Love of lathes.

[Refugee]

I was wondering if the glue would be too brittle as well.
If you do indeed resort to clips would it work if you added a little off-cut of fabric saturated in silicon RTV over both sides of the clip smoothed by stretching cling film over it while it dries?
Things would get bumpy if the belt was slipping but this would add an early warning that the belt could be overheating.

[pwdrive]

I had a similar problem years ago on my old Dominion combination woodworking machine, all the drives except for one were driven by vee belts, the other drive used a flat belt, it drove the 2 speed reduction gearbox that drove the feed rollers on the 16 x 9 planer thicknesser, it was made of canvas and was fraying badly were it was joined with the alligator clips, I took the belt to the local belt man and he recommended a new composite belt, I left the old one with him and a couple of days later he phoned up to say the new one was ready, not sure what it was made of but the core was some kind of modern stuff sandwiched between some kind of close weave fabric stuff, the joint was done using a finger joint rather than a scarf joint, I don't know if the finger joint was glued or welded but it was very strong and hardly any stretch all the years I used it, it had a real hammering too, I once stuffed a 24 ft length of 12" x 6" sawn Douglas Fir through the planer, I had to cut a hole in the end of the workshop for it to pass through on it's out feed.

Lawrence.

[Radio Fixer]

Like the hole in the workshop wall

Gary

[pwdrive]

Yeah, didn't have much choice Gary, operator cock up I'm afraid, the end of that beam was about 6 ft from the end of the wall when I suddenly realized it ain't going to fit, so out came the chainsaw.

Lawrence.

[Refugee]

That would have made a much bigger very jagged hole if the planer had pushed it through itself.

[pwdrive]

It would have probably pushed the whole shed over, the shed was a cobbled up lean to against my proper built shed, I made it from old bits of anything that was to hand, pallet, polythene, fencing slats and whatever, it housed the Dominion combination and a morticer, I used to make all the garden furniture for sale in there as well, mainly picnic tables and benches, later I rebuilt the lean to proper job style, the picture shows it rebuilt and after I sold my machinery.

The Landrover was undergoing a chassis transplant, the shed wall to the right is the front wall of the original proper shed I built when we first bought the barn, we lived in that shed for four years, at one point it was me, the wife plus our two kids, our dog, the wifes sister plus her two kids plus her dog, that shed was twenty years old when the picture was taken, it was built using 4 x 2 studs clad with feather edge on the outside and plasterboard on the inside and real slates on the roof, we had a wood burner in there too, I build 'em to last..

Lawrence.

[Radio Fixer]

All those dogs and kids would drive me nuts: you must be a very easy going guy Lawrence (or spent a lot of time working elsewhere ).

Not much insulation in it: I'm astounded how much has gone into our new Utility room. Uses a 6" hard fibre board, said to be 3 times more efficient than the old loose glass. One layer in the floor and walls between joists and double thickness in the roof along with triple glazed roof lights. Doors and windows are double glazed of course. Oh! and I forgot to say its clad with 22mm ply, water proof membrane and then UPVC timber affect cladding.

May put TV and arm chairs out there if the cost of energy keeps going up

Gary

[pwdrive]

There was no insulation in that lean to bit, the main shed it was attached to (the one we lived in) was insulated. The place we are in now is well insulated, we have to have both living room doors open when the wood burner gets going.

Lawrence.

[Retired]

Hi,

I didn't know there were export restrictions on Barge glue Colin but this is so typical when I want something?

Hot hide glue has been used forever Nick and yes it is the same as pearl glue. Hide glue is known under a few different names; hot hide glue/cold hide glue; pearl glue and Scotch glue spring to mind but it is all the same stuff; what isn't generally known though is that hide glue comes in a number of grades which determine it's working characteristics. Hide glue has been used successfully for jointing leather belts for many years; on its own hide glue is indeed very brittle but the thickness of the hide glue in a leather belt joint is very thin indeed and will allow it to bend around pulleys without the joint failing; it must work because it's been used and tested long enough.

Thanks for your suggestion Refugee. Drive belts need to be as continuous as possible without changes in thickness at the joints if this can be avoided. Even traditional belt stitching would be a problem on the this Lorch because the mandrel drive belt contacts pulleys on both sides due to the idler pulley just beneath the mandrel; all ideas are welcome though and appreciated.

What a story Lawrence; isn't a chainsaw so useful? I like the cats eyes on your Land Rover are these retro fit? I'd like to see a modern "tinny" planer handle the big lump of timber you put through your planer?

What a fantastic day it is today; the sun is shining and the Lorch is under power; just brilliant. I've just been running the Lorch for half an hour testing all its functions which as expected after a full restoration work flawlessly. The carriage drives are superb and everything works just like a well oiled machine should work. All controls are now fully working regarding power feeds to the carriage; the lead-screw gives the usual two way sliding travel but the drive shaft is brilliant in that it gives feed both ways on sliding and facing and the clutch also works a treat; what a truly wonderful lathe this Lorch is.

The Gryphon motor remains noisy which is a huge disappointment considering it was sold to me as new and unused having been stored a couple of years? The Gryphon motor was initially running well on the bench but once installed it started to sulk; because of the Easter holiday I'll wait until next week then remove the motor and service it adding new quality bearings; making it worse is that I worked at Brook Motor's for 24 years the Gryphon being a Brook motor?

Going back to the belt jointing problem Refugee; I'm duplicating this story on Practical Machinist forum in the states and one member of PM has been kindly supplying information on how to use serpentine drive belts; these belts are better known here as automotive drive belts and these belts are much stronger than leather belting of similar size. Now the Lorch is running with original style leather belts I know I've succeeded in jointing these leather belts but now I would like to experiment; my first priority was to fully restore the Lorch and now the Lorch is running I can start tweaking it a bit hopefully to improve it although it is already a top class lathe.

New timing belts are expensive so being a Yorkshireman I'll enquire at local garages and try to obtain a number of used timing belts to experiment with; timing belts are constantly being removed from vehicles during servicing once they reach a certain age; many of these belts would last a lifetime on a lathe such as the Lorch and I think garages would be happy to dispose of these old belts? Post #52;

http://www.practicalmachinist.com/vb/ant...ndex3.html

I'm now in a position Gary to add pictures of the two drive belts which show better than trying to explain in text. The motor drive belt is a very easy belt to replace and I could buy an endless belt and simply install it in minutes. The mandrel belt however is a real pain to replace because it needs joining in the lathe. The pictures show the reason for this; the front of the mandrel belt comes up from the Counter-shaft pulley and out of sight it travels over an idler pulley then over the mandrel pulley; from the mandrel pulley the rear of the belt travels outside the head-stock through a rectangular hole in the outer head-stock lower casting and through a matching hole in the drip tray returning to the rear of the counter-shaft pulley. In effect the head-stock is trapped within the drive belt hence the need to join it in the lathe.

Once the Lorch has settled down a bit I'll fine tune it; the guards still need painting and installing; the motor needs sorting out and new grease cups are required for the head-stock bearings; the original cups are with the lathe but both caps are missing?

I've stuck with this restoration so really it hasn't taken too long to complete given the full restoration its been subjected to. I'm delighted with the result and what a difference now how the Lorch looks compared to when it arrived; such projects are so rewarding both in terms of interest and ending up with a very usable and most desirable machine.

Thanks everyone for following this story and for your many much appreciated replies.

Kind regards, Col.

               

[pwdrive]

Col, poor cat's eyes now long gone sadly.

I did use a hand held electric planer to do both edges on that beam as the combination machine planer was only 16 x 9 (max. 9" depth)

On other unrelated jobs I've used a hand held Makita beam planer, that one has 12" blades, a superb machine.

Lawrence.