Tool gloat: New shaper

Good one. Finding a bargain like this will have you grinning like a chesire cat all week Well done.

Peter

Wow! That is so cool :-) And looks good camouflaged against the trees LOL.

I made some chips with my little hand-powered shaper the other week. Def. need to save up for an electric one!

How are you getting on with grinding the tools Nick?

Quite good. I'm making progress while I use them and slowly understand what helps and what not. I made a toolholder for keyway-shaping this weekend and finished the toolbit. Such a nice cut! The broaches I have don't cut that good. Anyone wanting to buy a set of duMont? :-))

The holder has the relief built in (making the tool easier to make) and has not clapper-mechanism. Think I'll make some photos and put them online during this week.

Nick

I'm puzzled what people use a shaper for?, in every workshop I've used since a child the shaper has been that dusty machine in the corner that no one ever used!. The one and only occasion I've ever had a use for one was because a shop didn't have a TCT milling cutter and I needed to get under the skin of some cast iron.

Greg

You can only ask that question if you don't have one! :-)

Or: As soon as you have a shaper, everythink looks like it got to be shaped.

Or: If you have a hammer, everything looks like a nail.

That's what they are often used for. But you can make very fine dovetails, super-smooth surfaces and remove lots a material (slowly) without dulling your mills. Resharpening the tools is easy. Let the shaper run and do soemthing different in the meantime or just sit aside and watch it shaping.

Today, I have cut a keyway with it. I could have bought a broach, but this way was much cheaper and not much slower.

Next, I'll try inner gearwheels and then gears will follow ...

Ain't that enough to have a shaper?

Nick

Hush your mouth. As you have noticed they are a throw back to times of old but the serious home shop guy HAS to have one, complete with all attachment and then he's stumped. Ask them what it's used for and you get flat surfaces and dovetails.

Well hey they can be done on other machines.

In truth once they have got one they suddenly realise just why they disappeared but can't admit to it. One jog they can do that others struggle on is internal keyways but in this they are limited in that you have to work blind away from the tool.

To this problem the vertical slotter was born which is a vertical shaper but even more limited.

If you own one of these you have to really have a need for it because of the real estate they need versus the use they receive.

They is a very true saying of shapers that there is nothing you can't make on a shaper except money, hence their industrial demise.

-- Regards,

John Stevenson Nottingham, England.

Visit the new Model Engineering adverts page at:-

True. I last saw shapers in use at work 24 years ago. We were still running one large (15'x15'x30') planer at that time as well.

Flat surfaces. Check Dovetails. Check Internal keyways. Check External keyways. Check Internal square corners, Check Power hacksawing. Check Surface grinding. Check (with an angle grinder in the toolpost.... the cast iron being worked on had was the table of the drill you sold me after I had filled all the craters with mild steel weld ....ing hard bits).

Yeah, you won't make money with one. You might not use it very often once you've got the milling machine, power hacksaw and surface grinder, but they don't take up much floor space, are fun to use and are cheaper to run than a horizontal milling machine. Yes they are a throwback to times of old, but so is the vast majority of stuff that model engineers/home shop machinists do.

You have to make a living (selling shaper CDs :-) I've got a day job and need to come home to anachronisms to distract me from the Hi-tech oxygen thieves I deal with all day.

Mark Rand (who hasn't used the shaper for 18 months, but who has also barely finished re-commissioning the lathe after the workshop building:-) RTFM

I once found a good use for an Elliot shaper. Before sending it to the scrappy, we took off the cube, and it's still giving sterling service as a fixturing aid on a friends Bridgeport ;-)

Wayne...

I well remember spending a whole school year in the metalwork shop taking the side off an Austin 7 block and head so the internals could be seen moving.

I think we all had a bit of it to do, but I had the block casting and spent many hours watching and adjusting that shaper.

Never used one since.

Peter

-- Peter & Rita Forbes Email: snipped-for-privacy@easynet.co.uk Web:

For example on grinders. But if you don't have one ...

Last two pictures. Watch a video too. The link is in the last line of the text.

Nick

I bought a shaper as the entire machine cost less than a decent endmill

and I cant afford any sort of mill. I have a lathe for round and shaper for flat ;) currently making flat is higher up my list of things than making money I have a day job for that...

Dav

-- small.plane

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i bought a hand shaper last saturday , cheap as chips and it'll do m

for flat surfaces till ive saved up enough for a vertical mill . iv only used a shaper a couple of times whilst i was an apprentice , bu it is fun to use and as a couple of weeks ago i got a massive bliste on the palm of my hand from a few hours sawing and filing , i'm no knocking the machine !!!

-- willowkevi

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Actually I wasn't knocking them, I just wondered what people found to do with them as I've seen a few going for nowt and been tempted, bargains always tempt me 8-).

Greg

Hi Nick,

I watched that video. I don't understand why it's necessary to use the grinder in that manner. Is it for grinding a particular edge in a way that can't be done on the normal grinding machine?

Ed

Nick M=FCller wrote:

He doesn't have a surface grinder. So he abused his shaper to make one.

Grinding with the side of the wheel wasn't such a good idea in this case.

Whilst we are on the subject of abuse: I had to cut a slot (1mm, 10mm deep) that was in a bigger slot. I didn't have a circular saw big enough to reach down. So I used a parting off tool for the lathe (Komet, the trapez shaped blades) in my shaper. I didn't break it _and_ it worked.

Nick

Hi Nick,

I watched that video. I don't understand why it's necessary to use the grinder in that manner. Is it for grinding a particular edge in a way that can't be done on the normal grinding machine?

Ed

Nick M=FCller wrote: