it would perform very well.

As a side note, I originally paid 30 bucks for the plane with free shipping. I think the plane is worth that much but I don't think I would pay whole lot more than that.

You get what you pay for. I didn't bother flattening the sole of this little block plane....what's the point, after all its a block plane! If it were a jointer, or even a jack, it would be worth doing, but anyway... The blade needs work. The bevel was not uniform, the back not flat or polished. As you might guess, the edge was marginal at best. Took about an hour to fix the edge with diamond and ceramic stones by hand lapping. NOW its sharp! I don't know how long it will hold an edge. Other minor gripes are that the mouth adjustment started out very stiff (worked that back and forth to loosen it up) and the blade advance screw is also too tight when the cap iron is clamped on. Maybe it will loosen up with use. In short, this is not a plane that is ready to use out of the box, but for the price, once you get it tuned, it looks like it will do just fine.

I am a beginning cabinet maker and my first case was not completely flush at the corners after gluing. Fortunately, this little block plane was very intuitive for me to set up. The instructions are very clear and written with consideration for all levels of skill. I was able to hone the cutter easily. It is now razor-sharp at 30 degrees. The tool's adjustments are easy to set, and they stay set. As with the other reviewers, I found I needed to hone the base to remove small burrs, but now that I have done that, I love the tool. Having a low-angle block plane restores my beginner's confidence that not every joint must be perfect from the start -- we have these little friends to help us out. Now the face frame fits to the case as if it was always there. Other planes cost more and might be better from the purists' perspective, but this plane is solid and true, and I can tell it will last for years.

I've used this for about six months now. For the price I am satisfied. But you get what you pay for. It required at least an hour to true the sole, clean the paint from certain areas and sharpen the blade. And the blade doesn't seem to hold an edge for a long time. I think I'll ask Santa to put a Lie Neilsen in my stocking this year. For the weekend warrior, this is probably the perfect plane. But beware, the blade needs to be sharpened before use.

No matter how many power tools you have in your builder's or cabinetmaker's kit, you need a block plane, and the Stanley delivers 90% of the performance of the high-end tools at a fifth of the cost. I've used mine for heavy duty work, like triming new window casings flush with walls, as well as for delicate trimming in repairing musical instruments.

The bases of the Stanley tools may not be as perfectly flat as those of the expensive Lie Nelsons, but that's easily rectified in short order with some sandpaper and a sheet of glass. A fine tool at an excellent price.