Gear Drive Trolley on a Frick?

steamsawyer · June 29, 2012, 01:39:38 AM

Hey Joe,

I don't see why you couldn't fab something out of steel. Maybe 1/2 or 3/4 inch plate or flat bar. Make it adjustable for both sides of the blade and put a socket for your hardwood pins made out of 1" ID pipe or square tubing with set bolts in from the side.

Al I like the one on your mill... Adjustable, individually, on either side of the blade.

You should never try to lead the saw with the guides. You need to set the guide pins with the blade running at the hammered speed and leave 3/32 to 1/8 inch clearance between the pin and the blade. With the blade at rest it is likely to be touching guide on the log side of the blade. The main function of the guide is to keep the blade from running over into the bunks.

Alan... #2

b dukes · June 30, 2012, 04:30:00 PM

Somewhere on here before someone posted a pic of one made from a cable clevis., and there is one on eBay for sale. Search Frick sawmill guide.

dblair · June 30, 2012, 05:12:52 PM

you could make one out of a shackle (clevis) but it would be a large one maybe 1.5 pin . it would be easier to fab one out of pipe I think . here's my guide . it 's a little hard to see

JoeBrittany21 · July 01, 2012, 09:40:40 PM

Guys, Thanks for the different ideas, I bought some nickel welding rods the other day for welding cast iron so I might take a shot on repairing the old one. $27 bucks for 10 welding rods at TSC ouch!!!

I still haven't poured the bearing for the mandrel. Now I found out that the bearing blocks don't line up. The one on the power side is 3/16" higher than it should be. Look closely at the picture across the block. It would not leave any space for the babbitt. So I decided to shim the bearing block on the saw side 3/16" to give me what I need for babbitt.

Apparently these blocks were made to carry oil and the center section of the bearing allowed the shaft to get an oil bath. However, when I took the babbitt out of the lower bearing block it was filled with grease. I know that wasnt right. Mainly because there was no way to get the grease in and there was an old oil cup on the side of the upper bearing block that when filled allowed oil to flow into and fill the lower block. I believe when it was put together in the past sometime that the grease was packed in then. But I believe I would rather have to grease it than try to contain the oil. What do you guys think?

So My idea is to totally fill the lower bearing block with babbitt and then put grooves in the bearing surface to have grease reach the entire shaft.
Checkout my idea for holding the babbit from going into the oil resevoir.

Rebuilding a sawmill is challenging to say the least but still having fun. :P ??? :D

ALWOL · July 02, 2012, 09:22:01 AM

If you don't have any luck welding that guide, you might try brazing it, and if that doesn't work, pm me and I will send you one of my surplus guides.
I have seen many babbited sawmill mandrels changed from oil to grease, so it must work, but I still think that a drip type oiler on each bearing box would be the best. Your boxes were designed for oil. Those voids in the lower housing should be packed with felt to wick the oil to the shaft, and the upper housing should also have a place to pack a felt wick to hold the oil to the shaft.

Alan

grweldon · July 02, 2012, 10:46:20 AM

Filling the bearing entirely with babbit and grooving a grease path will work very well and be much easier to maintain, but... I usually like to design seals into the shaft housing if using grease so as to keep it contained. When using an oil cup reservoir, the oil is continuously seeping on the shaft, escaping out of the ends of the housing over time until the oil cup is empty. I know nothing about circle mills so I don't know how high the temps will be on that housing. If it's high enough to melt the grease, without seals it will run out, possibly causing a "dry" running shaft.

Also, when you try to repair that cast iron guide with the nickel rod, preheat the cast iron with a torch until it's dull red to dull orange to try to prevent cracking when the welded area cools. Do not quench the part with anything after welding, allow it to air cool... don't even put a fan on it. It will allow the stresses to be distributed as best as possible...

dblair · July 02, 2012, 05:10:51 PM

I didn't see it in the pictures , so what does the saw mandrel do for thrust ?

JoeBrittany21 · July 02, 2012, 11:06:41 PM

Quote from: ALWOL on July 02, 2012, 09:22:01 AM
If you don't have any luck welding that guide, you might try brazing it, and if that doesn't work, pm me and I will send you one of my surplus guides.

Al, thank you this is very generous offer. I am going to try to fix this thing, I have some good ideas I just have to see how they pan out but I will post pics when I finish it then you can tell me what you think.

Quote from: dblair on July 02, 2012, 05:10:51 PM
I didn't see it in the pictures , so what does the saw mandrel do for thrust ?
There are collars on the mandrel shaft between the bearing blocks that controls the thrust.

I poured the babbit today and installed grooves and grease fittings in the bearing caps. I also drilled the bottom of the bearing and put grooves in it to be able to still use the oil bath if I choose. Thinking on this Yet.

The good thing is after it was all done I had .003 clearance and with it greased can spin the mandrel by hand.

Quote from: grweldon on July 02, 2012, 10:46:20 AM
Filling the bearing entirely with babbit and grooving a grease path will work very well and be much easier to maintain, but... I usually like to design seals into the shaft housing if using grease so as to keep it contained. When using an oil cup reservoir, the oil is continuously seeping on the shaft, escaping out of the ends of the housing over time until the oil cup is empty. I know nothing about circle mills so I don't know how high the temps will be on that housing. If it's high enough to melt the grease, without seals it will run out, possibly causing a "dry" running shaft.

Also, when you try to repair that cast iron guide with the nickel rod, preheat the cast iron with a torch until it's dull red to dull orange to try to prevent cracking when the welded area cools. Do not quench the part with anything after welding, allow it to air cool... don't even put a fan on it. It will allow the stresses to be distributed as best as possible...

grweldon, this is excellent advice I was trying to research welding cast and I am glad you verified the heating of the cast first. I wasnt sure of that. Thanks for that.

As far as the heat on the greased mandrel bearings. I have a chipper with a 2" shaft and I just grease that thing once a day and its been good to go. So I am hoping for the same here. I know what you are saying about the seals but I could not make that happen with what I have.

ALWOL · July 02, 2012, 11:46:27 PM

Yeah, I would be fixing that old guide if it were mine also. I think it will work out OK.

JoeBrittany21 · July 03, 2012, 04:39:52 PM

Today I worked on the drive shaft for the friction plate. One bearing was good and one was bad so I rebabbitted the bad one and put a grease fitting into the bearing cap. One of the drive shaft caps had an old greaser on it I kinda liked the looks of it so I am going to use that one to grease the front part of the shaft as it needs. The other greaser was missing.

JoeBrittany21 · July 06, 2012, 10:19:36 PM

Worked on the friction drive today. In the picture you can see the friction drive plate along with one of the paper friction drive wheels.

These paper drive wheels are in good shape. But the lever that engages them to the friction drive plate was pretty wobbly and did not give good leverage to make contact with the plate.

The yoke around the shaft that holds the forward and reverse friction wheels needed a new bushing in it. I installed that with more babbit and another grease fitting bolted it back together it has very little play now. Just enough play for the shaft to spin.
I also welded this eccentric to the lever and bolted a plate for it to press on to the husk this makes the friction wheels engage the drive plate better. The pictures shows the eccentric tacked in place.

This picture shows both the paper drive wheels.

This entire shaft with the paper wheels swings forward and backward just enough to make contract and release from the drive plate. The long operators lever moves right and left for forward and reverse as well as front and back to engage and disengage. Kind of an old fashion wobble stick for you heavy equipment operators.
The small gear runs the larger gear which turns the shaft with another gear on the opposite side that moves the log carriage.

In this next picture you can see two bolts that a wishbone attaches to to keep the gears meshed as they swing towards the friction plate. The wishbone needs to be replaced because it was allowing the gears to separate slightly.
The end of the shaft with the larger gear also swings kind of like a pendulum, so the gears have to stay together or they would break teeth off.

Well there you have it, except for paint the husk is now finished. By next problem will be to get a 4 belt pulley that fits the mandrel for the saw.

JoeBrittany21 · July 18, 2012, 04:15:41 PM

Well it certainly has been hot out the past 2 weeks. I was busy doing other stuff and had to let the mill rest.
I made a new link that links the friction drive idler shaft to the carriage drive shaft. This keeps the gears from separating when engaging the friction wheels to the drive plate.

I also made a new saw guide. It uses oak dowels. The dowels are tight in the holders because of a spur on the inside. There are caps on the outer sider of the dowel holders that can adjust the distance the dowels move. The whole assembly also adjusts for bigger blades and the distance from the husk.

bandmiller2 · July 21, 2012, 05:13:33 PM

Joe, was looking at the bearing with the pocket in the middle, that may have originally been for a ring oiler.Its a narrow brass ring larger than the shaft that walks its way around when the shaft turns and pumps oil up around the bearing.I've watched them on old electric motors and they really pump oil and do a good job lubing the bearing.The hardest thing pouring bearings is locating the shaft in the right place.I would melt out all the babbit drill and tap for two 10-24 long screws at 8 and 4 o'clock.With the two screws you and move the shaft any way, pour then back them out and put a shorty in for a plug. Frank C.

JoeBrittany21 · July 21, 2012, 07:12:18 PM

Hey Frank,

I have a pretty good grip on how geometry works and your right about trying to center the shaft in the bearing. The way I do it is to rest the shaft on v blocks and then use a feeler guage to center the shaft where I want it. The good thing about all the bearings on the sawmill is that they are almost a 1/4" thick and that gives plenty of room to manuever around.

Can't be positive on why the pocket was in the middle but I do know that the lower bearing block was hollow and looked liked it should have held oil. But I cant tell what was original because I have nothing to look at. So I just am trying to go with what will work. I would love to see the original mill just to know what the original intent was.

There is no doubt that grease will let the shaft ride nice in the bearing. I should be putting high temp grease in it. The good outcome is that the shaft can be turned by hand because it sits true in the bearings.

I noticed the shaft at the collar where the saw blade attaches had two steps in it. One for the blade and another for the collar. The step in the shaft that holds the exterior collar was broken off, so I cut out two washers from some steel to fit the collar step and the bolt to keep the collar aligned. The pins for the blade were worn so I replaced them as well.

Thanks for the comment.

Holmes · July 21, 2012, 07:17:18 PM

Great job and a very interesting thread. I have thoroughly enjoyed following your adventure.

JoeBrittany21 · July 21, 2012, 07:37:39 PM

Hey Holmes,

Thanks, it would have been a nightmare if not for this forum. I was a college professor, I love visual affects. :D
I need all the encouragement I can find. The big job is yet to come "designing and building the foundation for it".

Take care.

cab037 · May 12, 2014, 04:38:34 PM

This has been a great thread going over some of the steps involved in bringing one of these old mills back to life. I recently purchased a circle mill that uses rack and pinion to move the carriage. Do you have any pictures of your final assembled mill? Mine is coming in pieces and it'll be a fun puzzle to work out.