August 17, 201213 yr Got it delivered on a tilting flatbed tow truck, right to my garage door. She's in fine shape, but from working with older lathe and miling equipment I know that vintage gear can perform better with simply a decent and thorough cleaning. Glad I had my overhead gantry crane, that top handwheel is very beefy on its own. Everything came apart nicely. Dismantled the entire press of all moving parts. There's some scarring of the ways in few spots, nothing horrible but shows some use. You can see that in some of.the pics. Some crusted grease, probably embeded with metal chips acted more as sandpaper than it did lubricant in the later years... I doubt this had ever been taken apart since it left the factory, you could tell by the paint lines. Never realized the ways have oil troughs that come down from the top with little 'pockets' to hold the oil at the very top. Cleaned all the internal nut threads, and gave the leadscrew a good scrubbing too. Nut and thread look in great shape... Now that she's all clean, only good way oil for her under my ownership, no grease. Got her all back together tonight and adjusted the ways for a nice fit. I think she's ready for another 100yrs of service. :)
August 17, 201213 yr Is it a one or two start screw ? My press has a two start screw with 1 1/2 inch lead and works fine for most work.
August 17, 201213 yr I found the Waterbury Farrell catalogue which contained my press in Google Books. The catalogue indicated, that mine was a die makers tool room press designed to be used testing dies. Perhaps you might find a catalogue listing for yours there as well. In any event yours looks like a good press. Did any tooling come with your press ?
August 17, 201213 yr Author No tooling, but I was happy that it had the tool block holder with it. Several I've seen don't have it, it would take some time and money for a chunk of steel that size to be fabricated.
August 20, 201213 yr Author Here ya go.... Not sure if this is the original block or not, but fits perfect.
August 20, 201213 yr My big H frame Hopkins has a block like that with a MUCH bigger v in it and that V holds my tool holder that has a 1" hole drilled into it with a set screw. It came with just a flat die in it so I change between them as needed.
August 20, 201213 yr Author Yeah, I thought the V looked a bit small..... I can do that on the mill if needed. ....easier to take material off than try to put it back on. I'm thinking about machining a holder to fit up in there that will swap out 1" dia round tooling with a setscrew.
August 21, 201213 yr Lot easier to machine 2" dia stock than 6" diameter stock... That looks like a retrofit part to me my original was cast and then machined where needed and that looks machined all over.
August 21, 201213 yr Author Sure does look machined all over- and since everything else was cast, that was my reasoning for thinking it probably wasn't original. Quite a chunk to start with! 3" thick, 5"x6.5". I'll most likely enlarge the V of the block to nicely accept my tool holder I'll turn and bore on the lathe.
August 21, 201213 yr Here is a photo which Shows the 2 of 3 tool holders that I made for my press. The dovetailed tool plate shown is the original hardened plate which was to hard to drill and tap so I elected to make another which could be easily drilled and tapped to receive the tool holders ( that plate is installed in my press and not shown). If you look closely you will see a shouldered demolition chipping hammer tool. Since the punches, slitters, and other tooling used in these presses need to be shouldered I elected to use these demo hammer tools as a basis for my smaller tooling. They are readily available used in dull condition for around $2 each from rental stores. From each tool bit you get one short shouldered tool for the press and a second longer un-shouldered cutoff to be used for hand held punches. The steel is plenty good for most uses. One of the pictured holders is holding a shouldered blank tool. Some press owners elect to have a single tool holder with a large bore. They accommodate smaller diameter tooling by using sleeve reducers. It is important that tooling be shouldered. A recent post described a newly acquired press with a tool mushroomed and locked into the holder.
September 11, 201213 yr Just got a fly press (estimate somewhere in the 6-8 ton area). Must be smaller since it fit in my pickup. I'll post pictures when I figure out how.
September 11, 201213 yr Well there is "fit in the pickup" and there's "fit in the pickup" I paid nearly the same amount for a rigger to load my press into my small 4 cyl pickup as my winning bid for the press was. Put a 3/4" sheet of plywood down first and strapped the press six ways from Sunday and drove all the way across town (15 miles) in the left lane of the major cross town street doing 25 mph---10 miles under the speed limit. *NOBODY* honked, cut me off, gave me the finger and I seemed to have plenty of room around me on all sides at all times. Got home and used a large tree and a chain hoist to unload fastening 4x4 "runners" to the factory base and chained it up against the back bumper and creeped it around to the shop doors where I used rollers and a honking big lever to get it inside... There is a lot you can "get away with" if you are willing to go SLOW and keep energy OUT of the system!
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.