Wooden Tool Restoration

My father recently gave me a collection of wooden hand planes (4) and spirit levels (2) that were owned by my carpenter great-grandfather. They are likely 80-140 years old (and of Victorian-era technology), were all grimy, rusty and paint-splattered but I was keen to have a go at restoring them. There are a ton of resources online with advice for how to do this, but many suggested fairly extreme measures (planing, sanding, rebuilding) and I wasn't interested in going to these lengths - I wanted to preserve most of the patina and charm of the tools, and just clean up the wood and put most of my effort into the steel parts. Pictures: collection of restored tools, plane before restoration, plane after.

1. Rubbing alcohol
2. Steel wool
3. Rust remover
4. Linseed oil
5. diamond whetstone
6. Lee Valley Tools sharpening jig

One of the hand planes had a cracked front handle, and one of the rabbet planes had had its base rebuilt. I dismantled the front of the hand plane by removing the large screw (which I wanted to clean up anyway) using WD-40 and an impact driver. I cleaned the two parts so I could glue them together with wood glue. I chucked the screw into a cordless drill and used steel wool for the threads, and polished the top the same way using a piece of sandpaper. I used the screw to clamp the two pieces in place while it dried. I rubbed some patina scrapings into the glue line to disguise the repair as best I could.

The rabbet plane also had a badly chipped blade so I decided against doing any significant work on it.

My favorite video for restoring wood planes was this one - he employed steel wool and methylated spirits and it had an immediate effect and left the surface in really nice shape. I used rubbing alcohol instead (isopropyl alcohol, less toxic than the methanol that the methylated spirits is adulterated with), which seemed to work well. Use whatever you're comfortable with and/or have on hand.

I did this in several passes with fine (00) steel wool. You could probably do it faster with coarser wool but as this was my first attempt at restoration I wanted to take it easy.

Once I had each piece as clean as I wanted it to be, I wiped on some linseed oil.

Historical note: clean up of the planes revealed owner's marks. My great-grandfather (initials WM) was responsible for the hand-carved M and WM. Someone called "D HOOD" owned the coffin-shaped plane at some stage. Clean up of the 12" spirit level showed the trademark "Hockley Abbey" and "Patent 22017". That patent was filed in 1898, so the level is definitely no older than that. The rabbet plane was made by A. Mathieson & Sons, Glasgow, who were founded in the mid-19th century.

I put all of the steel parts into a rust cleaning solution overnight. I washed each piece and cleaned with coarse steel wool to remove all loose rust. I used cloth-backed sandpaper to get each piece looking nice and clean (the video I linked earlier suggested using kerosene with the sandpaper, but I decided against breathing in that vapor and just sanded it dry - no real danger of overheating the steel when sanding by hand). I sharpened each blade using a diamond whetstone (surprisingly affordable and very effective!) and my Lee Valley Tools sharpening jig. One of the blades was curved and I sharpened it freehand.

Historical note: the plane irons were marked with "Charles Taylor's Sheffield Tools Co" and "W. Marples & Sons Hibernia T Sheffield". A search for the former throws up lots of hits but no convincing histories. Marples on the other hand has a very comprehensive site, and it seems the plane that had the cracked handle is a German Jack Plane.

The levels I just cleaned with steel wool and rubbing alcohol. I cautiously tested the screws to see if I could remove them, but even with WD-40 and tapping the screws did not move. I wasn't prepared to drill them out so I wrapped some steel wool around a dowel and chucked in in a cordless drill to make it faster to clean up the screw heads.

It's unlikely I will use these tools much (I have workhorse modern versions), but they make for attractive display pieces in my workshop and represent a nice piece of family history. Given how easily they are restored with the application of a bit of elbow grease, if you have any old wooden tools lying around I recommend giving them some TLC!