bruce johnson Report post Posted June 13, 2014 I ended up with a pretty large set of older Craftools. In the set are 17 stamps that are not plated. Very nice impressions, but definitely not plated nor evidence of having plating removed. I had been told that the stamps were not plated during the Korean war due to chrome being used in the war effort. The odd thing with these stamps is: 1) seven of the unplateds are marked only Craftool Co, but have the letter prefix before the stamp number. In my understanding the letter prefix was after Tandy bought Craftool in 1963 or so. 2) The rest of the unplated stamps are marked Craftool Co USA. and should be plated?? How often has anyone seen these variants? Thanks for any insight! - Bruce Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
WyomingSlick Report post Posted June 13, 2014 If they have a prefix letter before the number, they were definately made after Tandy moved from LA to Ft. Worth. The only exceptions to this are the "Indian tools" which had a " S- " before the numbers: 1 - 15 Unplated? Keep in mind that every Craftool was unplated initially, after machining and grinding is done, the lettering stamped in, and before it goes to the plating tanks. Perhaps you've heard the song Johnny Cash did called "One Piece at a Time" where he sings of working in an automobile factory and stealing all the parts to build his own car at home. I would suspect such things went on at the Craftool factory in Texas also. Do the tools feel "hot" to you? LOL As to the contention that Craftools were not plated during the Korean War due to chromium being a restricted "war material"......yes, I heard that originally from Ron Ross, and passed it on as fact......but I am not so sure about that anymore. If that were the case, I think I would have encountered quite a few, out of the many thousands of Craftools I have seen, by now. Ouside of a complete set of the "Indian" stamps in their original tool case, which is not plated, I can count on my fingers, the number of unplated Craftools I have come across. Perhaps that is because it was just as easy to steal a plated Craftool in the early years....... as an unplated one. They wouldn't have been believers in that BS about plating dulling the tool impression that too many ignorant folks subscribe to nowdays. I do have some very early Craftools, probably dating to the late 40's that would seem to be more of a chromium-nickel plating as they have that yellowish tinge common to old nickel plated stuff. As you can see in the pictures, I show three old veiners......all of them very early ones with the coarse knurling and no number The two outside ones are what I believe to be nickel plated only as shown by their yellowish color. These may posssibly be Craftools that were plated in a multi-step process where a flash straight chromium bath would have been the last step resulting in the common chrome look normal to Craftools. Only these two didn't make it into the finishing bath and so they show the usualy hidden underlying chromium-nickel coat only. The second pic shows the yellowish tinge better, Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
bruce johnson Report post Posted June 13, 2014 WS, Thanks again for your insight. I talked to Ron about this yesterday as well. He said he has a Craftool catalog with an insert that has the deal about the chrome plating and the war restrictions. How many were affected?? I have had the occasional unplated stamp and so far they have all been no-letter so I never thought twice about it. Now to find 17 of them in a whack with prefixes piqued my curiosity a bit more. I was rolling the dice and expecting they'd may be preletters, McMillens, or other handmades. No worries, these are nice stamps and I'll stack the basket and waffle stamp against anybody's made today. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Elliot Report post Posted June 16, 2014 I have some old Craftool stamps no numbers or letters some light plating, or not plated with just Craftool on the shank. Never see some of the patterns in the old catalogs. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
WyomingSlick Report post Posted June 16, 2014 I have some old Craftool stamps no numbers or letters some light plating, or not plated with just Craftool on the shank. Never see some of the patterns in the old catalogs. Post some pictures of them with their impressions and I will identify them for you. It would be helpful if you can do the pics with a penny for size comparson. Also a side profile of the tool head and the shaft are helpful in determining the time period in which they were made. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
chrstn53 Report post Posted January 5, 2015 WyomingSlick, I picked up this set of tools a while back. Almost all of the tools are marked Craftool Co. but are all marked with numbers in the 1,000's, for example 7034, 4130 3020, 6034 etc. The face of the stamps are bright and shiny but the shafts have a completely different unfinished look with a yellowish tint. The detail on the face of the stamps are pretty impressive. I picked them up from a guy in Pennsylvania, but he did not know anything about them. Were you ever able to dig anything else up about them? Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
WyomingSlick Report post Posted January 6, 2015 Those tools are the metal stamping tools for use on softer materials such as silver, copper, and aluminum that Tandy introduce in the early 60's Of course they could also be used on leather, and several article appeared in the LEATHER CRAFTSMAN magazine featuring them. Also some of the Doodle Pages also showed work done with them on leather. They are plated with a thin zinc coating which doesn't last long on the tips under use. Looks to me like you either have the full set, or nearly so. I counted 41 there, and if there are no doubles, then that is three more than I have collected. There were 39 shown in the original offering, but i know they did add some more later as I have a couple not shown on the original catalog page. Craftool did put out at least one instruction book, and perhaps more, for these tools. I have seen a few of the books come up on ebay, but they went to other buyers with fatter wallets than mine, or at least more desire than I had. A couple of scans that might be of interest below. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
chrstn53 Report post Posted January 7, 2015 Thank you WyomingSlick, I'm not at all surprised that you had some information of these tools. The set I have has all of the pictured stamps in the advertisement, plus two others that are not on the add. The two extras are numbers 9210 and 9213. I attached a picture with the two not on the add circled. These are defiantly some keepers for my collection and I will keep my eyes open for the instruction books. Hopefully I will come across one so I can make a copy for you. Thank you for your wealth of knowledge. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Crowdog Report post Posted July 19, 2015 I have 22 of them I always wondered why they looked different Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
King's X Report post Posted July 20, 2015 Didn't Jerry Jennings publishing a stamping/pattern book with the use of these tools? Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Oldtoolsniper Report post Posted July 20, 2015 This has been an interesting thread. Where does one find information on dating these tools? Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
