Power Pro Alternative -- SuperShop

[pennview]

Over the weekend I picked up a Smithy SuperShop with bandsaw in a great deal. While not up to the Power Pro capabilities, it operates at 32 to 7,200 RPM and requires some shifting of the drive belt to accomplish that, but it's quite simple to adjust with a couple of levers. It's quite heavy and has a built-in lift assist spring, which requires special care when releasing the tension to disassemble the machine for moving. Hopefully, I'll figure out how to do that safely before having to do that again as my left hand would be extremely pleased to avoid another round with a wrench rotated by a powerful spring. All in all it could have been worse.

It has a huge spindle/quill assembly that runs smoothly through the various speeds. It uses R8 collets and a draw bar to attach tooling to the spindle, but also has 2 1/8" x 8 threads per inch for mounting chucks and faceplates. It also came with a heavy 6" 3 jaw metal-working chuck and a 10" cast iron faceplate.

The motor doesn't reverse, but that seems to be only a matter of adding a DPDT switch to make it happen.

Interestingly, the bandsaw looks from the outside to be a Taiwanese knockoff of the Shopsmith bandsaw but with an aluminum front cover. At first glance inside it also looks the same, but it lacks the third support bearing mounted near the tensioning mechanism on the Shopsmith saw. The upper wheel on the SuperShop saw tilts like most bandsaws so that the blade tracks in the center of the wheels. Instructions for adjusting the upper wheel are on the last page of the owner's manual, but they appear to be incomplete. Elsewhere in the manual it says no adjustments are necessary. Clearly it was built to fit on something like the Total Shop as there are a set of tubes that are sized and spaced appropriate to fit that machine (or a Shopsmith I'd guess) as well as an adapter that extends the distance between the tubes so it fits the SuperShop. In any event it cuts wood and can be run at a slow enough speed to cut metal with the appropriate blade. The power coupler looks identical to Shopsmith's except it doesn't say Shopsmith.

When I called Smithy about accessories and parts, I learned that apparently there's been little interest in the machine of late and they only have a few accessories available. The only accessory tool they have is a 6" jointer. They no longer have any adapters that would allow you to mount Shopsmith tools on the SuperShop. They're selling the current machine at a substantial discount to what they had been asking, so I'd guess it's on it's last legs (although I wasn't told that).

All-in-all, it seem like a decent machine. The previous owner had a complete workshop for making custom moldings and used the SuperShop as a lathe for making the circular plinths for the columns he made. He had another full-sized lathe with all the attachments, including a Vega duplicator, as well as one of those Legacy Ornamental Mills for making the columns.