There were two versions of 24" Rockford hydraulic shaper, the '24" standard' which was basically the same as their 16" shaper, with a longer stroke, and then there was their '24" Heavy Duty', a much more generally massive machine, for which the term 'heavy' was 'truth-in-advertising'.
I can tell you that a 6000# forklift will handle a 16" or standard 24" Rockford hydraulic with ease.....the 'heavy pattern' is a different story.
We had a 16" Rockford hydraulic which we used ourselves, a good, fast, accurate machine.....with stable material, and a good tool grind, you could generally rely on .001 per foot, with a bit of care.
The Rockford would do surprisingly high finishes in steels, particularly some of the stainlesses....this was good for impressing clients who were accustomed to milled work.
We worked on some other Rockfords, one time and another, and there are a couple of details about these which will need a bit of care.....the oil in the hydraulic system will degrade in time, so drain, clean the reservoir, and refill with the oil the Rockford people specify....I forget just which oil that was, now, so call them and get the gen.....
There is one somewhat 'tricky' aspect to these....the smooth reversal of the ram is done by oil restriction in parts they call 'chokes'....which have to be delicately adjusted so that the ram will reverse smoothly at all speeds....set them after the machine has been running awhile and the oil is up to normal operating temperature.
There is another detail about these about which you must be ever so careful.....these were originally supplied with a 'safety crank' for the cross and elevating screws.
The safety-crank was provided with an internal tooth arrangement which allowed engagement of the crank handle by pressing in on the handle, but otherwise kept the handle free relative to the crank hub.
If the original safety-crank is missing, as will likely be the case, and a common machine crank has been substituted, the operator *must* remember to remove the crank before operating the electric rapid traverse....considering that the operator's leg or knee is likely to be within the circle described by the rapidly spinning crank, which, of course, would be spinning with enough force to cause terrible injury.
I would tend to think that the shaper advertised on ebay is one of the light pattern, as the motor hp is given as 7-1/2, which was standard for the light pattern machines.....I think the 24" heavy used a 10hp, but don't remember for sure....its been too many years.....so give the Rockford people a call for the gen on it.....
Also.....if you are thinking seriously about buying one of these, inspect the rail surfaces closely....many shapers will be found which saw a lot of service roughing down hot-rolled stock, and the scale from that stock will mix with the waylube to create an extremly abrasive substance, resulting in the rail surfaces being badly worn....some of the Rockfords were hard ways machines, but even the hard ways can be found badly worn on some units.....
This much I'll tell you, tho....if we had any work for a shaper these days, in our tiny shop here, and the shaper 'metl' is offering is a good serviceable one, I'd take him up on his offer in the proverbial micro-second.
cheers
Carla
