Klopp metal shaper documentation and/or manual

[Freenet]

Hi,

Did anyone ask Klopp for a metal shaper manual, and if yes how did it go? I wrote Klopp an email but now answer yet (Read on other forums that some users succedded in obtaining one for their machines from Klopp company)

The reason behind the question is that I want to rebuild a Klopp 625 shaper and some documentation would really help, so if anyone by chance has one and is willing to share it would be a greatly apperciated.

Also feel free to express any opinions or experience with machines form Klopp 600, 700, 800 series, which I understand are almost identical.

 

[benmychree]

I always wondered if Klopp was the noise they made in operation ? It would be a wonderment that shapers are still being made, they seem to be the least popular/desirable machine tool around. That being said, I like them and own one. Then there is the oft repeated statement; "you can make anything with a shaper, except money".

 

[Freenet]

Yes, shapers are not desired anymore and it is quiet normal because mills are faster and do most shaping jobs by using a slotting attachment. Shaper have a narrow market shared by odd jobs and shaper lovers. I am of the latter, this would be the second one. Hopped that someone will have a manual for it.

 

[benmychree]

I have had shapers in my shops, both as a hobby and in business since my teens, (now 79), the last one that I bought was the best of all, a 20/24 Gould & Eberhardt universal with vise tilt in both directions and power feed and rapid traverse to both saddle crossfeed and knee vertical travel, it has hard chromed ram ways, and was built in the mid 1950s, it was out of government storage prior to my purchase. Yes, slotting attachments for milling machines are nice for small work, but are pretty rare to find; I found one for my B&S mill, came all the way from the coast of Nove Scotia, it could not have been much further away from my location in North America, only perhaps 40 miles from the Pacific ocean. I was lucky to also come across a 6" Pratt & Whitney vertical shaper!

 

[Freenet]

Sir, I am much younger, 44 now, in my country nice machines are rare and quite expensive, mostly import from western europe. I was schooled as a "precision machinist" (at least that is written on my graduation diploma) and worked as a machinist for a very short period. By no means I consider myself a proffesional machinist, I am a amateur machinist.
This shaper is in need of countles hours of work: scored ram ways, damaged vise, cluth does not disconnect, electric system is a mess, motor works only on low speed and only directly wired to an outlet. Needles to say I bought it... somehow I find a shapers to be fascinating So, now, I realised that I do not know anything about this model!

In my country most mills are a localy produced clones of Deckel (FP type 1 & 2) which came as standard with a complete set of tools/atachments (dividing head, rotary table, slotting attachment). I never saw a metal shaper to be actively used in any machining shop, but many times there was a mill dedicated to slotting operations. Another reason is that shapers are seen as obsolete and nobody wants to learn working on them.