Shopsmith Forums

I have a 510 with a 520 upgrade. With the fence at its factory adjustment, it takes so much pressure to clamp it down in the front, that I can see the table deflect, especially if I'm using an auxiliary table. I measured the needed force at 21 lbs.

Is that normal?

Owad wrote:I have a 510 with a 520 upgrade. With the fence at its factory adjustment, it takes so much pressure to clamp it down in the front, that I can see the table deflect, especially if I'm using an auxiliary table. I measured the needed force at 21 lbs.

Is that normal?

Seems excessive. Adjust it.

Visible distortion of a table due to clamping force is NOT normal and the fact that you are getting different clamping pressures on the aux table versus the main table suggests (1) the distance between the front and rear rails is not consistent between tables and/or (2) the rails on all the tables are not all parallel, which can be a cause of (1).

If you are lucky, you can back off the nut on the end of the fence to reduce clamping force so that you are no longer getting distortion on the aux table and still get adequate clamping pressure on the main table.

If, after adjustment to prevent it from distorting the aux table, the fence slips under sideways pressure on the fence when it is on the main table, ishimming the rails may be required.

Unfortunately, we are talking about very small differences in the distances between rails or of the amount of out of parallelism. Getting accurate measurements on this scale is not possible with the equipment at the disposal of the average woodworker. Very small amounts of shimming will be needed and you will need some very thin shims.

If the upgrade kit is either new from Shopsmith or at least undamaged, it may be possible to call customer service and see if they will evaluate the tables, rails and fence.

I did this with my second-hand 520 tables/rails. I was having an unsolvable lack of parallelism between the main and aux tables/floating tables that drove me bonkers trying to diagnose. Ultimately I shipped them to Shopsmith and they shimmed them all parallel and shipped them back. Problem resolved. If you ship them, pack them very carefully. I had some problems in that regard.

Good luck,

Al

I don't have a lot of experience but the same thing happened when I upgraded and quickly decided to readjust.

I found this type of problem many years ago starting with the 510 upgrade and it continued with the 520 upgrade. I made a 3" wide jig from 3/4" MDF that extended beyond the table ends and added step blocks at each end to get the same vertical and longitude setting (position) for the rails to the table. I used shim washers, filed some spacers length and made the mounting holes in some tables bigger to allow for this adjustment. I used an auto feeler gauge to get the measurements for the adjustments. I had a different jig for the 510 and 520 upgrades. My customers did not give me any negative feedback about table alignments after I started doing these adjustments. I was able to sell dozens of rebuilt 510 and 520 Shopsmiths during this time. Those were the fun times playing with the Shopsmiths.

Thanks, everyone. I loosened it slightly and it fits much better now. I was hesitant to start adjusting in case it was supposed to be that way for some reason.

As far as alignment with the aux table, I think it's deflecting more just because that table isn't as rigid. The aux table isn't supposed, to be as rigid as the main table, right? Mounted on just the two downward tubes, it deflects rather easily.

That said, I don't have the table aligned yet. The 510 is from 1995. The 520 upgrade was purchased in 2004, but was never installed. I purchased the whole setup from the original owner and installed the upgrade. The aux table is not at all level with the main table, and I haven't adjusted the height yet. I'm hoping that takes care of the alignment issues. According to the original owner, who received it and the upgrades as gifts, she never used the Shopsmith after the first day that she got it (and everything does look unused), so it's very likely the table was never aligned properly.

I adjusted the aux table and everything aligns nicely.