Just for interest here are a few details of my Startrite Robland K260 combination woodworker. It's a five function machine; saw-bench with rise/fall & tilt; spindle moulder 6,000 rpm; slot morticer 6,000 rpm; surface planer and thickness planer both 10" wide.
These are industrial machines mine when bought having three 3HP 3 phase 415V motors installed; no playing around belt changing just turn a switch for each function allowing only one function at a time.
Mine had been run into the ground and was virtually scrap when I paid £1,000 for it 15 years ago. This was about the third of new price then. Buying it in such poor condition didn't trouble me in the least because I would subject it to a full and comprehensive restoration and upgrade at little cost; all the motors were working so no heavy expense there.
I completely stripped out the mechanicals and rebuilt throughout with new quality bearings. The original power feed to the thicknesser was removed and thrown away it being worn out. This was the most difficult part to resolve because of the speed reduction required. At the time I owned a big industrial Colchester Triumph engineering lathe which came in handy. I turned new power feed rollers having one covered by a rubber sleeve the sleeve being vulcanized in position the other was machined to give axial teeth it remaining bare metal. The ends of these rollers were turned to accept cycle chain gears allowing chain drive. At the power end I installed a new single phase motor and for speed reduction adapted a gear speed reducer from a scrap Denford 16" Sharpedge honing machine. A matching cycle gear was added to the out feed; a spring loaded tensioner was designed and installed then the cycle chain was adjusted for length and installed; this motor being fractional horsepower I connected to a standard 6A light switch.
New drive belts were installed; the saw motor was found to be full of sawdust so was completely cleaned out and a general purpose new saw blade was installed.
Not wishing to connect this to my then Transwave converter which I disliked immensely I needed to power the motors so I connected all the 3 phase motors in Delta and added just two capacitors to supply the third phase allowing the machine to run from our standard 240V single phase; just a start and a run capacitor was needed because these were installed on the feed side of the rotary selection function switch; not wanting to complicate the electrics I added a second start control button which when pressed put the start capacitor online; to start; the function switch was set then I need to press the original start button together with the additional start button; the original start button put the contactor in together with the run capacitor these remaining online until the stop button was pressed; the additional button was briefly pushed in just long enough to bring the start capacitor online and once the function came up to full speed both buttons were then released; this allowed the start capacitor to drop offline with the function remaining at full speed until the stop button was pressed; running on Delta and with the capacitors full power isn't attained but for my use it's never bothered me.
I went to a lot of trouble adding dust extraction allowing 4" hose connection; the saw; moulding head and thickness planer can be hooked up to my home made extractor and what a huge difference this makes because I had run the functions without extraction and it kicked up a dense and dangerous fog; with the extractor hooked up I can work comfortably without donning a dust mask.
I use my machinery to repair machinery saving a great deal of money. This Startrite after the restoration shook hands with me and is a best friend whilst being a joy to own and use. Over the last couple of days I've been machining lots of English oak using the band-saw and saw-bench for cutting and also the thicknesser for bringing the sections to a common thickness. I'm making Bron a chest of shallow drawers to house all her card making materials and this oak needed deep cutting and planing into thin sections.
Here is a tip for anyone new to thickness planers wanting to bring multiple pieces of thin timber to a common width; putting a single piece of very narrow timber through a big thicknesser whilst the timber standing on edge is just asking for trouble; I made a simple sled out of a base MDF and off cuts of softwood to secure eight pieces of timber at a time then fed the lot through the thicknesser; I'm adding this for information only so am not accountable if something goes wrong should anyone try this method; it works for me but I have a lot of machinery experience to draw upon.
So far I've machined around 140 pieces of this oak with still plenty more to do; drawers are exacting if they are to fit correctly and trying to plane this lot up by hand would be highly difficult.
I also added two wheels at the front and a castor at the rear allowing the machine to be moved around; the morticing unit is attached as required but its a heavy unit to install.
I enjoy doing rebuilds of rough machines and once the rebuild is completed I have a top class machine which will pay for itself many times over. The entire restoration of this Startrite didn't cost a great deal in monetary terms but obviously it wasn't done in a day. It always gives me a lot of personal satisfaction to hear my restored machines singing. Hope this is of interest.
Kind regards, Col.
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