It features a solid brass and stainless steel build, with a bubinga fence accent that feels amazing in the hand. Combined with its hefty weight, it’s an incredibly satisfying tool to use. Placing the TurfChek I on the overlap between two runs, or two units, allows you to ensure the height of cut is consistent.

That said, don’t rush out to buy replacement blades as soon as the edge starts to break. Even a dull wheel gauge will mark your pieces just fine due to the small size of the ring. You might not get as clean of an edge as a cutting gauge, but it should at least be comparable to pins. Can I make my own marking gauge? Whatever you decide to do, make sure you put your own flare on it. Shape the fence to match your hand. Put the wedge or thumb screw where it won’t interfere with your work. You’ll have a better idea of what you want the more you use it, which will probably lead you to make a second or third marking gauge until you make one that’s just right. Here is the section of the 1846‘Broadsheet’ that shows the Gauges that were available. This sheet shows no images so it is hard to guess how some of these tools looked. [Gauge, Rowters, per set of 8 ?]

A Woodworker’s Guide to Marking Gauges

Getting your setting exactly right can be tedious, but it’s worth spending time redoing until it’s perfect. You know the old adage: Measure twice, cut once!

Below here is some additional information that is very difficult to incorporate into the above Charts: However, this model is made with slightly less precision, meaning that the stem is a bit loose in the fence. Also, the thumbscrews and micro-adjustment knob can be clumsy for beginners. Rosewood[?] with Boxwood Head Screw with both Head and Stem Brass ‘Faced’. If it were Ebony it would be #474 c.1873

Gauge# 2052 Beechwood, Half Round polished Head, not plated and with a cream coloured Plastic Thumbscrew. This one below is from around 1960. Issued from the very beginning and until 1965+

The cutting gauge uses a knife instead of a pin to mark wood. This allows it to make a deeper marking, meaning it can be used against the wood grain. One side of the knife will have a bevel (a sloping edge) to make the knife point, this should face the fence so that it is waste side of the work piece (the side of the wood that will be cut off). There are three main types of marking gauges that we’ll talk about in this guide: conventional marking gauges, cutting gauges, and wheel marking gauges. For simplicity’s sake, I’m lumping mortise gauges and combination gauges in with tools that use the same cutting mechanism. The same Beechwood gauge is shown in 1897 as #635, but again a Boxwood gauge is not mentioned. So I wonder if this totally Boxwood gauge [below here ] is #636 which may have been listed in a catalogue before 1888. In the 1888 Cat. a #636 gauge is mentioned but is totally different in description.Below you will find a table depicting the availability of MARPLES Gauges plotted against time up to 1965. After that time I have just included further notes. and available 1873-c.1909, this Rosewood based Combination gauge [shown above] is quite rare. It has a brass slide circular faced head secured by a brass screw. The under side has a ruled brass surface. . Japanese marking gauges, or keshiki, are slightly different than their western counterparts. The basic shape and outcome is the same, but there are a few key elements that make them unique.

bottom edges. The 2 photos below show that the gauge with ALL Phillips screws has a more pronounced curvature to the Top and Bottom of the Head and was thinner at 2.1/16″ Another variant, called a kama-keshiki, features two blades at the end of metal rods. These metal rods run directly through the fence, removing the need for a wooden stem. This also means there’s nothing protruding past the cutting edge, making them great for working in small spaces. The Mortice Gauge #2120 [above 3 photos] and below, seems to be the bog standard for Mortice gauges as it lasted for eons [ c.1861-c1965<]. It had everything……Rosewood; ‘Fancy’ Head; plated Head; Thumbscrew operation; and was a ‘Combination’ gauge. I have noted that the earlier ones had the ‘fancier’ brass inserts [more delicate with smaller screws… photo below here] below] is a Cutting Gauge that I can only find in the 1909 Catalogue, so it may have been short lived.The stem of a cutting gauge is its main body – it holds the knife and the fence. Larger cutting gauges have longer stems to allow them to work over larger work surfaces. The same reference is seen in the 1888 Cat. with again only Ebony being shown but the number is now #645. In the 1897 Cat. it does not appear. The Clarke Brothers Wheel Marking Gauge kit includes an excellent single-wheel gauge and two replacement blades.