Robinson Table saw rebuild finished

[Mark Hennebury]

Finally finished another never ending job. Started this a few years ago, I was planning on keeping it but had a customer ask to buy it so I finished off for him and it is shipping this week to California.
It weas an incredible amount of work. completely stripped, cleaned, primed painted, new shafts for the rise and fall and tilt, new collars, new bushings, new washers made, all hot gun blued, new riving knife and bracket made, new rosewood handle, hand scraped rip fence, it just seemed to go on and on. but it is done! Strange feeling, sad to see it go but glad that it's done.

Thomas Robinson ET/E sliding table joinery saw, 18" blade 7.5hp,weight 2300 lbs


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[Cameron Wood]

Wow- that's a lot of machine, and a lot of work!

Did you do the machining yourself?

[Bruce Page]

Beautiful work!

[Mark Hennebury]

Thanks. Yes, i did all of the work. I will post more photos over the net few days.





Wow- that's a lot of machine, and a lot of work!

Did you do the machining yourself?

[Bradley Gray]

Amazing work as usual. Thanks for sharing!

[Jenifer Emerson]

Well done on finishing the Robinson Table Saw restoration! You should be commended for your attention to detail; it sounds like a very involved and rigorous project. Your meticulous attention to detail in stripping, cleaning, priming, painting, and replacing different parts is quite impressive.

[Maurice Mcmurry]

Very impressive work and machine! A video showing it operate would be very cool to see.

[Andrew Hughes]

That’s a saw that inspires confidence and respect.
I would take that saw over 10 saw stops any day.

[Ronald Blue]

Another tool you have brought back to it's original glory. Definitely a great job of restoration. Looks like a beast and I bet it's smooth as silk when powered up. Always enjoy your projects because you do them so well. Do you find time for woodworking? LOL

[John Pendery]

Looking forward to more photos! Thanks for sharing

[Warren Lake]

Nice work Mark, wish I could have put you in a friends sandblast booth its a full automotive booth with a crane. He can do anything in it then has three compressors in a sound proof room and he runs 200 PSI. Robinson machine here and Brookman are amazing quality. Better than the wadkin I have.

The old guy said Germans were the best on the machinery and Italians next. I get it based on industry here but the British stuff at least the Brookman and Robinson were on par with German machines. Rolls Royce quality.

[Jim Becker]

That's quite a beast of a machine! Very nice looking restoration and I'm sure that the person buying it will enjoy the heck out of that massive thang...

[John TenEyck]

Amazing work, Mark. No matter how much you sold it for I think your customer got a true bargain.

John

[Mark Hennebury]

Thanks to all. The Robinson is a serious machine, really interesting roller table system. Quite fascinating to see how these old machines are made.
Warren, a full sandblast room would be great! bid stuff I have sandblasted outside with a temporary plastic sheet fence, the smaller stuff is done in my home-made sandblast cabinet, not the best, but it gets it done. the most psi I use is about 100, so it's slow going. Lots of filling and block sanding on the old castings, them multiple primer and sanding, the multiple top coats.
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[Jerry Bruette]

Curious about the idea of hot bluing the shafts. Was it for aesthetics or for rust inhibition? Did you do the hot bluing? I'd like to hear more about the shaft fabrication and bluing.

[Mark Hennebury]

It was in pretty rough shape when I got it, but all the casting cleans up very nicely when its sandblasted. It is a lot of work to dismantle, clean all the dirt and grease, then mask, sandblast, remove the masking, clean all the sand dust, re-mask for painting.

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[Mark Hennebury]

Hi Jerry, I made new shafts, but I didn't blue the shafts. I blued the nuts, bolts and washers, for protection from rust and for cosmetics. I also made many of the washers, a little heavier, and blued the to look nice. I cleaned and wire brushed every nut, bolt and washer first, then heated them and quenched them in oil. They is a big variation in color but overall they looked pretty good, and I was happy with the result. I don't have it down to a science, I just put them in the oven and check on them once in a while. I just have a small oven, so mostly only do the small stuff, I have on occasion done larger parts in the BBQ.

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Curious about the idea of hot bluing the shafts. Was it for aesthetics or for rust inhibition? Did you do the hot bluing? I'd like to hear more about the shaft fabrication and bluing.

[Jonathan Jung]

Incredible! I would love to have one, setup just for solid timber crosscuts. Nice job and thanks for sharing.

[John Kananis]

Pretty amazing work, thanks for sharing this.

[Jerry Bruette]

Hi Jerry, I made new shafts, but I didn't blue the shafts. I blued the nuts, bolts and washers, for protection from rust and for cosmetics. I also made many of the washers, a little heavier, and blued the to look nice. I cleaned and wire brushed every nut, bolt and washer first, then heated them and quenched them in oil. They is a big variation in color but overall they looked pretty good, and I was happy with the result. I don't have it down to a science, I just put them in the oven and check on them once in a while. I just have a small oven, so mostly only do the small stuff, I have on occasion done larger parts in the BBQ.

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Interesting, I've never seen it done like that. What temperature do you cook the parts at, and how long? Do you worry about changing the tensil strength of the fasteners with the heat?

[Ray Newman]

Does my heart good to see the old iron returned to once again working wood. Well done, very well done!

[brent stanley]

Beauty Mark, Robinson made great machines.

[Kevin Jenness]

It's inspiring to see such meticulous work done on a classic piece of machinery. I hope this saw will still be in use a hundred years from now.

[Mark Hennebury]

Hi Jerry.

I don't believe that the temperatures are high enough to cause any problems, and these machines are seriously overbuilt to begin with.

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Interesting, I've never seen it done like that. What temperature do you cook the parts at, and how long? Do you worry about changing the tensil strength of the fasteners with the heat?

[Mark Hennebury]

The new shafts that i made out of precision ground shafting, pretty cool fit!


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5rGu7tEqIF0

[Mark Hennebury]

Threads, always a worry to me.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=86kqeridB3M

[Mark Hennebury]

I made two new shafts, new collars and sleeves. The shafts had threads and keyways machined. Two deferent keyway slots and custom keyways to suit the different kewway slots in the handles.

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[Mark Hennebury]

Installing the new rise and fall shaft and collars into the motor mount.

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[Bill Dufour]

His bluing is a lower temperature process. More like seasoning a cast iron skillet or parkerizing. I assume low enough there is no light emission. So well below red hot.
The chart of tempering colors are just transition reflection colors that only occur as long as the metal is at that temperature. They disappear when it is cooled.
Austenitic steel temperature is more like 1,500-1,600 F.
Bill D

[Ronald Blue]

Looks like you have a nice lathe as well Mark. Collet chuck on it. Setting up to cut threads brings back memories. You are a skilled machine rebuilder. Taking the steps to make sure it works as good as it looks.

[Joe Calhoon]

Amazing job Mark! As usual for you. Thanks for posting.

[Mark Hennebury]

Thanks Ron, machining tolerances keep you on your toes. Are or were you a machinist?
The lathe is a grand old beast from the 1950's Dean Smith and Grace, made in England, weighs over 5000lb! Lots of fun exploring the potential of this machine. It would be nice to work alongside someone who could teach me. So much to learn and figure out.
The photo is from when i was moving it into the shop a few years back.

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Looks like you have a nice lathe as well Mark. Collet chuck on it. Setting up to cut threads brings back memories. You are a skilled machine rebuilder. Taking the steps to make sure it works as good as it looks.

[Ronald Blue]

I worked as a machinist/tool and die maker the first 19 years of my working career. When I went to work on the railroad I never did any actual machining any longer. I benefited from my background often though in machine repair. A well made lathe that is in good condition is a delight to run. I retired 2 years ago.

[Mark Hennebury]

That's a good background to have, and will always help you. The only "formal" training that I had was doing woodwork and metalwork at school in England for a year or two in the late 60's, but it was enough to get me hooked, plus my father was a carpenter joiner, so I have always been a tinkerer.


I worked as a machinist/tool and die maker the first 19 years of my working career. When I went to work on the railroad I never did any actual machining any longer. I benefited from my background often though in machine repair. A well made lathe that is in good condition is a delight to run. I retired 2 years ago.

[Mark Hennebury]

This is the tilt gearbox.
The bushings were a little loose for me, so I made a new bushing for the screw shaft and a new shaft for the crank handle that went through the two long bushings. I also made a new thrust bushing.

you can see in the second to last photo the old shaft is 0.002" under 1" and in the last photo the new shaft is (approximately)0.0005" under. The caliper only shows half thou, not tenths. So anyway the new shaft fits very nicely in the bushings.

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[Mark Hennebury]

I pressed out the old bushing. Made a new bushing, Pressed it in to the casting. Then skimmed the shaft to fit the bore of the bushing.
The bushing to shaft fit needs to be done after the bushing is pressed into the casting, as pressing the bushing in reduces the bore size.


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[Mark Hennebury]

I made a new thrust bushing. made it a little thicker than the old one so that it moved the gears a little closer together to remove play, the put some lapping paste and rotated it a bunch to mesh the gears, disassembled and thoroughly cleaned and re-assembled it. So now the shafts fit nice and the gears fit nice. Everything runs snug and smooth.

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[Mark Hennebury]

I jigged the shafts on the drill press to drill the holes accurately, drilled and taper reamed the holes, made new taper pins, installed the motor mount and tilt mechanism, shafts, collars, thrust washer and pins.


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[Mark Hennebury]

To pin the collars accurately is quite fussy, pre-drill the collar, install, slip a sleeve over the shaft, clamp snug and drill in place. All good exercise for the brain, trying to figure the sequence to get things accurate and snug fit.

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[Mark Hennebury]

Gearbox installed.



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qkgtrdbGkUE

[Mark Hennebury]

A flash of insight on the Robinson motor!


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eX_lQ17RVUY

[Mark Hennebury]

assembled the motor and installed it. Surface ground the collars and installed them, put on a blade and checked the rise and fall for accuracy, it was within a thou over 5" of travel, which is probably as good as I can get with a sawblade, a precision plate would be more accurate I am sure. but this is pretty good.


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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ACbsKTJCaYI&t=43s