# Bedrock vs Bailey



## BZawat (Sep 21, 2012)

Evening all. I'm wondering what some of you experienced guys think about the differences between the Bailey planes and Bedrock planes, and which you prefer. 

Is there a particular function that one model performs better than the other? 

From the bit of reading I've done, the biggest difference I've noticed is in the frog receiver portion of the casting. What's that all about?


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## Wrangler02 (Apr 15, 2011)

BZawat said:


> From the bit of reading I've done, the biggest difference I've noticed is in the frog receiver portion of the casting. What's that all about?


The biggest difference between them is that you can adjust the with of the mouth without removing the iron on the Bed Rock, and frankly it's not that big a deal. You don't change that width often enough to justify the additional cost of the Bedrock. I'll take a Bailey with a Hock blade any day. I own and use a #5 Bailey, and a #605 Bedrock; pick up one and use it until it needs sharpening, pick up the other and use it. There is no difference in the performance. The Bedrock is prettier!!


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## knotscott (Nov 8, 2007)

What Wrangler said....plus, the Bedrock will generally hold value better due to a perception of it's superiority (deserved or not).


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## timetestedtools (Aug 23, 2012)

I collect all types, but I _*use*_ my bedrocks. A bit backwards maybe, but its true. No technical reason, I don't feel they work any better than most good vintage (or new for that matter) but they just look really cool.


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## Dave Paine (May 30, 2012)

BZawat said:


> From the bit of reading I've done, the biggest difference I've noticed is in the frog receiver portion of the casting. What's that all about?


That was marketed as a big technical advancement at the time. Back then the normal Stanley - Bailey planes did not have a frog adjustment screw and the blade had to be removed to adjust the position of the frog.

Some time later the Stanley - Bailey planes had the single frog adjustment screw, but this design still needs the blade to be removed to adjust.

As the others said, in reality it was not as big a deal as the marketing hype.

The early Bedrocks had the curved sides, later Bedrocks have the flat top sides, which do look nice. Not going to change how the plane works. 

If you find a Bedrock at a decent price, it is worth getting. As others said, they normally go for a premium.


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## Billy De (Jul 19, 2009)

Its easy in hind site to say the bedrock was just a marketing stunt, but what I'm led to believe and I have no reason to disbelieve it.

Stanley at the time just before the bedrock had a problem with the planes chattering.

Now this could have been the answer to the problem, if you look at normal Stanley bench plane the frog connects to the sole just behind the mouth and at two maybe three points behind that and fastend to the sole with two cheese headed bolts.

The bedrock has a machined bed on the sole and on the frog dovetailed on the sides so there is no side ways movement and two pins with holes in the end that drop through the frog into the sole.

On the sole there are two threaded bolts with tapperd ends that fit into the holes in the pins and fastern the frog down so it just aint going to move.

But the secret to the whole thing is the central adjusting screw, the bedrocks where the first to have this and Stanley with one eye on the patents introduced this to the other bench planes.

In reality this solves the problem but makes the bedrock over engineered but if people want to buy it well sell it to them,later on cut down the cheeks and man it looks cool.

Just recently Stanley reintroduced the Sweathart plane JMHO but they missed the bus, if the had cut down the cheeks they would have sold a lot more.

Record had a plane with cut down cheeks they called it the T5 the 5 because it was a jack and the T for Technical they sold the plane to schools it had a tapped hole in each cheek that a handle screwed into and then it could be used on a shooting board.


So is the Bedrock better than a normal bench plane JMHO no but it sure is cool.

But if there is no difference, why are all the top end planes based on the Bedrock?

Could it be just the cool factor?


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## BZawat (Sep 21, 2012)

Just so you guys all know, I haven't checked out ;-) Thanks for all the responses & the info!


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