In this post I will be finishing my coverage of bits for braces found in the Tison Tool Barn, including a bit gauge, a screwdriver bit, countersinks, and washer cutters. First, I want to show a device that is not a bit, but which attaches to an auger bit. It is an adjustable bit gauge. It locks onto an auger bit, and stops the bit after it has bored a hole to a specified depth. This allows a worker to precisely bore a series of holes all to the same depth. This item is marked "STANLEY MADE IN USA C575." The bit gauge has two identical cast pieces, held together by two sets of bolt, washer and wing nut. The flared feet on one end stop the bit when they touch the surface of the piece wood in which the hole is being bored. This gauge fits on an auger bit up to 1 inch in diameter. This Stanley No. 49 adjustable bit gauge was introduced around 1904. Stanley began advertising a different bit gauge, No. 47, by the 1950s. The Stanley adjustable bit gauge No. 49 in the left photo, and set on an auger bit in the right photo. Photos by Donald Albury. Next is a screwdriver bit. A screwdriver bit mounted in a brace can be handy for driving or removing large screws, as the sweep of the brace provides much more torque than gripping a screwdriver handle by hand. This bit is 5-1./2 inches long and has a 9/16 inch wide tip. The bit has no visible markings. A countersink bit cuts a conical depression around a screw-hole, so that a flat-headed screw will have its top at or below the surrounding surface. The first countersink in the Tison Tool Barn collection bores a conical hole up to 7/8 inch across. This countersink has a hollow head with a cutting edge that shaves wood from the hole, unlike many countersinks, which scrape wood out of the hole. It has "PATD APR 12, 187~", "P MALVIK" and "P WHEELER" stamped on it. US Patent 101,796 was assigned to Asa Wheeler on Apr. 12, 1870 for this countersink. The countersink was manufactured by George B. Wheeler and, later, by the Stanley Rule and Level Company. I have found no information on the name P. Malvik.. This countersink bit has a cutting head with several radial vanes that scraped wood from the hole. It is 3/4 inch at the widest point of the head. "RAFTSMA" is visible stamped on the shaft. This is almost certainly a Craftsman bit from Sears, from sometime after 1927. The next countersink bit does not have a tang, It probably was used with a powered drill. It has "80" (or "08") stamped on the shaft. The cutting head has a single cutting edge. If you have ever taken a pump apart, then you have probably had the experience of hand-cutting a replacement gasket. Gaskets may be made of cork, leather, rubber, rubberized cloth, and other materials. (One contemporary supplier lists 41 types of gasket material for sale.) Washers, or circular gaskets, may also be made of those materials. The next two items are washer cutting bits, which allow the cutting of washers with concentric inside and outside edges from any material that can be cut by a knife blade. Both of these washer cutters have two adjustable cutters. One can be set for the outside diameter of the washer, and the other for the inside diameter. The first washer cutter has a maximum outside diameter of 3 inches. It is marked "KING & SMITH'S PAT. OCT. 24, 1865" and "MF~ BY SAVAGE & SMITH, MIDDLETON, CT". This tool was assigned US Patent 50,600. The second washer cutter has a maximum outside diameter of 4-1/2 inches. The only markings on the tool are an "H" in a circle, and the letters "HA" followed by some worn down or otherwise obscured characters. This tool was sold under the "Hargrave" trade mark used by the Cincinnati Tool Company. (My thanks to Bob Page and Mark Stansbury in the Antique and Vintage Tools Forum on Facebook for helping me identify this trade mark.) The Hargrave brand was used on clamps, chisels, punches, washer cutters, and other related tools. I have not found a model number for this tool, nor when it was made. In my next post I will leave woodworking tools for a bit, and take a look at the monkey wrenches in the Tison Tool Barn.
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In my last post I wrote about bits in the Tison Tool Barn that were used with a brace to bore holes in wood. In this post I will look at hollow augers, which cut wood away on the end of a spoke or post, leaving a cylinder of wood called a round tenon. Round tenons are a form of the tenon in mortise and tenon joints. Round tenons are inserted into round mortises, which are indistinguishable from bore holes. Round mortises and tenons have primarily been used by wheelwrights in mounting spokes to rims on wooden wheels. Round mortise and tenon joints are also used in making Windsor chairs. Forming round tenons that fit correctly in their corresponding mortises took skill and care. The development of hollow augers allowed wheelwrights and chairmakers to repeatedly and quickly cut round tenons of a consistent size and shape. Between 1835 and 1928 there were 98 US patents issued for hollow augers and other tools for cutting round tenons. (Although manufacture of wagons and coaches had steeply declined in the 20th century, wooden spokes continued to be used in motor vehicle wheels until well after World War I.) Many of the hollow augers invented during that time cut tenons of a fixed diameter. A worker needed a different fixed-size hollow auger for each diameter tenon he wanted to cut. Other hollow augers were adjustable, allowing a worker to use one tool to cut tenons of various diameters by making adjustments in the settings of the cutting blades. The Tison Tool Barn collection has three adjustable hollow augers. First is a Bonney's Pattern Hollow Auger, patented Aug. 2, 1870. This bit has one cutting blade. It has a wheel with 8 holes from 3/8 inch to 1 inch in diameter, limiting it to cutting round tenons of those diameters. This range of tenon diameters may have met the needs of most woodworkers. This tool has two slots cut into the tang, indicating that it could be used with at least two different varieties of cut-tang chuck. The next adjustable hollow auger in the Tison Tool Barn is shown below. It is marked "E. C. STERNS & CO. SYRACUSE, N.Y." and "PATENTED MARCH 16, 1880." Patent number 225,496 was issued to Edward C. Stearns, who had become the head of a company founded by his father in 1864. George N. Stearns & Co. became E. C. Stearns & Co. in 1877. The company was still doing business in 1891. Father and son were obviously interested in improving hollow augers. George N. Stearns was issued 8 patents for hollow augers between 1863 and 1880, several of which were manufactured by the Stearns company. The third adjustable hollow auger in the Tison Tool Barn appears to be a rare find. The only marking on the tool is "PATḎ DEC ~ 1868." US patent 85,423 was issued to J. H. Beauregard of Sandy Hill, N. Y. on Dec. 29, 1868. The Directory of American Tool and Machinery Patents web site, which is a volunteer effort to compile information on patents, had not found any previous evidence that this tool had ever been manufactured. I have found no information on who manufactured this item, or when. This hollow auger has two cutting blades. Before a hollow auger could start cutting a round tenon, the end of the spoke had to be pointed, that is, have a truncated cone cut on the end so that a hollow auger could be securely centered on it. Spokes could be trimmed with a pointing tool. The Tison Tool Barn has two tools that could be so used. First is this dowel pointer or trimmer. It could point a spoke or dowel up to 3/4 inch in diameter. The only mark on the tool is the trade mark "STANLEY." Next is a spoke pointer. This tool is marked "E. C. STEARNS & CO. SYRACUSE, N. Y." Patent No. 220,442 for this tool was issued to Edward C. Stearns on Oct. 7, 1879. This tool will point a spoke or post up to 1-3/4 inches in diameter. In my next post I will cover some odds and ends of bits in the Tison Tool Barn that were used with a brace.
By Donald Albury. This week I continue describing braces that are in the Tison Tool Barn. In the second half of the 19th century chucks using jaws tightened and loosened by rotating a shell came into use on braces. William Henry Barber was issued a patent in 1864 for what became known as the Barber chuck. The Barber chuck has a pair of spring-loaded jaws inside a rotating shell. The jaws are arranged so that they make contact along their full length with a square tapered bit tang. The rotating shell tightens or loosens the jaws depending on which way it is rotated. The Barber chuck, with various improvements introduced over the years, became a popular style of chuck for braces. The Tison Tool Barn holds several braces with jawed chucks. First is this brace with a Barber chuck and a wooden head and sweep grip. There are stamped markings in four different places: "F. BUNNY", "F. DUCK" (twice), and "G. ROCK". I have no idea what those markings mean. This brace is 14.5 inches long and has an 11 inch sweep. While a brace was an efficient tool when the crank could be swept in a full circle, it became much less useful if something obstructed a full sweep. The invention of a ratcheting mechanism solved the problem. William P. Dolan was issued a patent in 1871 that became the basis for most ratcheting braces, in which the sweep could be swung back and forth, turning the bit in only one direction. Ratcheting braces normally have three settings, turning the bit clockwise only, counter-clockwise only, or locked, so that the bit always turns with the sweep. This ratcheting brace, which has a Barber chuck, is marked "NO. 33" and "PAT PDGY.18 1880". "PAT PDG" is short for "patent pending", but the rest of the marking is confusing. The PDG may have been stamped over JUL in what was originally JULY 18 1880, or the date was added in an attempt to overstamp PDG. A (rather cursory) search has not found a patent with that date for either a brace or a chuck. "NO. 33" is probably a model number, but I have no clue as the manufacturer of this brace. The brace is 13 inches long with an 8 inch sweep. Here is another ratcheting brace with a Barber chuck. It is marked "STANLEY" and "NO. 945-10 IN." I have seen comments on the Internet that the model 945 was offered in the 1920s and in the 1950s, so this brace is likely between 60 and 100 years old. It is 13 inches long, and has a 10 inch sweep. The next brace, shown below, is marked "P. S. & W. Co." and "59 1/2". The Peck, Stow & Wilcox Co. was formed in 1870 by the merger of three companies, and continued in business until 1950. This brace appears to have a Barber chuck, which indicates that it was probably produced in the 20th century (braces with Barber chucks are shown in a 1911 caralog from P., S. & W). The "59 1/2" appears to be a model number, but the few model numbers I have seen for P. S. & W. braces have been four digits long with no fractions. This brace is 11 inches long and has an 8 inch sweep. Below is another ratcheting brace from the Peck, Stow & Wilcox Co. with a Barber chuck. The Brace is marked "P, S. & W. CO. 2010". Again, the Barber chuck indicates that this brace was probably manufactured in the 20th century. The brace is 13.5 inches long, with a 10 inch sweep. The next brace is also from Peck, Stow & Wilcox Co. It has a Peck and Powers-style interlocking jaws chuck. (The Peck of Peck and Powers apparently had no relation to the Peck of Peck, Stow & Wilcox.) The Peck and Powers chuck was patented in 1879. The brace is marked "P., S. & W. CO." and "1003". The lack of a patent number for the chuck on the brace indicates this is a later model. The brace is 13.5 inches long with an 8 inch sweep. The brace below is a corner brace. The rotary motion of the crank is transmitted through gears to the chuck. The brace is not marked, but appears to be a Fray model 100, but with a Barber-style chuck rather than the interlocking jaws chuck pictured in the 1911 Fray catalog. This model was also made by Stanley after it acquired Fray, and it may have been produced for sale by other companies. The brace is 17.5 inches long and 9 inches wide. It has an 8 inch sweep. The last brace in this post is more of a toy than a working tool. It probably came from a child's tool kit. The handle on the crank is short, and not really big enough for a grown man's hand. The sweep is narrow, producing a low torque suitable only for drilling very small holes. The chuck is simple. There is a ratchet, similar to ones on mechanical screwdrivers, just below the head. The brace is 12.5 inches long, with a sweep of 2 inches. Sources:
Spofford Style Bit Braces - 1897 Featured Braces - The Barber Brace, Dolan's ratchet patent Peck, Stow & Wilcox Co.. PEXTO Braces Another source (for information about all sorts of old hand tools) is: Walsh, Peter C., Woodworking Tools 1600-1900, Smithsonian Institution. The e-book version is downloadable for free from Project Gutenberg. Information about augers is found starting at location 515. By Donald Albury. I was pleased to learn this week that the Tools and Hardware section of the Collectors Weekly web site has linked to this blog as a Great Reference Site. A Brief Note on Augers I could say that the search for truth is unending, but that seems a bit pretentious when talking about old tools. I have found, less than a week after my last post, more information about the history of augers. D.B. Laney posted a few days ago about the book Country Furniture by Aldren Watson. I've had a copy of the book for 40 years, but hadn't looked at it in a long time. I agree with Laney, this book is a real pleasure to browse through. Watson does mention (page 97) that a single cutter spiral auger with a gimlet point was invented about 1770, but the gimlet point was narrow and frequently broke. The 1809 patent that I referred to last week was apparently for the double cutting edge on a spiral auger, rather than for the gimlet point. Another source I just found on Wikisource is the article on "Boring" in the 1879 issue of The American Cyclopedia. Figures 7 through 16 illustrate the various forms of augers and auger bits in use up to that year. Braces: Origins, Sheffield and Spofford This issue of my blog begins a description of the braces held in the Tison Tool Barn. I will finish this topic next week. A brace or bitstock is a woodworking tool used to bore holes in wood. It has a U-shaped section offset from the shaft of the handle that forms a crank. One end holds a bit, which will bore into wood when it is turned. The crank allows the woodworker to rotate the handle with one hand while pushing down on a knob or pad (the head) at the end of the brace with the other hand, imparting a continuous rotary motion to the cutting end of the bit. The sweep is the diameter of the circle swept out by the crank handle as it is turned. The wider the sweep, the greater the torque that can be generated with the brace. A brace and set of bits were essential to woodworkers well into the 20th century, but have been largely replaced by power drills. I bought a brace and set of auger bits some 50 years ago, but have not used the auger bits for 35 years. I have used the brace with a screwdriver bit on occasion. The brace is a relatively recent addition to the woodworker's tool chest. The oldest known surviving brace was found on the Mary Rose, an English warship that sank in 1545. The first known depiction of a brace is in a painting by Robert Campin completed sometime between 1425 and 1428. In the detail below, St. Joseph is holding the brace in an awkward manner that makes me suspect that neither Campin nor his model had ever seen a brace in use. The earliest braces had a bit permanently mounted to the brace. A woodworker would need a different brace for every size hole he wanted to bore. Eventually a socket was introduced into the end of a brace, in which a wooden pad mounted to a bit was held by friction, or by a thumbscrew. The sockets and pads had a square cross-section. Some early sockets and pads had the same width for their full length, but the development of tapered pads and sockets allowed for easier insertion and removal of bits while still achieving a tight fit. Wooden pads for bits were eliminated by the development of tangs, in which bits were given a tapered end with a square cross-section. A mechanical device to secure the tang of a bit to a brace is called a chuck. There have been many types of chucks and many styles of braces in the past two centuries. I will only cover ones for which examples are found in the Tison Tool Barn. One early method of securing bits to a brace was the cut-tang chuck, in which the tang has a slot which is engaged by a spring-loaded hook. The brace shown below is a Sheffield-type brace with a push-button chuck. A push-button chuck is a type of cut-tang chuck. The button pushes the hook clear, releasing the bit. There are no markings on this brace. A book on 18th century tools published in 1816 has an illustration showing a brace with a push-button chuck. Similar braces were made through most of the 19th century. The brace is 13.5 inches long, and the crank has a 7 inch sweep. The next brace is another Sheffield style brace with a push-button chuck. This brace has brass (or brass-plated) reinforcing plates attached to the curved sections of the brace. The only markings on the brace are the name "JOHN GREEN" with unevenly spaced and aligned letters, and "1816" in another location. "John Green" is probably an owner's name. The number is a problem. I doubt an owner would bother to stamp a date on his tool. A manufacturer might stamp a part number on a tool, but that is seen primarily on metal tools. A year may appear on a tool as either the date the manufacturer was founded, or the date a patent was issued, but neither is the case here. I suspect the "1816" was added at some point to make the tool seem older, and therefore more valuable. The brace is 11 inches long and has an 8 inch sweep. The brace below is a Sheffield style brace with a lever release chuck. This is another type of cut-tang chuck, in which pressing the lever lifts the hook out of the slot on the tang. It has brass reinforcing plates on the curved parts of the brace. It is stamped "Made for T. TILLOTSON SHEFFIELD". Thomas Tillotson was a merchant and dealer in New York. The business, an old family firm, became "T. Tillotson" after 1843, when Thomas's brother John left the firm, and appears to have closed by the beginning of the Civil War. This leaves a well defined time period in which the brace was probably produced. The brace is 14 inches long, and the crank has a sweep of 7 inches. This next brace is a steel brace (even the head is metal). It has a Taylors Patent chuck, which is another type of cut-tang chuck. Jeremy Taylor of Connecticut patented this chuck in 1836. The brace is also marked "I. WILSON". Increase Wilson manufactured tools starting in 1818. His business became a public company under the name "Wilson Manufacturing Co." in 1855. This brace is 12 inches long, and the crank has a 9 inch sweep. In 1859 Nelson Spofford received a patent for a "clamshell" type of chuck. This chuck was formed by a fork or split at the end of the brace, with a channel for a bit tang. The chuck was closed on the tang like a vise by turning a thumbscrew. The Spofford chuck was used starting in 1859 on braces produced initially by Fray & Pigg Manufacturers, and from sometime before 1866 by John S. Fray and Co. Stanley Works acquired John S. Fray & Co. shortly after 1900 and continued to manufacture Spofford chuck braces until 1942. The brace below has a Spofford chuck. It is marked "JOHN S. FRAY" and "BRIDGEPORT, CT." The wood head and rotating wood grip on the crank indicates that this is a later model from Fray. The wood crank grip is two parts held together on the crank by pewter rings. The brace is 11.75 inches long, and has a sweep of 13 inches. This next brace is not marked, but is very similar to the one above, and likely also from John S. Fray & Co. It also has a wood head and crank grip, and is therefore from sometime in the later part of the 19th century or the 20th century. The brace is 11.5 inches long and has a 17 inch sweep. I will cover more braces from the Tison Tool Barn next week. Sources:
Hand-powered drilling tools and machines, Low-Tech Magazine A Collection of Bit Braces Brace Innovative History: an Overview The Primitive Wooden Brace Repair of push-button chuck John S. Fray & Co. Spofford Style Braces PEXTO Braces Barlow, Ronald S. (1999) The Antique Tool collector's Guide to Value. Gas City, IN: L-W Book Sales. Another source (for information about all sorts of old hand tools) is: Walsh, Peter C., Woodworking Tools 1600-1900, Smithsonian Institution. The e-book version is downloadable for free from Project Gutenberg. Information about augers is found starting at location 515. |
AuthorI have been a volunteer at the Matheson History Museum. Feeling an affinity with old hand tools (some of which I remember from my youth), I have tried to learn more about the history of the tools in the Tison Tool Barn, and how they were used. All text and photographs by Donald Albury in this blog are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. All illustrations taken from Wikimedia Commons are either in the public domain, or have been released under a Creative Commons license.
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