Determining Age of S&J hand saws

Discussion in 'Forum: Saw Identification and Discussion' started by enjuneer, Jun 2, 2014.

  1. enjuneer

    enjuneer Member

    Messages:
    22
    Are there any good online sources for determining the date of manufacture for a Spear & Jackson hand saw? I acquired one that has a stamped trademark on the plate and split nuts on what I believe to be a London pattern tote. It has a medallion which one source said started in about 1865. The plate is 26 inches long, filed about 6 tpi rip and is very straight. It is even still very sharp. It does have some condition issues though. The toe of the plate has some heavy pitting for about 1". The lower horn was broken and repaired with a nail. There is a chip out of the top horn.

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  2. fred0325

    fred0325 Most Valued Member

    Messages:
    1,084
    Hi,

    There are probably a number of people who use this site who can answer this better than I can as they are S and J "aficionados", but I do not know of any single source, i.e. an S and J website similar to the Disston one.

    The best way to date is from catalogues, where they exist.

    Apart from that, it is just general features such as handle shape, style of mark. style of font style of medallion if any and saw screw style. Your handle has original orange/yellow varnish which puts it, for me at least, later than 1870 - ish but before the circa 1910 cut-off for split nuts. As does the general handle style.

    This is a wide date range which I an sure that others will be able to narrow down. If I had to guess, I would put is around the 1880's/90's.

    Fred
     
    tonyba likes this.