Footprint Tools

[Dekon]

Hello, I made a resolution this year to stop being a watcher of woodworking shows and actually start making things. I'm mostly interested in hand tools and smaller machines.

..And well, I would like top of the line hand tools, but I don't want to pay that price, yet.

Does anyone know anything about Footprint? They seem cheapish? Would it be worthwhile to buy them for learning on and replace as I can?

I found this set: Woodworkers Tool Set

But I can't seem to find any solid reviews of the company. Some are good, some are bad.

Thanks in advance.

[jwatson]

if i remember footprint is a copy of record hand planes. for a while record outsourced the manufacture of the line to the company. later they brought it back to england but footprint was born to make the copy. im sure its no worse than a groz or anant. both if tuned can work just fine. i prefer to look at the tool in person because it gives you an idea just how cheap they are if you look at how they are cast etc. some might really blast the company because soles arent perfectly flat etc. you might look back through the reviews to see what it is they are saying. you can generally tell by that what the issues they have are how well it will work for you.

[Dekon]

if i remember footprint is a copy of record hand planes. for a while record outsourced the manufacture of the line to the company. later they brought it back to england but footprint was born to make the copy. im sure its no worse than a groz or anant. both if tuned can work just fine. i prefer to look at the tool in person because it gives you an idea just how cheap they are if you look at how they are cast etc. some might really blast the company because soles arent perfectly flat etc. you might look back through the reviews to see what it is they are saying. you can generally tell by that what the issues they have are how well it will work for you.

The issue is that I find reviews that range from 'Junk' to 'Good if you spend the time to tune them'. I was looking to see if anyone else had experience with the company before putting down the money for it. I'm more than willing to sit down and learn how to tune them and spend that time to make them work. To be honest, that's one of the things I was looking for in a decent starter piece. I don't want it usable right out of the box.

[Sac]

You are talking to the right person there, JW is an Ebay guru when it comes to finding old good planes. He helped me find a good Stanley Sweetheart #4 and I am currently looking a #7. You cna find him and others that LOVE to talk handplanes over in the the live chat. Hope to see you there.

[jwatson]

thanks chuck.

ill do some research and see if I cant find a better set of reviews for you to delve through. unfortunately i have not used footprint i know of thier reputation. They are an indian company not just another chinese startup. I'll look around for some more constructive reviews. Ive been a big proponent of buying antiques but for two reasons, one being that you dont have to worry about quality because most of the makers are good, and two I love history so buying a hand plane and looking around for the history of the maker is fun. its not for everyone. I do recommend the live chat. MuddlerMike is another great resource he has also ventured into Anant and is a rehabber of antiques. abike2many is another who is great at rehabbing old planes.

are you in any opposition to rehabbing older hand planes? I have a sizable collection now of usable hand planes because I found some of them on ebay refurbished them and got them working again. Its looking like mainly the reviews are to that effect that when tuned have the feel of a classic bailey but much better than a home center hand plane.

[Bhelart]

Over the years I have used a few Footprint tools, they were ok but I upgraded all the cutting tools and only one lonely hammer remains in my kit. They were perfectly good to learn on, I was force to learn how to tune chisels and planes and the blades didn't hold edges very long so I got practice with sharpening. Ultimately I recognized the benefit of better tools and started selling the Footprint and upgrading.

I looked at the link to the kit and I'd also suggest that, if you are just starting out and you want to learn hand tools, don't buy a kit. The kit will include a lot of tools but you will find yourself using a few of them regularly while others sit idle. Spend the money on a few well selected tools. If for instance you want to make boxes and cut the joinery by hand get a good cross cut saw, a couple of chisels (1/4 and 1/2), a square, a marking gage and a block plane. Other selections might be considered if your intended projects re different.

[mdbuilder]

I had a footprint jack, it will take a shaving. Having said that, the blade isn't great and I just tossed it in the trash a couple weeks ago I had had it for a couple years, it's good for rough carpentry and taking shavings off a 2*4 for use in getting the backyard firepit going. Beyond that not too much as far as furniture building goes.

Now, I have built up a decent collection of hand planes in the past year or so that are very useful in furniture building. I've got a Lie Nielson #4.5, a Lee Valley low angle #4, a couple Wood River V3's (#3 and #6) and two old Stanley's in the form of a #5 and a #7.

General comments:

The Lie Neilson is sweet right out of the box, it's also pretty expensive. Same for the Lee Valley but not as expensive. The Wood River planes are excellent, really not much of a difference to the LN or LV and quite a bit cheaper. If your budget stretches to the $125 - $160 range of the Wood River it is recommended as they work really well out of the box (gotta shapen the blade but that is it) and you'll have something usable for years.

Old Stanley's - if you want cheaper and want to fiddle to get good usability I'd go this route I think. I picked up my two from a local antique shop, prices are higher than you might find on e-bay but you can hold it in your hand and make sure nothing is bent or broken. My #5 was $45 which isn't too bad. I sharpened the old blade and it "worked" better than the footprint ever did. Then a while later I spent another $45 on a new Lee Valley A2 blade + chip breaker and did the whole frog fettling and sole flattening procedure which consumed about $10 worth of sandpaper. Now it works really well, on par with the new premium planes.

For my #7 I had the sole flattened by a machinist and bought one of those Cosman blades. The thicker blade required so work with a file to open up the mouth, this one also works very sweetly now which is good cause it cost a few dollars to get there <g>. Anything up to the 5 or 6 size can be re-habbed at home, the 7 or 8 is a much tougher job. Might want to consider buying a new one of those, the low angle #7's for instance are not quite so expensive.

[Mister Pants]

From what was mentioned earlier, if you need to do a fair amount of work to get the Footprint stuff usable it sounds like eBay may be a decent alternative. The Footprint planes listed just appear to be knockoffs of the Stanley planes anyways. While that's not necessarily a bad thing, if you need to do a fair amount of work to flatten the sole etc. From a cost benefit perspective eBay, or the local flea markets may be a better deal since you're putting the work in anyways.

For an example of what eBay finds can be this #4 cost me $7.00. I don't mind putting the work in, but you can also find ready to use (just need sharpening) planes for fairly cheap too.

After cleaning it up it turned out fairly nice, and it's one of my daily users (I did replace the iron but that was personal choice).

For about that price, I expect you could get three or four old Stanleys from eBay, a good set of Marples/Irwin Blue Chip chisels etc. and possibly even save some cash:

For instance:

#4, #7, #9 1/2 from eBay ~ $120 (more or less depending on how much you're willing to put into it. I paid about $45 for a #4, 7 and 2 9 1/2's

Set of 8 Narex bevel edge chisels $76 at Lee Valley (they've won best value awards in several mags, including FWW). The Marples/Irwin should be about the same and they've been almost the defacto entry level good chisels for several years

4 1/2 Beechwood mallet $21 at Lee Valley (and about the same price for one at Woodcraft, etc.)

10" sliding bevel $22.50 at Lee Valley (I have this one, I can't recall the maker at this point, it's aluminum and made in Japan. It has the set screw at the bottom not on the side so it won't get in the way).

Wheel marking gauge $14.99 at Rockler (or you can splurge on a nice micro-adjust one at Lee Valley for $36.50)

6" try square $26 at Woodcraft

That totals to about $280.50, though it doesn't include a cheap honing guide (personally I'd splurge for the Veritas Mark II it's about $65) and you'd probably be happier in the long run with higher quality tools. You also don't need to pick up everything at once. I almost never find myself in a situation where I need chisels larger than 1" for instance, I turned my own mallet, I use an engineer's square instead of a try-square etc. Mind you that's just my $0.02.

[jwatson]

mr pants wow thats one heck of a rehabilitation. that looks great!

ps noticed the depth adjuster looks like a type 18 from that. I have two type 18s one a #5 and the other a #6

[jmaichel]

Dekon,

I know what you are going through I just finished completing my hand tool kit. I originally was going to go the used tool route but decided against it because rehabbing a old tool is just not my bag. Frankly I am not sure what a finely tuned hand plane is supposed should look like or how it should work. If I were going to the used tool route I would have bought all of my stuff from this guy brass city records. He has ton of used tools in good working condition and they are all users. They are little bit more than what you would pay on ebay but he sells everything. I had already committed to buying new tools when I stumbled across his website.

For chisels I already owned some Marples that I bought last year when I first started woodworking. Not bad for a cheap chisel but you can do better for the same price. I ended buying a set of LN's and don't regret it. I did however but a couple of large buck brother chisels for paring. I know what your thinking buck brother is "crap", you are right. The buck brother chisels from HD are crap but these are buck brothers chisels that are made right here in the USA, come with wood handles and are inexpensive. You can purchase them online at Craftsman Studio in a set of 6 for around $60. The one caveat is at some point you will want better chisels for fine furniture making and the LN's at $55 a piece are a little steep but well worth it. It never hurts to have a cheap set of chisels either so the Narex or the Buck Brothers is a good place to start.

When it comes to sharpening this was a tough one for me. I had used the scary sharp system before and it was okay but kind of a PITA. I really did not want to try several different sharpening systems I just wanted to find one that was easy, effective, practical. For me that is the waterstone method using Shapton sharpening stones. They are expensive but well worth it. When you working primarily with hand tools sharpening becomes essential and you have to sharpen often if you want to produce good work consistently. In my opinion the Shaptons are the best tool for this job. You can can get Norton waterstones for cheaper but from I have heard a lot of people just end up buying the Shaptons at some point.

Saws, if you are going to do hand work saws become essential as well. There is probably some debate on what saws you need in your tool kit but if you are doing strictly hand work you will need 2 panel saws (rip/xcut), 2 carcass saws (rip/xcut) and a dovetail saw. Some of the nicer panel saws (LN's, Wenzloff & Sons) are about $225 a piece. You can get used disstons from ebay, brass and antique shops for around 50-$100 depending on the condition and you may need to get it sharpened. I did not want to pay 225 for a new saw and I certainly did not know or want to try and sharpen a saw myself so I bought these Pax Panel Saws from Lee Valley. The price seemed right and they were recommend by Shannon Rogers. For my carcass saws I went with This Set from Lee Valley. The price is incredible and the saws seem pretty darn good. The only real problem is that these saws are relatively small and at some point I am going to need a bigger tenon saw but thats okay because I can splurge for a Bad Axe. Finally you will need a dovetail saw and this is what I went with Standard Dovetail Saw.

I thought this was a pretty good starting point for my hand tool kit. It's a lot of money up front but really nothing compared to the cost of a few power tools. I am not a galoot nor do I intend to be. Hand Tools just seemed like a good starting point for woodworking and I will eventually work in some power tools (bandsaw, tracksaw, planer). I would finally like to recommend checking out Shannon Rogers Hand Tool School. The videos are awesome and Shannon is only an email away from answering your questions. His class is a must for a new hand tool user. Good luck.

James

[Mister Pants]

mr pants wow thats one heck of a rehabilitation. that looks great!

ps noticed the depth adjuster looks like a type 18 from that. I have two type 18s one a #5 and the other a #6

Thanks. I'm very happy with how it turned out. It is a type 18. I have two type 18s myself, the #4 and a #3 that I'm in the process of rehabbing. My 6 is a type 17, I can't remember off hand what my #5 and #7 are. The only problem with getting into rehabbing old planes is you can't stop! .

[jwatson]

thats the truth. i have an assortment of planes from Keen Kutter Stanley and Millers Falls.