Delta Milwaukee 6X48 refurb drum question

[Janderso]

Finished the sander. I’m in it less than $200.
It looks rough, but it works and has new bearings. The table has been repaired many times.

 

[carlquib]

It looks good to me! Did you braze up the broken bolt hole or used a different repair method? I'm always looking for new ways to repair things.

Sent from my SM-N976U using Tapatalk

 

[Janderso]

I brazed it.
The table has been repaired already in many ways. This seemed the most promising.

 

[MikeInOr]

When I rebuilt my Milwaukee horizontal belt sander with my father 40+ years ago we wrapped some electrical tape around the center of the rear drum. 40 years late it is still there, the sander still tracks and I have never found a need to turn a crown on the wheel... even though I now have a lathe to do the operation. I use one of the wheels for sanding inside curves... the opposite wheel is the one that is crowned so there is a consistant radius to the wheel I some times sand with.

 

[projectnut]

Anyone looking for parts for a Rockwell Delta sander similar to the one J Anderson has should take a look on eBay. Mine started making some noise yesterday so I thought I'd check out parts availability before tearing it apart. There are currently 4 pages of parts listed for these machines. Apparently several are being parted out. Some prices are over the top, but others are more reasonable

 

[Janderso]

When I rebuilt my Milwaukee horizontal belt sander with my father 40+ years ago we wrapped some electrical tape around the center of the rear drum. 40 years late it is still there, the sander still tracks and I have never found a need to turn a crown on the wheel... even though I now have a lathe to do the operation. I use one of the wheels for sanding inside curves... the opposite wheel is the one that is crowned so there is a consistant radius to the wheel I some times sand with.

Out of curiosity, why did you wrap the center with tape?

 

[MikeInOr]

Out of curiosity, why did you wrap the center with tape?

Building up the center of the rear wheel with electrical tape is the same thing as crowning the rear wheel with the same result of making it track better.

If I did it today I would probably just throw the rear wheel on the lathe and crown it but we didn't have a lathe back then. But, honestly, I don't recall there being a lot of extra meat on the wheel that could be removed to crown it. The next time I go out to the shop I will try to remember to look.

I recommend crowning the rear wheel (or just building up the center with tape) but not the front wheel. I will frequently sand on the front wheel instead of the platen and it is nice to not impart weird angles on the piece being sanded with a crowned front wheel.

 

[projectnut]

You're correct about the drum not having much meat. The walls are only about 1/16" thick. The strength comes from the webbing inside the casting. Mine is laying in pieces in the shop. Not only is it thin the halves also have to be aligned in the proper orientation to keep it balanced. The outer end of the inner half is drilled in several places to remove sufficient material to balance the entire drum. Inside each half there are markings to allow the halves to be assembled in their original orientation.

Unfortunately mine was repaired somewhere along the way. The shaft was worn on the inner end. As part of the repair the shaft was brazed and turned back to size. Then a spacer was brazed to the shaft and also turned to the proper diameter and thickness.. The threaded spacer must have been damaged in that the casting was bored just enough to remove about half the threads, and a shop made unthreaded spacer was inserted. None of the current current hardware is original except for the retaining nuts.

I ordered a new set of bearings last week. They should be showing up next Monday. It will take some measuring to figure out the size and number of spacers that will be necessary to get the proper compression on the drum halves to make them stay in alignment and turn with the shaft.

As an FYI I did find some information on serial numbers and date of manufacture for the machines. Mine is a bit newer than I thought. It's a model 31-710 built in Tupelo Mississippi in 1971. Here's some information I copied from a website and pasted into a Word document. The date range covers the period from 1941 to 1982.

 

[Janderso]

Inside each half there are markings to allow the halves to be assembled in their original orientation.

Thank you, Thank you!!
I didn't know that. Now maybe I can reduce the vibration I am feeling out of the lower drum!!!!

 

[projectnut]

Thank you, Thank you!!
I didn't know that. Now maybe I can reduce the vibration I am feeling out of the lower drum!!!!

The markings I'm referring to on my drum are red paint on 2 of the opposing internal webs. One web had a red line the entire width of the web, and the opposing web has a line about 3/8 of an inch long. I believe these are done at the original assembly