Atlas 7B Disassembly and Teardown! Pic Heavy!

[Weldo]

Now we can finally get to work on the crank gear.

First remove the six large flat head screws. On my machine it looked like they were heavily staked in place but I noticed that some of the stake marks were not lined up exactly like they should be. That tells me someone has disassembled these screws before. I had to use an impact screwdriver to remove them. Some took about a half dozen good whacks!

The plates then come off.

Both plates removed.

Notice the socket head bolts. Four are visible here and one half hidden at six o'clock. There's another one behind the rectangular block.

They all get removed.

These were not very tight on my shaper.

To get the one behind the rectangular block, turn this square head shaft from the feed mechanism.

That will move the rectangular block and reveal the socket head bolt.

Remove the other four bolts.

 

[ErichKeane]

Great progress!

I've had parts of that apart, but not that deep obviously. One thing I WAS amazed at is how (took it apart today!) Simple the ratchet mechanism is! They go for tons of money I'm told, and break often. They seem reasonably easy to make for something so simple!

 

[Weldo]

At this point I thought the gear could be tapped out. The gear has a large shallow counter bore that fits snugly to a mating face very much like a lathe chuck fits on a face plate. There's also an alignment pin in the gear that indexes to that mating face plate.

I think it is possible to remove the gear at this point, but after I tapped on it a few times through the switch hole I decided to remove some more stuff just to see if there were any more hang ups.

I set to work to remove the rectangular block on the crank gear. You could do this step before you remove the six socket head bolts from the previous post. That would save you the trouble of repositioning the block to reveal the other bolt.

There is a set screw on the block holding a nut like on a lathe cross slide. The set screw is backed up with a jam nut/lock washer.

Once loosened you can wiggle the block out. It took some light prying.

Removed.

The pinion on the center shaft is what I was worried about keeping the gear from tapping loose. I saw the assembly in the manual and didn't want to mess up the teeth on that pinion by forcing the gear off while the teeth were meshed.

Loosen the nut on the end of the shaft, seen here caked in old grease.

5/8" was a sloppy fit, but 9/16" was too small. The nut was not very tight so 5/8" did the trick. Hold the other end of the shaft with a wrench to keep it from turning while you loosen the nut.

The nut was not very tight.

Lock washer.

Almost there!

 

[Weldo]

At this point I tried tapping the gear off again. I thought the lead screw and pinion would come off with the gear but it actually didn't.

I had to remove the switch plate cover first. Two flat head screws. These pics are from earlier in the process.

I then tried tapping the gear through the switch hole with a brass drift.

Keep rotating the gear to tap evenly along the whole circumference.

Eventually it comes free!

Here can be seen the counter bore face plate interface.

It's out!

This is the backside, note the locating pin.

Turns out the pinion and lead screw stay attached to the shaft part. So You can actually remove the gear BEFORE delving into the nut on the end of the shaft and the pinion gear. It probably doesn't really matter either way.

I couldn't easily pull off the pinion gear so I tried tapping the shaft out from the inside.

It moved easily and allowed me to remove the pinion gear.

Another tiny woodruff key.

And a spacer.

There was on the back side of the spacer a tiny ring of brass. This is not shown on the manual.

All parts removed form the shaft.

 

[Weldo]

The shaft now easily pulls out.

Now to tap the outer shaft from the outside towards the inside of the column. This was a little bit tight but the soft faced dead blow moved it no problem.

The shaft popped out with its bearing.

Loads of grease! I intend to restore this machine to the proper recommended lube, which is light oil. If I hadn't taken this apart to clean out the grease the oil might have never found its way to the bearings.

Here's a view of the screw mechanism.

The bearing on the outside popped out when the shaft was released.

Now the bearing housing can be removed. It was lightly tapped around the circumference after the bolts were taken out.

It comes out of a shallow bore.

More grease.

Looks fresh at least!

And that's the crank gear removed! The last piece is the pinion shaft. It's the smaller gear that turns the crank gear. I actually tried to remove it BEFORE the crank gear but I found some interference that indicated it would be much easier to remove the pinion shaft if the crank gear was out of the way.

 

[BGHansen]

The shaft now easily pulls out.

View attachment 327074

View attachment 327075

View attachment 327076


Now to tap the outer shaft from the outside towards the inside of the column. This was a little bit tight but the soft faced dead blow moved it no problem.

View attachment 327077


The shaft popped out with its bearing.

View attachment 327078


Loads of grease! I intend to restore this machine to the proper recommended lube, which is light oil. If I hadn't taken this apart to clean out the grease the oil might have never found its way to the bearings.

View attachment 327079

View attachment 327080


Here's a view of the screw mechanism.

View attachment 327081


The bearing on the outside popped out when the shaft was released.

View attachment 327082


Now the bearing housing can be removed. It was lightly tapped around the circumference after the bolts were taken out.

View attachment 327083


It comes out of a shallow bore.

View attachment 327084


More grease.

View attachment 327085


Looks fresh at least!

View attachment 327086


And that's the crank gear removed! The last piece is the pinion shaft. It's the smaller gear that turns the crank gear. I actually tried to remove it BEFORE the crank gear but I found some interference that indicated it would be much easier to remove the pinion shaft if the crank gear was out of the way.

Great job documenting the process! We all love seeing how these machines actually work. Another plus side to many photos is when you put it back together you can review them in case the Atlas manual and the actual shaper differ some.

Bruce

 

[Weldo]

Yea, I’ll probably take a few days to clean everything up so referring back to the pictures will be a great help.

 

[Weldo]

The last part to come out is the pinion shaft.

Here it can be seen with its 4 step pulley. Remove the single set screw in the pulley groove.

The pulley comes off fairly easily.

Pinion shaft. Another tiny woodruff key. The threads on the end are for the grease cup.

There's a threaded nut to remove on both ends of the shaft. It's tough to see through the years of dried grease.

But there's two holes like the nut on an electric angle grinder.

There's also a set screw on each of the threaded nuts. That is one on each end of the shaft. Below is the pulley end.

And the other end.

 

[Weldo]

Here you can see the two holes for a spanner wrench.

And the same two holes on the pulley side of the shaft.

I modified an angle grinder wrench to fit. The center to center was just slightly too large on the wrench so I just ground the pins a little to fit.

It was not super tight.

The other one came off in similar fashion.

 

[Weldo]

Now we turn our attention to the inside parts of the shaft. You'll notice that the crank gear is still installed in the following pictures. That is because the pictures were taken before I realized that the crank gear must be removed BEFORE the pinion shaft. If you attempt to tap the pinion shaft out with the crank gear still installed, the collars on the pinion shaft will hit the crank gear preventing removal of the shaft.

On the pinion shaft are a couple of collars and a gear. There is a collar on the left but it's kind of buried. Solid pins hold the right collar and gear onto the shaft. Below, the punch is pointing to the pin in the collar.

And the pin in the gear. It's hard to see.

They punch out with little effort.

The gear can be slid on the shaft to reveal a woodruff key. It's not visible in the picture but there is a tiny solid pin that is drilled axially in the gear that mates with a hole in the buried collar on the left side of the picture. That pin is around 1/8" diameter and 1/2" long.

From here I had removed the crank gear and the shaft can be tapped out from either side. The bearing will push out the race since the bearings are pressed to the shaft more tightly than the races are pressed. Below is the race from the pulley side nearly removed. I tapped the opposite side with a brass drift.

A little more tapping frees it up.

Now since the crank gear is gone, the whole shaft can be removed through the race bore. First we see the pulley side bearing.

Next is the collar that was buried in the previous shots.

Followed by the gear.

And finally the other collar and bearing.

The astute among us may realize that there really is no need to remove the pins from the collar and gear in a earlier steps since the whole shaft comes out through the bore anyway. You would be correct. However at the time I was trying to figure out how to get the shaft out with the interference of the crank gear. I thought that if I freed up all the collars/gears/bearings on the shaft that I could slide the shaft out from inside those parts. Turns out the bearings are pretty tightly pressed on though so this idea didn't work.

Once I removed the crank gear, the pinion shaft becomes much easier and the collars/gear could have been left in place. You would simply tap on the shaft to press out the opposite race, then the shaft could be passed through with all its collars and gears in place.

The last part is the opposite side race. I tapped it out with a brass drift.

Nice!

That's it! We've removed all the internal parts to an Atlas 7B shaper! Now for lots of cleaning...