My boring gloat

[CatButler]

This is a Bell Systems 2101 "Yankee" bit brace. I know this is the South and its hard to get excited about anything named "Yankee", but this has been described as the best bit brace ever made.

View image in gallery​

This one was made after Stanley bought North Brothers, but it reads by "North Bros a division of Stanley tools", so it is still one of the high quality ones.

It has a little wear, but is in great user shape. It has a ball bearing ratchet and handle. It is just unreal how smooth it operates. Here is a picture of the chuck. It is difficult to see, but it is nearly perfectly square with no round out.

View image in gallery​

I got it off of Ebay for $25 dollars. Some of these have gone for $50.
I can't wait to try it out.

 

[froglips]

Talk about a Hole in One!!!

Jim

 

[LeftyTom]

You can't beat that with a stick.

 

[scsmith42]

Nice score - that thing looks practially new. I once had the opportunity to use on of the Bell bit braces. They are incredibly smooth.

 

[CatButler]

It's in pretty good shape. The top of the ratchet case looks to have been mashed with a hammer a few times, but it still works fine. These were made to the old Bell System standards that everything had to be nearly indestructible. It's really a marvelous feat of early to mid 20th century engineering. Then we discovered that if something breaks, we can just throw it away and buy an new cheap one.

 

[Ray Martin]

Bryan,

Saw the subject of your post and had a hard time getting excited about opening it... :gar-La; (bad pun, sorry)

Very nice tool snag. Congrats.

 

[sapwood]

Great snag!
That or a similar quality brace and bit is high on my want list.

Roger

 

[cpowell]

That's a gorgeous specimen you got there. Man it looks pretty cherry.

Gloat away! :gar-Bi


Chuck

 

[CatButler]

Great snag!
That or a similar quality brace and bit is high on my want list.

Roger

Cool. Chris Schwartz wrote a big mushy blog post about the North Bros Yankee a few years ago and they became scarce on eBay.

This is a good resource on them

http://www.sydnassloot.com/brace.htm

I also have a Peck, Stowe, and Wilcox with the Sampson chuck and its nicer than most, but still doesn't compare to the Yankee.

Watch out for new Stanley models, apparently they weren't as well made.