Have you ever ran a Shaper?

[Eric in IL]

I did use a shaper in High School, but never attempted anything this complex. Cutting a helical gear is not for the faint of heart. I bet this fella has at least 8 hours invested in each gear. You may enjoy watching this if you like machining.

 

[Janicholson]

I did use a shaper in High School, but never attempted anything this complex. Cutting a helical gear is not for the faint of heart. I bet this fella has at least 8 hours invested in each gear. You may enjoy watching this if you like machining.

Not to make gears, but many hours on several shapers. I have used a Sajo horizontal combination mill to make straight cut spur gears with cutters designed for tooth profile, accounting, in the main, for those design factors. It was the driven gear for a cross feed on a lathe. interesting index head manipulation (mine was manual indexing and not as complex. Challenging though. Jim

 

[560Dennis]

Yup , long time ago , good machine ,can do a lot with one .

 

[timcasbolt]

I took a basic machine shop class at Rochester Institute of Technology back in the 80's. Everybody ran a shaper once.

 

[old-9]

Our HS Shop had a 7 inch shaper, no one ever used it or knew how. The old 6 weeks of wood shop, 5 weeks of machine shop, 6 weeks of foundry, 6 weeks of welding,6 more of forging . And the instructor did not know much of anything. 6 weeks is not much time to design a project, gather material and complete it. Could have been much more. joe

 

[urbancase]

I did in machine shop one time for a project as we had too. Been over 40 years ago.

 

[Pete7]

I did use a shaper in High School, but never attempted anything this complex. Cutting a helical gear is not for the faint of heart. I bet this fella has at least 8 hours invested in each gear. You may enjoy watching this if you like machining.

Still use one about every other day. Fastest, easiest way to get a finish I need on some hydraulic parts I make/sell. Enjoyable to run.

 

[DanielW]

Haven't myself, but the machine shop I take my large circular saw blades to to get hammered/tensioned has one. They say it's still a good/efficient way to make all the internal blind keyways they use on some of their saw collars.

 

[drsportster]

I have a small Atlas shaper which makes great parts and runs itself on auto feed.

 

[drsportster]

Why is my copy bolder than everyone's?

 

[Absent Minded Farmer]

Why is my copy bolder than everyone's?

Highlight the sentence & click on the bold "B" up top. Should clear it up.

I've started typing in bold before, due to leaving it on from a former post. It's can also happen if you copy & paste something that is in bold text.

Mike

 

[MFJohn]

I did use a shaper in High School, but never attempted anything this complex. Cutting a helical gear is not for the faint of heart. I bet this fella has at least 8 hours invested in each gear. You may enjoy watching this if you like machining.

I restored a Logan shaper a while ago. As they say, a shaper can make anything, except a profit. It takes patience for most tasks, but it’s perfectly suited for machining slots and keyways.

 

[Ultradog MN]

I did use a shaper in High School, but never attempted anything this complex. Cutting a helical gear is not for the faint of heart. I bet this fella has at least 8 hours invested in each gear. You may enjoy watching this if you like machining.

Never did anything like in the video but did run a shaper in the Navy.
Big old 3 ton Buddha of a thing.
I planed a bunch of 471 Detroit heads on it. We had a planer too and I ran that a few times.
I just sold my little 7" South Bend shaper at an auction in January. It was a cute little thing but I never really used it for anything.
Three guys got into a bidding war on it and it went stupid high. I didnt complain...

 

[Mike(NEOhio)]

Back in my die-making day I spent thousands of hours with shapers. Cincanniti 24 and 36 inch. Never cut anything like splines but lots of profiling work and descaling of tool steels.

 

[Watthour]

I was fairly impressed by the Lenz-Liebherr and Fellows hydrostrokes. I did rebuild and recontrol on a few of those, and it was educational to watch someone who knew what they were doing to set up and run those.

 

[Hemmjo]

Why is my copy bolder than everyone's?

You can easily turn bold off with key strokes also. On my MAC the "apple + B" key sequence toggles bold on and off.

 

[cleddy]

I did use a shaper in High School, but never attempted anything this complex. Cutting a helical gear is not for the faint of heart. I bet this fella has at least 8 hours invested in each gear. You may enjoy watching this if you like machining.

I had no idea this subject would get such a good response?? When I went to Machinist Trade School in 1970 they still taught "Shapers" and had a project for its use. I wanted to build a Drill press and Welding dept let me cut a wide I beam side off about 10" x 20" and I machined it flat on the shaper. It made a good drill press table and I still have it. In about 1986 I got a chance to buy a old Shaper (Very Old) for $250.00 and have never used it. It did run but I think its rusted solid back in the corner. That wasn't enough so about 15 years ago bought a small "ShapeRite Shaper for $200.00 and have never used it either. I broke a finger with that one trying to grab it to move and loose vice swiviled and twisted my finger. Now at Retired 70+ age what future do they have-Not much with a Programable Bridgeport Knee Mill ready to go??Cleddy

 

[4wdtom]

I have a 12" Vernon. I have cut internal keyways, splines, made a gear or two, and use it often for flat surfaces as opposed to expensive endmills in the verticle milling machine.

 

[Davidj]

I did use a shaper in High School, but never attempted anything this complex. Cutting a helical gear is not for the faint of heart. I bet this fella has at least 8 hours invested in each gear. You may enjoy watching this if you like machining.

Have a 14" "Prima" shaper here that gets used occasionally. Tooling is cheap, same as lathe cutters. Makes a nice finish on metal and wood. Have an old "Taylor & Fenn" mill I picked up cheap last fall. Tooling for that looks like it would lighten the coffers pretty quickly. I do see why mills overtook shapers though. Much faster and simpler for many things. I mill lumber from firewood pieces for small projects and in the absence of a planer, the shaper makes a nice job. Little, if any sanding required.

 

[560Dennis]

Our hemley hardware store has a nice small one for 700