MYSTERY OBJECTS

[PanBiker]

Is it used in the printing industry for lining up a typeset block?

[Stanley]

Sorry Ian no. You were on the right lines with tool holder but it's specialised and I want the use.

[chinatyke]

For holding T-beams/T-bars? I suppose it could hold I-section also. No idea really, just guessing again but watching with interest!

[Stanley]

Clue, look at the star wheel on the left and ponder what it's for. Bear in mind we have agreed it's a tool holder.

[Gloria]

Is it for holding an industrial diamond for dressing a grinding wheel?

[Stanley]

No Gloria but you are very close. Think back to how you generated a flat surface on a large or irregular piece of steel before the days of Planers, shapers and milling machines.

[Gloria]

I’m stuck now, possibly for trimming mill stones?

[Stanley]

No Gloria, think of wanting to make a flat surface on an irregular shaped piece of metal and all you have is a lathe.....

[plaques]

Sorry if I have stolen Gloria's thunder.

Some of the very old vertical turret lathes were used as planing machines. The overhead tool post would hold whatever you wanted to clamp onto it. I've never seen your clamp being used but I don't see why not.

[Gloria]

I wouldn’t have got that Plaques.

[Stanley]

Not sure If you have quite got it Ken but it's go0ne far enough so I'll knock it on the head. The device clamps on to the faceplate of the lathe and the star wheel on the drive shaft hangs over the edge. The cutter was mounted in the tee slot and the item to be machined was clamped to the saddle of the lathe which allowed it to be advanced into the tool to get a cut. If set up correctly, when the lathe is started and the face plate revolves the tool acts as a fly cutter on the workpiece and the star wheel is struck by a peg mounted on the lathe bed each time it passes, this advances the tool and the cut moves across the surface. This gave a surprisingly flat surface and was the only way this could be done if something couldn't be chucked and rotated in the days before shapers and planers.
Next one?

[plaques]

No I was definitely thinking of a VTL., and really big lumps of metal. I can see what you are saying and its quite a novel way of using a lathe. They always said if you have a lathe you can machine anything.

[Stanley]

There's always a way with a lathe.....

[Stanley]

What is it?

[Gloria]

An ancient baler?

[Stanley]

Sorry Gloria, no.

[Wendyf]

Threshing machine?

[plaques]

My guess. A horizontal reciprocating log saw.

[Tizer]

And my guess. A horizontal reciprocating stone saw.

[Stanley]

Ken got it, that's exactly what it is. Built by Tommy Robinson's in Rochdale. Started life in Stockport sawing coffin boards and in WW1 was put to sawing boards for trench duckboards in the woods at Poynton by the man who founded the present day Gas Engine museum at the Bomber Pit. I bought it off him and shifted it back to the Wheatsheaf Centre in Rochdale via a complete refurbishment by the Rochdale Apprentice School.
Next one?

[Gloria]

Where is the Gas Engine Museum at the Bomber Pit?

[Stanley]

Poynton Wood Gloria. Well worth having a look at. See THIS Wiki article about the Anson Pit. Funny, I thought it was called Bomber locally, perhaps an association with 'Anson'.

[Gloria]

Thanks Stanley

[Tizer]

Funny, I thought it was called Bomber locally, perhaps an association with 'Anson'.

From the Anson Engine Museum web site: LINK
`During the 1939-1945 war, the National Company supplied vast numbers of engines to Government requirements. In addition, contracts were undertaken for the manufacture of jigs for the Manchester and Lancaster bombers, hydraulic recuperators for 25 pounder guns, and groups of machines were laid down for the manufacture of blade adaptors for the Rotol variable pitch propellor and also for machining propellor hubs.'

[Stanley]

Who is this?