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When I’m trying to explain why I like hand tools to a hostile crowd – usually at a woodworking show – I like to pull out a Record 043 plow plane to demonstrate.
First, it’s cuter than socks on a squirrel. Second, it’s a drawer-grooving little monster. In just a minute or two, I can cut all the grooves for a drawer-bottom using the 043. And I can talk as I demonstrate. No routers or dado stacks.
And the shavings are fun, too. Like enormous spirochaete bacteria (perhaps that’s not the best simile).
In any case, the 043 is a great introductory plow plane for budding hand-tool users. It’s robust, simple to set up and performs a useful operation in two shakes of a lamb’s tail.
The reason I am writing about the 043 today is that tool-pusher Patrick Leach has come upon a small cache of these English tools and will be offering them up for sale (at a reasonable price) in his newsletter that comes out on Monday.
What, you are not a subscriber to Leach’s newsletter? Fix that here. Right now!
— Christopher Schwarz
Here are some supplies and tools we find essential in our everyday work around the shop. We may receive a commission from sales referred by our links; however, we have carefully selected these products for their usefulness and quality.
