Shopsmith Forums

My Jigsaw rebuild is nearly complete and I think it is going to work great. I used an app called Scan2CAD to produce a perfect gasket cnc file, and my local Alphagraphics is cutting it out from a piece of felpro tomorrow.

However...putting it together just now to see how it looked, the top and bottom of the blade are not anywhere near aligned or vertical, with the upper chuck appearing to be left of where it should be by about 2-3mm. I can think of a few places I might make adjustments but wondering what people recommended.

• I can adjust the lower chuck left and right by tightening and loosening the two sides of the chuck, but it looks like the lower chuck is probably fine, moving it left to align with the upper chuck would make it align worse with the table

• I don't think I can move the table left can I? This probably wouldn't work anyway since it would just make the bottom chuck position even worse.

• The upper chuck, unlike the lower chuck, does not appear to have an adjustable left side (when facing it). Do I have it correctly configured where the left side is fixed to the left side and you can only loosen the right side? In any case, not seeing how to move the top of the blade right within the chuck and even if I could, it might get me 1mm, but I think I need 2-3mm

• I had the upper housing completely removed from the arm tube, is it possible that I put it on too tight, moving the upper housing, and upper chuck with it, a couple mm to the left and I should just loosen it and slide it out a bit before retightening? This is actually the most obvious solution to me but it also seems like a hack if other things are the real issue. Also looking at "before" photos, the upper housing, eccentric wedge, and arm tube were all pretty flush, also making me suspicious this is not the real issue

Thanks for any suggestions

I'll go ahead and ask the obvious question first to get it out of the way...

Is the tube inserted all of the way into the base? If it is then the "nub" (for lack of a better word) should be resting in a small slot cut out in the base to help align the tube to the correct position. This also is intended to help align to where "vertical" should be. I

Have you considered reversing one of the blade holders? I think the fixed one(no screw side) should agree with the short set screw on the two screw one. Been a while since I had my hands on mine.

gloomis wrote: Wed Apr 21, 2021 10:03 am I'll go ahead and ask the obvious question first to get it out of the way...

Is the tube inserted all of the way into the base? If it is then the "nub" (for lack of a better word) should be resting in a small slot cut out in the base to help align the tube to the correct position. This also is intended to help align to where "vertical" should be. I

I was pretty sure but your message made me doubt myself. I wish that had been it but it does look properly seated against the nub:

JPG wrote: Wed Apr 21, 2021 10:33 am Have you considered reversing one of the blade holders? I think the fixed one(no screw side) should agree with the short set screw on the two screw one. Been a while since I had my hands on mine.

I think it is set up correctly and I also don't think switching those sides would buy me more than a 1mm. If you even look at the centering of the bracket back (tube air comes out of) compared to the table insert, it is off by a few mm at least. So I could try that but I don't think it's going to do much.

Sadly I would tend to agree. Based on my experience when I restored my jigsaw not too long ago I would try removing the top assembly from the tube and re-inserting it to see if that modifies the alignment. As you mentioned in your post the top assembly is held in place in a (IMO) strange way. I had a bear of a time removing and re-assembling that particular part.

I would look at the upper housing and how it is mounted in the arm-tube to see if it is positioned properly and/or seated correctly. Otherwise is it possible something got bent to put the upper housing parts out of alignment with the lower housing parts. Not sure how it could have happened but it seems anything is possible.

My guess is that the big black arm is not aligned correctly so take a look at where it attaches below the table to see if it can be corrected by this adjustment.

Ed

I can definitely pull the upper housing away from the arm tube by as much as 3-4 mm which would fix it. I was hesitating because it seemed odd that would be needed, but sounds like everyone is agreeing this is weird. I'm wondering if the tube is just bent. This thing is old and has been through a lot. So I'll double check everything, but in the end I know that will work and will try it out if no other solution presents itself.

My main headstock rebuild is also looking good, putting on new bearings and belts tonight, so hopefully I can fire everything up by tomorrow!

Loosen A then rotate and watch B and you will see movement. See if that helps on the upper end.
This is what I was referencing above in my post.

Ed