Stanley Defiance Restoration III – Defiance 1203

So she arrived in the mail today and immediately I knew something was off about her. Turns out she’s a Frankenplane but it worked out in my favor.

This particular Frankenplane had the Defiance body, frog, tote, and knob but the lever cap and chip breaker were for a standard No. 3 ( which I happen to have as well ) and I was able to swap them out and boom, back on track for both planes with no money out of pocket. Not sure if it shows in the pics but you can see this was previously cleaned up, and rather poorly, because there’s deep gouges out of the sole and cheeks from something like a belt sander or grinder. So then it was onto the cleanup which I am presently doing now… here’s some before pics:

Looking at it again I think the adjustment knob and the screws for the tote and knob aren’t correct either. I know the one for the knob is from a Handyman and the one for the top may be correct but I’ll double check once I have some time to get into the books and see what I can find. It doesn’t really matter to me much as I intend to use them so complete accuracy and looks is secondary to function. Anywho, keep checking back as it won’t take me long to get this little lady all pretty and added to the collection which will soon be showcased on a nice new custom built tool wall in the house where I intend to shoot “talking head” videos when the weather is bad and I don’t want to go out to the shop… like today.

UPDATE 2-26-20: Had a bit of time to get things sanded and cleaned up, primed, and painted… next up is the tote and knob.

Think I’m going to look for a new chip breaker and proper iron for this plane as they are both just way to pitted to really look good. They’ll work but if I can get new or better ones I will.

Update 2-28-2020: And there she is, all completed and ready to join her big brothers. As I said, I’m still going to replace the chip breaker and iron but for now they’ll do, I’m just not going to go through the trouble of polishing a badly pitted piece of metal to make shiny pits.