Brace Yourselves

If I was a good tool historian, I might be able to give a timeline of when certain brace features showed up.  But I'm not that guy.  When I recently bought a box of tools that included three 10-inch braces and an unattached brace chuck, I was intrigued with the similarities and differences among them.  I also compared them to the two braces I already own.

From left to right:
Millers Falls #1662-10 IN
John S. Fray Co. #123 (12 in.)
Stanley #923-10 IN-Y
Stanley Handyman #H1250 (10 in.)
Dunlap 10 F (10 in.)

You can see right away that the top handle attachment is different for the MF and Fray braces than for the other three.

The metal part supporting the handle is about half the area of the underside of the handle

On the two Stanleys and the Dunlap, the metal supports the entire handle 

I'm really just guessing here, but I think the latter three braces are from the 1960's and that the MF and Fray braces are older (the Fray is probably from the early 1900's).

While we're on the top handles, the MF and the two Stanley top handles were rosewood.  Not sure what light-colored wood (stained reddish-brown on the Dunlap) was used on the others.

All these braces have basically the same ratcheting mechanism and I don't know a lot of details about them, so I'll focus on the chucks, the jaws and the springs.

The Millers Falls brace is first.

Millers Falls #1662-10 IN

The MF jaws with opposing triangular teeth

MF spring captured permanently(?) by punching the jaw around the groove

The Fray brace is next.

John S. Fray #123

The Fray jaws with no teeth

Fray spring captured permanently(?) in a drilled hole

Now the Stanley #923-10 IN-Y.  The chuck and spring are very different from the MF and Fray braces.

Stanley #923

Note that the chuck looks like a cylinder from the outside.  The braces above had shaped chucks.  The Stanley #923 also has most of the outer surface knurled, whereas the MF and Fray braces has smaller portions of the chuck knurled.

The jaws have teeth, but not triangular in shape.
The spring and jaws easily come apart.

This spring is totally different from others I've seen.  It's made to wrap around the shaft just behind the threaded part of the brace.  With this spring configuration, the jaws come out of the chuck and stay with the brace when the chuck is removed from the brace.

Spring in place, with jaws removed

This shows the spring in place with jaws attached

Because the back end of the spring straddles the rear of the threaded part of the brace,
 there is a groove to house the straight part of the spring

This shows how the front of the spring attaches to the jaws

The Stanley Handyman #H1250:

Stanley Handyman #H1250 - cylindrical chuck, mostly knurled

Handyman jaws with triangular teeth

Jaws were punched to capture the end of the wire spring, similar to the MF brace

And the Dunlap 10 F brace.

Dunlap 10 F with chuck shaped similarly to the MF and Fray

Look ma, no teeth!

The spring end is permanently(?) captured in a hole, similar to the Fray brace

For good measure, I'll throw in an unknown maker chuck that came with the box of tools I won in an auction.

Unknown maker non-cylindrical chuck, interestingly shaped spring and toothless jaws

This spring is captured by a punched jaw, but is easily removable

Interesting that this chuck has a hexagonal base, as well as a knurled area.  I can't imagine any case where I'd want to use a wrench to tighten a chuck onto the brace, but what else could that be for?  BTW, if anybody recognizes this unknown chuck and wants to have it, I'll be happy to ship it, for free.

I'll finish this post with an end-on view of the five braces, in the same order as the first pic.  The jaws are all set right at the chuck opening.  Look how different the hundred year old Fray is from the others.

MF, Fray, Stanley, Stanley, Dunlap

It's interesting that in tools that do the same job, there is so much diversity in chucks, springs and jaws.  I guess I shouldn't be surprised, as there was a lot of competition and tool makers were always trying to come up with something unique and patent-able to separate their tools from others.