An unusual shaper - The "Shapemaster"

I've just been sent, without any accompanying text, these pictures of a rather unusual-looking shaper: Shapemaster Shaper - Young Engineering Laboratories Inc. USA built by the Young Engineering Laboratories in St Paul, Minnesota.

Interesting. No knee at all, just a longish clapper slide.

The swivelling top suggests it may have been made for a specific purpose, but what that might have been, I couldn't even guess.

Doc.

Looks like a 7 inch home shop unit.

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I just got back from St Paul, grew up there in the 1950s/60s.

I have a vague recollection of a "Fillmore", but am no longer sure where.

Do you recall any other streets or map landmarks in the area where you think it was?

Several freeways have been put through, and a lot of areas were covered over. Interstate 94, Interstate 35E, highway 494, etc., all were put through, generally through areas considered expendable.... Low income areas, older industrial areas, etc.

JST said:

I just got back from St Paul, grew up there in the 1950s/60s.

I have a vague recollection of a "Fillmore", but am no longer sure where.

Do you recall any other streets or map landmarks in the area where you think it was?

Several freeways have been put through, and a lot of areas were covered over. Interstate 94, Interstate 35E, highway 494, etc., all were put through, generally through areas considered expendable.... Low income areas, older industrial areas, etc.

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This is the area - though only East Fillmore is mentioned Google Maps

DocsMachine said:

Interesting. No knee at all, just a longish clapper slide.

The swivelling top suggests it may have been made for a specific purpose, but what that might have been, I couldn't even guess.

Doc.

Click to expand...

I wonder if the unusual table might be mounted on a stem that allows a little rise and fall?

Interesting table design.

tonylathes said:

This is the area - though only East Fillmore is mentioned Google Maps

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That's why I recalled the name. I was over there near E Fillmore a while back, although not this trip.

Fillmore Ave West is further southwest of there. Follow E Fillmore to the west as it becomes W Water St. Where Water St ends at Plato Blvd, look for a street labeled "40" on the map across Plato.

Zoom in. Right there, by Albers Mechanical Contractors you will find Fillmore Ave West (they are on Fillmore Ave West). That may be the street wanted.

tonylathes said:

I wonder if the unusual table might be mounted on a stem that allows a little rise and fall?

Click to expand...

Could was. I'm thinking of my H.B. Preise Panto-engraver and its elevating compound rest.

This little shaper could, for example, "Florentine" a plate. Think firearm grips and "checkering" type of parallel lines or grooves as a background.

But for making a mold to produce many, easily as much as onesies.
And not-only.

Herr Pelz once described an adapter be made for a shaper that made the mold for a compound-curved "diagonal mesh" white-metal-cast grille. Early mantelpiece radio cabinet.

Ram was as ordinary as can be. A linkage of jointed rods and plate cams attached to it to pull the tool into a complex curved path in more than one dimension. Patience. Light cuts. Didn't need a lot of "muscle" back of it.

Only had to be more "regular" than hand-cut working so the grille appeared to have been made by riveting thin strips of metal at their crossings after "weaving" over one, under the next, over the next, then under, in an attractive pattern that led to a perception of higher quality..