Building a line shaft shop

hi.....our non-profit learning foundation is building a facility which will house a line shaft machine shop, blacksmith shop and wood working shop....in addition we have some 30-35 vintage tractors and other pieces of farm equipment almost all being brought back to life, plus numerous pieces for the shops....for the line shaft shop we have an early candy-otto camelback press, a peerless hacksaw, an air compressor and a lodge and shipley lathe....we also have a large collection of shaft hangers, etc....all of the buildings needed are in place....what we are looking for is as much information as possible on building the line shaft shop....if there is any reference material in existence that anyone is aware of, please let us know....we are located in a mountain community in california so finding all of the pieces we would like to have is difficult....if you can provide any assistance with regard to that, it would also be helpful...thanks

Shafting, Pulleys, Belting, Rope Transmission and Shaft Governors - Google Books

is a good start. I volunteer at Tuckahoe;

Untitled Document

though the lineshaft pic is getting old at this point, we have quite a few more machines up now. If you end up with a variety of stuff from a variety of places you'll have to mix and match hangers & pulleys. We use the clipper belt lacing system, a couple members having found the bench-mount belt lacing equipment which makes managing the belt links a lot easier- that can be a big deal on the wider belts. You'll need a lot of belting as well.

Our "starter" equipment came from a tack factory in downtown Baltimore, the group did that cleanout a few years before I started- they pulled A LOT of stuff out of that building.

THe books don't adequately cover how troublesome some pulley combos can be- sometimes a set & belt give nothing but trouble despite following all the rules; crowns, width etc... sometimes the belt itself is the reason it slips off sometimes not, sometimes the crowns help sometimes not... and belt stretch is for real. Keeping after a factory full of lineshafts and belts must have been a pretty huge job.

Greg

From the 1910 catalog.

In case you have yet to look at it, here was what the L&S countershaft looked like for your 3 step cone head. It would have been driven by the line shaft, and in turn, drove the lathe, either two speeds forward or one forward and one reverse. Page 74 in this catalog specifies countershaft speeds for your 16" 3 step.

This assembly, with its clutches, allowed you to start and stop (and possibly reverse) the lathe, since the line shaft ran all the time.

Naturally, it was sized to suit the particular machine it was sold with.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v337/johnoder/LS 1910 Scan/071.jpg

Try to find a millwright's manual from the early 1900s. By the 30s much of the line shaft info had been replaced by electric motors and V belts. Audels manuals are good but hard to find in that vintage. There are other books that are good. I have a 1908 edition of "Shafting, Pulleys, Belting, Rope Transmission and Shaft Governors" by Robert E. Collins and a 1919 edition of "Millwrighting" by James F. Hobart that have diagrams that are easy to understand. You will gain a new appreciation for the engineering minds of 100 years ago.
I am in the process - over 20 years - of assembling my line shaft driven blacksmith shop driven by a 25hp Superior Type C gas engine. Planning ahead to get all the machinery/shafting parallel and in the correct position will pay dividends down the road. I was lucky to find hangers with self aligning bearings which are much more forgiving than fixed bearings.
The last 2 years I installed a small line shaft machine shop at our local county museum consisting of a lathe and floor drill press driven by an electric motor. It has a reversing clutch shaft for the lathe and a belt shifter clutch on the drill press.
Good luck with the project.

Bob
WB8NQW

I have most everything I need to set up a lineshaft in my shop.

Shafting came from the gate drive at Deerfield No. 1 impoundment dam (which had been formerly powered by a mechanical reduction drive and rack and pinion driven by a one lunger gas engine.)

Hangers came from a selected buy at the flea market at Dublin, NH

Countershafts have been picked up here and there. Sometimes I have paid more for the counter than the machine which sits under it.

Once I climbed on the pile in a scrapyard in New Bedford, MA after spying a lathe counter. I climbed back down with 80 pounds of pulleys/shafting in hand to the waiting Junkyard Tzar who immediately upbraided me (with good reason) for risking my neck to get what to him was an $8.75 purchase - and it wasn't worth my time to risk my neck for that - or (more important) subject him to a potential liability.

Then he softened and said "If you have a use for that - call me and I'll help you get it down - I can use the bucket truck (on the margin of the pile) and can reach down and pick it out for you." We parted friends and I was back a couple more times.

But that was then - now one is hard put to find shafting - most of it has gone to become Toyota Corolla's I think.

Just part of the "de-industrialization" of America.

Joe in NH

Thanks to all for you input and comment....if you have further thoughts, please let me know....

This old catalog can be downloaded as an ebook. It is an excellent reference. See pic.
Jim

thanks for the information....david

Lineshaft components for sale

dlhiggins1 said:

hi.....our non-profit learning foundation is building a facility which will house a line shaft machine shop, blacksmith shop and wood working shop....in addition we have some 30-35 vintage tractors and other pieces of farm equipment almost all being brought back to life, plus numerous pieces for the shops....for the line shaft shop we have an early candy-otto camelback press, a peerless hacksaw, an air compressor and a lodge and shipley lathe....we also have a large collection of shaft hangers, etc....all of the buildings needed are in place....what we are looking for is as much information as possible on building the line shaft shop....if there is any reference material in existence that anyone is aware of, please let us know....we are located in a mountain community in california so finding all of the pieces we would like to have is difficult....if you can provide any assistance with regard to that, it would also be helpful...thanks

Click to expand...

I have a number of Lineshaft components available.
Mark Alloy
2816583004

blcksmth said:

Try to find a millwright's manual from the early 1900s. By the 30s much of the line shaft info had been replaced by electric motors and V belts. Audels manuals are good but hard to find in that vintage. There are other books that are good. I have a 1908 edition of "Shafting, Pulleys, Belting, Rope Transmission and Shaft Governors" by Robert E. Collins and a 1919 edition of "Millwrighting" by James F. Hobart that have diagrams that are easy to understand. You will gain a new appreciation for the engineering minds of 100 years ago.
I am in the process - over 20 years - of assembling my line shaft driven blacksmith shop driven by a 25hp Superior Type C gas engine. Planning ahead to get all the machinery/shafting parallel and in the correct position will pay dividends down the road. I was lucky to find hangers with self aligning bearings which are much more forgiving than fixed bearings.
The last 2 years I installed a small line shaft machine shop at our local county museum consisting of a lathe and floor drill press driven by an electric motor. It has a reversing clutch shaft for the lathe and a belt shifter clutch on the drill press.
Good luck with the project.

Bob
WB8NQW

Click to expand...

Hi,

Could anyone elaborate on how a belt shifter clutch works?

Mark

marka12161 said:

Hi,

Could anyone elaborate on how a belt shifter clutch works?

Mark

Click to expand...

There are two pulleys of the same width and diameter on the shaft. One is loose on the shaft with a bearing inside, the other is tight to the shaft. The belt runs through a couple of rods or "forks" which are connected to a handle. Moving the handle moves the forks and shifts the belt between the pulleys, turning the machine on and off.

That's the simplest. There are different mechanisms to make that happen, but any tight and loose pulley arrangement is referred to as a belt shifter.

Hope that helped.

Boy is this an old thread.

Is OSHA going to allow line shafts?

I will try to attach a photo of a belt shifting mechanism. See the belt on the right side.

Bob
WB8NQW

Here is a link to a video on our installation of a line shaft at the Tobacco Farm Life Museum in Kenly NC. It has a belt shifter and other things you might enjoy seeing. YouTube

Thanks Ed

Pretty neat video. Thanks for posting


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