Resurfacing crowned bandsaw tires

[Jonathan Jung]

The tires on my 1952 Northfield are still soft and pliable, but they aren't very round anymore. I've had success resurfacing flat tires on another bandsaw by jigging up a 2" piece of a jointer knife, removing small shavings of rubber with a burr on the knife. I thought I could grind such a blade with a slight concavity, to resurface the crowned tires. I've been told the crown only needs to be about 1/16".

Any thoughts or recommendations?

Alternatively, could I just grind them flat? Or is the machine only worthy with crowned tires?

Northfield wants about $300 a tire...

[Richard Coers]

I'd use abrasives long before I rig up a scraper. One misstep and you wipe out the tire with the scraper. Some 80 grit should do wonders.

[Lee Schierer]

I'm not familiar with Northfield bandsaws, but $300 seems pretty far out of line. Scraping a tire or even sanding it seems like a poor choice as well. Contact Sulphur Grove (https://sgtool.com/product-category/urethane-band-saw-tires/by-manufacturer-model/?wpf_filter_band-saw-size=20) and see what they quote for new tires for your saw.

[Jonathan Jung]

Lee, thanks for reminding me about Sulphur Grove. I didn't know they made bigger tires, they have up to 42". I'll call them and see if they have replacements. From what I see on their site, 24" crowned tires are $107. If they work, that's a lot of time saved.

[Bradley Gray]

I have an old Crescent. When I bought it 45 years ago I bought new tires. Still good. Buy new tires.

[Jonathan Jung]

Big update:

The machine was made with "speedy change" tires, which are pre-crowned tires mounted on a hoop that gets "speedily" pressed on and off for quick turnaround (still waiting for them to explain the best way to press on/off these hoops). I have talked to Tannewitz (the saw is not a Northfield...I was tired when I wrote the original post and I got the saws mixed up). "speedy" swap out tires seems like a good idea, but they want $480 EACH + shipping.

That's going to be about $1100.

Tires from Sulphur Grove Tool are pre-crowned and $106 a pair.

I'm not sure what to do. It's frustrating to feel like I'm backed into a corner. The only direct fit new tires may be quick but they're over $1100 with shipping. I've tried taking the old tires off the hoop to see if I can get to a place where new tires from Sulpher Grove can set. The issue is that it's taking a long time to get the tires off, but more annoyingly, the metal surface has a rib running down the middle.

I suspect that Tannewitz puts tire blanks on their "speedy change" hoops, mills them round and with the crown, then ships them out ready to go. Nice idea but brutally expensive.

If I could mount the Sulphur Grove tires, I may have to resurface them round myself due to the rib etc. I'm used to simply removing tire, mounting new one, and go.

What to do?

[Jonathan Jung]

Just discovered that Carter does something similar. "Quick change" tires on a steel core:

https://carterproducts.com/band-saw-products/band-saw-wheels-tires/rigid-wheels-tires

I have it on my to do for tomorrow, call Tannewitz, Carter, and someone recommened Bobby at http://www.woodworkerstoolworks.com/services/items/show/26.php

[Mel Fulks]

Well, I would buy some flat thick rubber and glue it on , crown with rasp and sand paper .

[Tom Trees]

Centauro CO tires have a tongue
There's a wee bit of crown on them, as you can see.
Don't think I measured the tongue, but can do so if need be.

Tom
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[Jonathan Jung]

The saw is 24" by the way.

Spoke with Bobby at Woodworker's Tool Works. For him to convert the wheels standard glue on tires would be about $400-500, + approx $160 shipping both ways. His service includes removing the old tires from the speedy-change hoops, prepping, gluing on new tires, crowning them and making them concentric.

Anyone with experience with Bobby's work and results? He wasn't the nicest on the phone, in that he didn't like being asked questions.

Spoke also with Carter. They don't offer anything that will work, as the Tannewitz speedy-change tires are proprietary and Carter doesn't offer a service to recover them with new rubber.

Tannewitz says the 24" speedy-changes are much more difficult to remove, that guys who have swapped 30"+ speedy change tires with ease find the 24" difficult enough sometimes they send them in for Tannewitz to do. Another $250 each wheel for them to swap out and rebalance.

Tannewitz sells the tire change tools, the clamp set, for $220.

To top it all off, I found this thread which has two customers of the Tannewitz tires who are not happy with them:

http://www.machinejunkie.com/new/viewtopic.php?t=896

[Erik Loza]

Jonathan, how does the saying go? “Cheap, fast, and reliable: Pick two, because you can’t have all three”. Based on everything so far, it seems like you have two choices:

1.) Pay to have a professional put on fresh tires, re-balance, etc. The price that got mentioned seems reasonable to me, given the design of your wheels and their size.

2.) Go Mel’s route and DIY the tires. If it were my machine, I might give that a shot. On a bandsaw the size of yours, tire “tolerance” isn’t going to be as big of a deal as it might on a smaller machine. The last Felder FB710 I worked on had tires that were basically a thin strip of canvas. No rubber whatsoever. Basically, blade-on-wheel. I realize that the shoulder on your wheels won’t allow this but point being, tire design isn’t really a thing.

Erik

[Pat Germain]

If I was in this situation, I would be so ticked about the overpriced "speedy" tires, I would dump that saw and get another saw with conventional tires. But that's just me.

[Stephen Bandirola]

is it possible to change over to flat tires? I really like how my felder flat tire bandsaw works, ( Yes, I know it is designed that way) no blade drift at all. Honestly I don't even have to touch the tracking when I change blade width it just works.
I don't know what Tannewitz wheels look like, maybe machine down the lip enough that a rubber tire will be taller than the lip.

[Tom Trees]

Not had a good googling of the new green tires on the budget Felder range, but I'd be very surprised if they were actually flat,
Not seeing why Centauro tire won't fit, perhaps getting one from UK or EU country might be prohibitively expensive?

Oh, now I see, they've more than doubled the price since I got one!:eek:
https://www.scosarg.ie/centauro-48-02-33-00-co600-bandsaw-spare-tyre