One can move the cap iron to a position where they are basically doing nothing but sitting there and the plane will still work. Whatever happened years ago most likely had more to do with a dull iron set rank and honed with no camber or corner relief at all. A dull iron, taking too big a bite, with the corners digging in as icing on the cake.
It's understandable, but it is not the plane's fault.
My first outing with a plane was horrifying until I realized how little material each pass was supposed to remove and I either read, or somebody told me, to take some metal off the corners. Then the gates of heaven opened up and this was late model Record with cap iron screws instead of lever cap -- planes made when quality was supposedly a distant memory. But for a shop fire, I'm sure I'd still be using the very same ones. I bought jointer, jack, and smoother in one order all from Garrett Wade back when they and Woodcraft were the go-to mail order outfits in the U.S.
My difficulties had virtually nothing to do with the cap iron though I do recall keeping them set at less than a sixteenth or so. Don't know why, I must have read it in the Garrett Wade catalog or somewhere else at that time.
