Can't seem to find a motor cover anywhere for a round dial 10EE, so...

I'm a sculptor. I make rubber molds all the time and cast things in fiberglass. I live in NC. Does anyone live near me with a 10EE who would be kind enough to lend me their cover for a day so I could take a rubber mold off it? It wouldn't affect the part in any way. I'll be happy to pay a little for this opportunity. I could even drive to VA if someone has one.

Larry in Hillsborough, NC

I would be happy to lend the cover for a square dial if they are the same, can someone answer if they are the same or not?

-John

Hi John,

Very kind of you! I'll send you an email to discuss this more. I sure hope they are identical. I'll go study some pictures and try to figure it out. Yea!

Larry

WiaD Square Dial bottom headstock covers are interchangeable with Round Dial bottom headstock covers, although Round Dial are cast iron and Square Dial are aluminum. Modular bottom headstock covers are not interchangeable with either.

Round Dial top headstock covers are not interchangeable with Square Dial, due to the change in height.

-Dave

Larry

You might give Lost Creek Machine a try. They had a round dial they were parting out.

Hal

Back when I was looking for covers for my round dial machine, I would have been happy to have found fiberglass ones. And yes, the lower square dial cover will fit on the round dial machine, but bear in mind that all covers were custom fit to their machines. I have some other covers on my machine right now (cast iron) and they fit "OK" but not perfect. Some day when I restore this machine, I will grind them to fit better or perhaps buy fiberglass ones from you.

Jeff Major

I'll be driving from Buffalo, NY to Hickory NC on Dec 19th returning on the 22nd. If you don't have one by then I can bring mine, but I will be on a tight schedule.


Ryan

Dear John, Dave, Hal, Jeff and Ryan,

I sure appreciate all your offerings of help and advice. I wrote an "off-list" message to you John, but didn't get a reply so I might have done it wrong. In the meantime a local guy offered to lend me a cover to mold up for a price of $50. I felt it was a little steep, but since he was delivering it (and picking it up afterwards), and I hadn't heard from anyone else, I went for it. Ryan, if I had seen your email earlier, I might have taken you up on your kind offer, but even that would have meant driving several hours to meet you to pick it up and return it, so I guess the $50 isn't so bad. Once I have a nice mold, I can make these covers pretty inexpensively for anybody who needs one.

Thanks again. Larry

Custom fit issue should be fairly easy to fix... if there's a good layer of resin over the substrate, a flapper wheel and dust mask would fit it up alright...

Just as long as the cover had enough excess to 'trim to fit'.

About the fit of various upper covers, although it's a little late for Larry since he's found one. I have I think it's a '53 aluminum square dial upper cover on my '41 round dial. It fits "ok" but it is overall slightly thicker, not the wall thickness of the casting but the overall thickness of the part. Not a functional problem but the cover sits a little bit proud of the lower cover. Not a big deal and I think I was using it for well over a year before I even noticed. If I wanted to I could fix it by trimming about 3/16ths or so off the mating face edge.