Thanks, all. I mentioned GEM because those safety blades came in a little packet, less than one square inch, back in the 50's, 60's. The little packet, you know the sort - you put it away somewhere safe but you could never find it when you wanted it, until you were looking for something else. I've got one somewhere....but I haven't seen it for years. Meanwhile, Mr. Stanley now provides them, in a little dispenser pack which I could find, and Lo ! it fits nicely and the clamping plate can go on the right way, and the little thumbscrew tightens down just right. Turns out the old blade (made in Taiwan) was much thicker than the proper ones.
In this photo there's the scraper made of pressed metal, and made in the USA. It sits on a ledge in the garage, for nearly forty years, and as mentioned above, was used once a year to scrape the car registration sticker off the windscreen. One year I couldn't find it, and had to buy a cheap copy from our cheap supply store. It was made...somewhere else over there...and was so flimsy I turfed it straight after that single use.
The other scraper is a you-beaut, fold-up, with safety catch, from Kingchrome.
Both of them have the problem that the blade can slip out to one side if you're not careful.
I have tried the standard Gillette double-sided razor blade in the new-old scraper, but it doesn't fit, as it is much wider, and so it won't fit between those two locating tabs. Funny, that. I would have thought that all razor blades were of the same dimensions, but that's because the cutouts on the sides look alike. Cheers.
