oldpanforge

That $6 Amazon assortment set of bearing balls was an excellent investment. Replaced all the wrecked balls on both ends of the shaft. Actually the far end of the shaft was missing half of its balls, obviously improved. Adjusted the original cones to just the tiniest hint of slack, and the blower is fully functional. I could not call it a precision machine. Noisy, rattles a bit. Lateral and axial slack/runout feels like 0.010" to my calibrated hand. But the crank force observably all goes into forcing air, not overcoming mechanical friction. It was missing a wooden crank handle when I bought it, remained just the handle "spindle", all bent up, which I straightened. My expedient solution was to cut a short length of fat broomstick, drill through the center, split it lengthwise, and wood-glue it around the spindle with some grease in the middle. I don't know if that's considered proper, but was quick, and it works great. Unsure where this unit is going to land. It is just the blower+tripod, no forge. It probably isn't worth a great deal. But amusing to bring back to functional. Thanks everyone for the help!

I build things and fix things. Sometimes low tech like this ancient forge, other times more high tech. Often in the electromechanical domain. Sometimes fluids, sometimes more like embedded processor electronics. I've certainly re-packed my share of bearings, but usually the balls were more or less spherical and smooth to start with, heh. Chinese bearing balls from Amazon are available at bargain prices. Good quality or not, who knows? Might just see how they roll on these old races. What more to lose? I'll take some measurements on this bearing cone, and its threads. Maybe it matches something odd like a British bicycle bottom bracket bearing. Some bike and scooter stuff from Taiwan and China uses old British thread standards.

Frosty, thanks the suggestion. Too complicated for my purpose. Just wondering about a low-cost, basic fix, how modern, inexpensive, hard bearing balls might likely interact with 100+ year old cup and cone metal.

Earlier today I replied to a 3 yr old Lancaster blower topic, but scratch that... I acquired a Lancaster blower in not the best condition. Improved several aspects already, but now getting to the keep-or-toss decision. A key problem is the blower shaft bearings. Here's a photo of the "balls" and the inner race from the blower-side end of the shaft. If I were to replace these bearings with actual polished 1/4"bearing balls, what will happen? No doubt it will initially roll a lot smoother than now, heh. Longer term, will the lousy race "win" and ruin the balls? Will smooth balls roll ok and tend to smooth that lousy race? The outer race looks about like the inner, maybe a little better; difficult to zoom in for a clean photo. I haven't opened up the blower shaft rear bearings. Presumably they may be in a little better shape. In any case, if to replace, they would be those also. Overall blower, and a bit of disassembly photos FWIW.

I've acquired a similarly-marked Lancaster blower. Mounted on a tripod stand. Just the stand and the blower, nothing else attached. My unit has some differences from the one described here. The ends of my blower shaft are covered by screw-in brass caps. The blower wheel blades and spider are a sheet metal assemblage welded to a hub. It is missing the brass bushing on the crank shaft, the non-handle side. That bushing seems common design with those on the secondary gear. I jammed a PVC pipe fitting in there for the moment. The blower shaft turns, but rumbles like crazy. And occasionally it jams. I'm guessing flat spots on one or more bearing balls. The crankshaft and secondary shaft bushings are very loose. Assuming this is wear. I set their adjustment screws snug. Gears feel ok, look ok. I've had the gear box open, inspected, not cleaning it yet. What might my luck be were I to replace only the bearing balls?