Shopsmith Forums

Here she is. Resurrected from a Craigslist sale, three boxes in a storage unit. It was abused after the speed control and sheaves locked up. I sold off all the extra 500 stuff and a jointer to recover my initial costs and a little extra. Dropped $200 at the Shopsmith mothership for parts. Amazing we can still get parts for a 30 year old machine and make it run perfectly. The new speed dial looks out-of-place. I've sent the old stripped one to the ebay guy that re-gears them so I can maintain that proper battleship grey era look. I have around $100 in it (and ~40 hours of learning!). I was a little scared with the AO Smith motor in pieces and I had to figure out the centrifugal switch from parts in a box. What's amazing is they were all there.

All new sealed bearings, new belts, upgraded casters (had to have 'em), tubes cut 16", new screws and bolts to replace the 30 year hodge-podging, cleaned and waxed. What a fun project.

Thanks for all the help!

Ready for another 30 years of service. Hanging out with all of the other battleship grey SS stuff:

Not 30 yr old stuff still available, 65+ yr old stuff still available(not all parts but most). AND newer stuff is compatible/direct replacement.

It appears these days are limited, but we keep the faith for now.

Very nicely done. Great story bringing her back to dependable service.

Everett

I just didn't care for the new graphic on the new speed control dial I bought for my resto. I sent the original stripped one to an ebay vendor and he rebuilt the original speed control dial. An added benefit is the engagement is very positive. Now things look right (OK, I need to order a new sticker next time I hook up with the Mothership):

Looks very nice!

I don't think the CAUTION label is available from Shopsmith anymore. A while back I replicated one for my 1980 machine, and I think others have too. I still have a few on mylar label material if you want to PM me with your mailing address I can send you one. Or, you can experiment with printing one yourself.

I believe that for those characters that feel entitled to walk into your shop and grab a handle and crank on it we need to have a system that if the SS is off the speed control handle will ZAP!!! them...
For our horses I have a few fence chargers that will charge 100 miles of fence wire. That sounds about right for a wake-up zap.


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