Shopsmith Forums

Well I finally got some nice weather and have made good progress on the Greenie rebuild. Yesterday I got most of the sheetmetal primed and today I got most of it painted. I used Rustoleum Bare Metal primer which is a white color and was difficult to cover with the Rustoleum Hammered black that I was using. It took 2-3 coats of the black to cover the primer completely. I am by no means a painter but I suffered through and it came out good enough for my tastes. There were a few drips here and there no doubt caused by my lack of patience but with the hammered finish the drips seem to melt into the background much more so then if I used a flat glossy paint. I chose to use hammered black and silver as the local Home Depot didn't have the green. I am using the silver to paint the headstock casting and the legs and everything else is getting blacked. The black is really more of a gun metal color somewhat grayish/black and frankly I like it. I have only the two legs left to do tomorrow. the legs need some bondo work to cover some serious pitting from the rust that was blasted off. This is only down near the bottom of the legs near the feet.

So then I worked on the motor. I never had a chance to run the motor after I bought this machine as it was not in any shape to plug in and run. I took the motor apart and cleaned it out real good, checked the bearings and they seemed to be very smooth and tight. The power cord was totally shot so I picked up a 12/3 contractors extension cord today. It is 30' and I cut the female end off then stripped back about 24" of the outer jacket. Then I crimped on a couple of female spade lugs and one #10 ring terminal for a ground connection which this machine was lacking??? I also got this slick strain relief at HD today and drilled a bigger hole in the motor pan to install it. Then I wired it all up and plugged her in. She started right up and I didn't know if the switch was in the on or off position. So I turned the switch off but much to my chagrin the motor continued to happily purr. So I have a power switch that is DOA. Not the biggest deal in the world but a minor setback.

The way tube collar that JPG so kindly clued me into the otherday is also a sudden casualty as the way tubes that were leaning against my work bench decided to test gravity and when they hit the floor the plastic collar hit solidly which knocked it loose but also deformed it to the point it will not be reuseable.

After that test run I decided to put the rip fence back together. Again thanks to Ron and JPG I was able to get it back together in no time. With it all polished up and shiny I can't wait to put it to use. My Mark VII doesn't have a fence so this will be nice to have and I may actually use the saw on the Mark V. The only other thing I will need to replace is the control sheave, I removed the bearing on the end thinking I coould replace just the bearing but found out quickly that the little rod that the metal loop goes through is permanently pressed into the bearing.....ARGHHHHH AGAIN! So I peened the control sheave tunnel and reinstalled the bearing but it is too rough for me to feel comfortable reusing it. If anyone has a set of Model 500 gilmer control sheaves I would love to purchase them or else I will have to breakdown and actually buy something direct from Shopsmith. $50 for the control sheave and $110 for the whole assy. man they are expensive parts but this particular part isn't really something you can replace used unless you know the condition of the old one. I will probably order it when i order the switch and be done with it.

Tomorrow i will take some pics of the completed painted items. I should be able to put some of the machine back together. The headstock is going to have to wait for the new bearings to arrive which I just ordered today. I did get the other caster set done today and put back together, so now both of my casters are shiny and pretty ready to reinstall on the legs after they are painted.

Mike, I may have some gilmer sheaves. What part numbers do you need? Send me a PM.

I also got this slick strain relief at HD today and drilled a bigger hole in the motor pan to install it.

Mike,
Where did you find the strain relief at HD? I looked all over there, Lowes, and Manards yesterday to no avail. I also have a #12 "rewire" I need to adapt to the motor pan.
Monte

CML you have a PM.

Well today I started out cleaning up the garage mess before i dug into the reassembly. Got everything tiddyed up and went to work. Got everything that I could reassemble put back together. I unfortunately screwed up the paint job on my table carriage so that will have to get redone but no biggie. I had used some Bondo on the legs to cover up some of the heavy pitting/holes near the bottom of the legs but since I had never used the stuff before I ended up using way more than needed and trying to sand all of that down was a nightmare.....lesson learned! So I took the legs to the wire wheel and started from scratch. Got them all cleaned up and then summoned the better half who actually has used Bondo before. She completely redid a 73' Beetle in our garage years ago and completely painted it all with spray cans.....yes you heard right spray cans. It came out so good that the guy who eventually bought it asked her who did the paint job. When she told him she did it all with spray cans he about keeled over, he said it was an incredibly good job and only needed some buffing out to be perfect. So with the knowledge that my wife has infinitely more patience then I she took over the Bondo work. Once that was done I primed the legs and will shoot them with hammered silver tomorrow.

I couldn't wait any longer so I took some pics, although it isn't back together yet you can get a little bit of an idea of my progress. I am pretty pleased with the outcome so far even if I did have some painting problems. I have never been any good with painting and the results of this adventure are far better than anything else I have ever attempted before minus the screwup on the carriage. My problem was i did not take the time to cover up the holes and such so when it was dry and ready for assembly I had difficulty sliding stuff together. So i had to get some Acetone and try to remove the paint from inside some of the holes etc. and that is how i ended up poochin' the paint job on the carriage. Oh well live and learn and it is well worth the time and effort to tape up anything you don't want paint to get on......DUH!

Here is a shot of most of the parts, strangely the swivel housing rod looks completely rusted in the pic?? I can assure you it doesn't have a speck of rust on it as my buffer can attest to!





Here is a shot of my rip fence which Ron and JPG so kindly assisted me with reassembly as I had somehow forgot how it all went together which is kind of rare for my steel trap of a mind.

Only four pics per post is kinda strange....??????

Oh well I will just post the rest here.....!

Here is a shot of what started all of this sickness my beloved Mark VII which is not nearly as pretty but is mechanically and functionally perfect. When I rebuilt it the focus was solely on functionality and not esthetics. After my Greenie adventure though she may see some new clothes as well.




Here you can see the carriage, I purposely didn't take a closeup for obvious embarrasing reasons but the metal shines nicely.



Here are the tubes. You can see a small section of rust on one of them. This is where the little plastic ring used to live before the tubes decided that falling on the concrete was a good idea. The rust will be polished away before reinstallation.



And last but not least the headstock housing and belt cover which came out the best of all the parts by far. I think it is going to look real nice when i finally get it all put together which hopefully will be by next weekend if i can get all the bearings, switch and sheaves I need.



I have been wondering if it would be worth it to buy a used 1 1/8th HP motor to replace this 3/4 HP motor I have??? Is there really a huge difference in the ability of the machine to do it's thing??

Looking good, Mike! I almost went with the black and silver combination myself.

Thanks Heath. It has been a lot of fun to restore this machine. I never planned on getting two Shopsmiths but after getting the Mark VII for short money and then finding the 54' Greenie for $99 I had to go and get it. Even though it was in sad shape it has really come around with a little bit of elbow grease. These machines really are diamonds in the rough if you have the ability to fix them. Extremely easy mechanically and they truly clean up nicely with a little bit of effort. So my stable will include a Mark V and Mark VII very soon. What next???? I am not sure the other half will allow me to get anymore but I have my eyes open and if another short money machine shows up I will jump on it and maybe turn it around for someone else to enjoy. The painting is really the worst part of the deal. I have no patience for paint drying so if i had something else to do while the paint is drying I could let it dry for several days before messing with it. So another one would be easier now that I have two functioning machines to play with.

Mike

The black/gunmetal looks good, and the contrast with the silver will really make it pop. I gotta ask, are the legs on the extension table chromed? I didnt get any where near that amount of shine on mine.

In all honesty I guess I'm just somewhat of a purest at heart. I felt should try to return my greenie back to as close to original as I could. The Verde green paint isn't available locally here either but... I was able to special order it from the big orange store and they got it in about a week. Since I was doing other things on it waiting on the paint didn't slow me down.

Mike,
I bought a new 8" Delta bench grinder and I use that to polish all the parts up. Some of them need wire brushing first then they get the polishing. I use a green color #5 polishing compound I bought at Lowes I believe and have gone through 3 tubes of it so far.... Most of the aluminum parts have really shined up nicely some of the ferrous metal parts don't seem to polish up as nicely but they have come out good as well. I will take a few more pics when I get home so you can see better the shine I am really pleased with that portion of the restore and it was the most labor intensive and time consuming part of the whole deal. Not really necessary but I am kinda anal about stuff so it got the full treatment. Now I am lokinf at my Mark VII and I think it is going to get new clothes put on as well. With the experience of doing the Greenie I think that the Mark VII will be much easier and quicker to complete.

I have to agree that experience is a great teacher. The first one I did was a 54 back long before I knew of this forum. I even found where I had recorded the serial number (287729) so if anyone has that one I disavow any responsibility at this point:D. I looked it up and it was July of 2001 when I bought the 54 as a basket case after I owned my 1986 (then)510 for a few months. It came with a jointer, Band saw, Jigsaw, Shaper and molders, mortising attachments, various blades and all the standard stuff. it was a basket case in California (San Jose area) with the motor in a box and all the parts taken apart. I paid about$200 for it and had it shipped for about $200($400 total). I cleaned, polished and lubed everything, spent about $75 on misc. paint, bearings and belts for everything then sold the SHOPSMITH for $500, The Jigsaw for $50 and kept everything else. That is where I got a LOT of my add on's.

I have those pictures around somewhere and will have to put something together on that sometime.

That experience made my last rework https://forum.shopsmith.com/viewtopic.php?t=3674 much less arduous, and this one https://forum.shopsmith.com/viewtopic.php?t=5240 has been even smoother, although I will admit that bending over to pick up things does seem to be a bit more exercise than it used to. Probably all the doughnuts I've eaten over the years.