"The Porter" 16" jointer

[Jared Burkey]

I'm purchasing a "the porter" model B 16" jointer for $1400. With the exception of a newer baldor motor this thing is original original. It's been well maintained and the babit bearings have been kept well oiled. It has very little ware.

Would you guys have the bearing mounts milled to except an inclosed bearing and add a Shelix head? How do the old babies bearings hold up long term?

Would you paint over the original paint to seal it (I'm assuming it was originally painted with lead based paint and my kids are in the shop daily.)

I'm not as concerned with maintaining its value by keeping it original as I am with maximizing its accuracy, safety, and longevity

Any thoughts and suggestions or things I've forgotten will be greatly appreciated.

Jared

[Bill Space]

I'm purchasing a "the porter" model B 16" jointer for $1400. With the exception of a newer baldor motor this thing is original original. It's been well maintained and the babit bearings have been kept well oiled. It has very little ware.

Would you guys have the bearing mounts milled to except an inclosed bearing and add a Shelix head? How do the old babies bearings hold up long term?

Would you paint over the original paint to seal it (I'm assuming it was originally painted with lead based paint and my kids are in the shop daily.)

I'm not as concerned with maintaining its value by keeping it original as I am with maximizing its accuracy, safety, and longevity

Any thoughts and suggestions or things I've forgotten will be greatly appreciated.

Jared

If it works as it should, why change anything?

Go over to OWM and ask for advice...Old is not necessarily inferior...probably OWWM...have not been there in a while...great site...

[Tom M King]

I would think that as long as your children don't chew on it, that it that the paint wouldn't be much of a worry.

[Mike Cutler]

Does it work right now? What kind of head does it currently have on it? What kind of bearings?

To modify that jointer to accept anything other than a cutterhead made for it, is going to cost you more than you're paying for the jointer, unless you can do the machine shop work yourself. Don't believe that a "new" cutterhead will give you any better performance. The knives on the current cutter head may be up to 3/8" thick and will have no problems leaving any quality of surface you require. "Mass makes Right"
Those tables are big and will probably weigh everybit of 250-300lbs. by themselves. You can't just drop them off at any machine shop.
Me personally, I wouldn't alter it, unless there is a reason.
As for the paint? If it's not peeling off and flaking, I'd leave it alone, or maybe just put a clear coat over it.
Those are nice jointers. If it works use, it for a year or two and then decide what you want to do with it.

[Andrew Hughes]

I think porter has the very best knife gib setup.
The lip of the gib sweeps up nice and close to the edge of the knife. This is what I’ve seen on a 3 knife head.
If the op has Babbitt bears maybe it’s two knife? Much different arrangement

I still stand by my past opinion a insert head is not a upgrade for a jointer. Because it’s a handfed machine
Good Luck

[Jared Burkey]

Thanks guys. I'll definitely leave it as is. It is a 3 knife head and I'm familiar with the gib set up, the babbitt bearing is what I'm unfamiliar with. I know to keep the oil reservoir full but I'm not sure about any other maintenance for them. Does the lead in the housing ware away? If so, do I need to reduce the thickness of the shim as it does to keep the head snug to reduce vibration and inaccuracie?

[Matt Day]

Lots of info over at OWWM and VM. SMC really isn’t the place for this type of stuff.

Most bearing conversions aren’t done well. Educate yourself on Babbitt bearings and you should be good to go.

Jealous by the way. I’d like to upgrade to a 16” at some point.

[Kevin Jenness]

If the bearings are in good shape, just keep them oiled and they will probably outlast you. You can remove shims if necessary. Congratulations on getting a bargain on such a nice machine.

[al ladd]

I bought an Atlantic 17" jointer with square head for cheap about 14 years ago. My plan at purchase was to replace the head with a Shelix head. I paid as much for the head as for the machine. Still a bargain. The babbits were perfect -almost no use had been put on since last pour. So I had my new head made to fit the babbits. It's worked great! I oil it every day I use it (I'm a one man shop so that's about 4X a week). Takes a few seconds, and it's a good moment to appreciate my 100+ year old jointer. I have a small single phase motor powering it, 2 HP I think, and it takes a few seconds to get up to speed, and I can't take heavy wide cuts with it. But I can joint the gnarliest figured wood with virtually no tear out. While it might be true that straight knives produce a better finish on untroublesome wood, the difference on figured wood is enormous. Nor do I miss sharpening knives. I might have considered a bearing conversion if the babbits weren't in good shape, but I'm really happy with the route I took.

Of course your situation is different, because you don't have a head notorious for throwing its knives.....but if you go the Shelix route you might keep the present bearing system.

[Richard Coers]

Babbitt bearings wear in an oval. The bottom half usually wears the most in the vertical axis. First thing to check is to pull the head and make sure the oil grooves are still there in the bottom half and have some depth to them. Just removing a shim is not all that is needed if they are worn. You use a bluing agent on the shaft and spin it by hand. That marks the high spots and you take those off with a little hand scraper. With a lot of wear, this could take a couple days. If there are still shims in between the cap and base, the likelihood of them being good is high. Rabbit bearings last for decades unless you use it for production. Just check the rpm of the head and make sure it's the same as stock. I have no idea what that is, but many of those old heads are larger in diameter and should be run slower than modern small diameter heads.

[Mike Cutler]

Thanks guys. I'll definitely leave it as is. It is a 3 knife head and I'm familiar with the gib set up, the babbitt bearing is what I'm unfamiliar with. I know to keep the oil reservoir full but I'm not sure about any other maintenance for them. Does the lead in the housing ware away? If so, do I need to reduce the thickness of the shim as it does to keep the head snug to reduce vibration and inaccuracie?

If the Babbitt has been correctly maintained, then no, the actual lead should be fine. The wear comes from startup and shutdown, and should last decades unless abused. You shouldn't need to remove a shim just yet, if everything is good. If not, and you feel some play, remove a shim from both sides, mic them, and find some shim material that is a few thousandth's less than the mic'd thickness and try that.
If that Babbitt has been poured correctly, been maintained, and even if it does need a shim replacement, it will last you the rest of your life.
Babbitt's are still used in ten's of thousand's of applications world wide, every day. They're not the "ancient art", people believe they are. Any competent machine shop can easily pour a new Babbitt it comes to that.

[Steve Rozmiarek]

Ditto most of the leave it alone comments.

I have a really old 36" Oliver bandsaw, a babbit machine that came to me in rough shape. I was determined to convert it to roller bearings and even bought all the materials to do so. Then I tried it out first and realized it would gain nothing to convert, so switched gears and resto-mod fixed it. Replaced the grease zerks that someone had added on the lower shaft with a proper oiler, adjusted that babitt, changed the lower guides from a tiny carter to a huge Tannewitz and found out that the upper Oliver was exactly the same as the Tannewitz, so replaced a few wear points there too. Added a fence and changed the motor, now it runs fantastic.

Someone mentioned checking the speed, do that. Most of these old machines were line belt originally so when they got converted or messed with over the years the ratios may have been altered. You cah research proper cutter/blade speeds pretty easily. My saw had been set to run some ridiculous fast speed, so new pulleys were in order too.

The oil is interesting, they are designed to run on a light film. You actually use lighter oil that you'd think, I'm using a 20W now. In the bottom of the oiler there is a wick, just a piece of rag, that touches the shaft and slows down the oil flow. One fill of the oilers lasts a long time in use. Of course if it sits, they slowly dry out, but it's kind of fun to refill. I turn mine by hand a couple revolutions if its been sitting for a month or so between uses to get oil on the shaft before adding load.

I'm really glad I didn't mess up this old machine by "upgrading" it. It would have gained absolutely nothing.

[Alex Zeller]

Babbitts are a frame of mind thing. If you are the type of person who doesn't mind oiling them and can keep track of when you last did it then you'll be fine. If not then you're like me wondering if I need to add oil while using the machine. It's like the older chainsaws with the manual bar oiler. I always ended up giving it a squirt of oil sooner than needed and would use a tank of oil to a half tank of gas. If you don't want to deal with it then I would convert it to high quality bearings and be done with it. For me the upfront pain would be worth it so my mind would be 100% focused on the piece of wood I was pushing through it.

[Stewart Lang]

I had a 16" Moak jointer at one point and also restored a 16" Crescent. I like to take pride in my machines, so I say if you're going keep it for an extended period of time, then restore it and paint it. You'll be pleased with it every morning when you look at it.

I had a Byrd Shelix put in the 16" Moak. Byrd will custom make any head, so you can easily have one made for Babbit bearings. The only thing is there's probably a 50% increase in the amount of force it takes to push boards over it. So running a 15" wide board of any hardwood pretty much requires you to put your whole body into it. So keep that in mind. It's still worth it I think, but it's something to be aware of. I absolutely hate changing straight knives.

[Jerry Bruette]

If you're worried about oiling the babbit bearings you could hook up solenoid valves that open when the machine is turned on and close when it's turned off. Then all you need is a see through oil reservoir to make sure you always have oil available.

We have five spinning lathes at work that use that system and they have 8 inch angular contact bearings. Those bearings are way bigger and under way more load than your jointer will ever be.

[Mel Fulks]

Many of the old jointers will remove 3/4” or 1” in one pass. Manufacturers have cut way back…. like the top of spinning knives isn’t always
to be used by the skilled and sober. Straight-line saws are good IF you have a helper …or just like to take long walks. And have the space.

[Steve Rozmiarek]

Babbitts are a frame of mind thing. If you are the type of person who doesn't mind oiling them and can keep track of when you last did it then you'll be fine. If not then you're like me wondering if I need to add oil while using the machine. It's like the older chainsaws with the manual bar oiler. I always ended up giving it a squirt of oil sooner than needed and would use a tank of oil to a half tank of gas. If you don't want to deal with it then I would convert it to high quality bearings and be done with it. For me the upfront pain would be worth it so my mind would be 100% focused on the piece of wood I was pushing through it.

They self regulate, you don't have the option to add more if you want. Just top of the oil cup periodically, it'll run for days or maybe even weeks with one fill, and forget about it.

[Matt Day]

I had a 16" Moak jointer at one point and also restored a 16" Crescent. I like to take pride in my machines, so I say if you're going keep it for an extended period of time, then restore it and paint it. You'll be pleased with it every morning when you look at it.

I had a Byrd Shelix put in the 16" Moak. Byrd will custom make any head, so you can easily have one made for Babbit bearings. The only thing is there's probably a 50% increase in the amount of force it takes to push boards over it. So running a 15" wide board of any hardwood pretty much requires you to put your whole body into it. So keep that in mind. It's still worth it I think, but it's something to be aware of. I absolutely hate changing straight knives.

I’d rather fuss with knives and a dial indicator for an hour or two than have to push my whole body into it unsafely.

[Mike King]

Anderson Ranch has a Porter that has a helix head retrofit in it. I have no idea if the original babbet bearings are present or not, but that jointer is both a thing of beauty and an incredible jointer. Congrats on getting an amazing machine.

I'd put a segmented head in it. Once everything is aligned and set up, you will enjoy this machine for the rest of your shop life.

Mike

[David Kumm]

If you go insert, look at the Hermance head but the large diameter straight knives will do a great job and with two dial indicators you can set them in less than 30 minutes if you are slow. Dave