Early Rhodes Shaper restoration

[RCPDesigns]

I picked up an early Rhodes Shaper last weekend. It appears to be built around 1903 and has a few interesting details. First, the foot is extended quite a bit under the table. It has a handle on the flywheel and a different ram design than some of the others I've seen. It does look pretty much identical to the 1903 ad I saw that showed it with a base that looked more like a lathe base. Unfortunately the base was nowhere to be found. Perhaps most curious is that the lettering on the casting side appears to have been placed by hand and has a couple of goofs. The wrong size R was used and some letters are spaced at bit too much and a little crooked.

 

[RCPDesigns]

While a little rusty and dirty, the shaper was in pretty good condition. I stripped down the main casting and soaked the machined parts in Evapo-Rust. I cleaned up the main casting and prepped it for paint. While the shaper was originally gray, I chose semi-gloss black. I have a lot of Delta machines that are all gray and I've kinda gotten tired of the color.

 

[Nogoingback]

Looks like a great project! I like the Irwin vise off to the side as well as the car. MG?
Welcome to the group!

 

[Nogoingback]

Old machines look good in black...

 

[RCPDesigns]

Yes, 1952 MG TD that I'm about 75% through restoring.

 

[NCjeeper]

I enjoyed the discussing about it on PM.

 

[682bear]

It's good to see you on here, Jeff... welcome to the site.

I'll be watching this thread... one of these days I may find a project shaper to tinker with...

-Bear

 

[Tim9]

Looking good. You‘re going whole hog there with your restoration. I just tuned my Rhodes up. I did do a mod... or start a modification. But that’s a ongoing project in which I just put on hold for time being. I’m leaning towards making a fixture so I can get more clearance on my Z -axis so I can fit a rotary table + vise + something a few inches tall. Bottom line is every time I go to use my shaper I don’t have fixtu at the ready to quickly knock out something as easy as an internal keyway.

Anyway, nice score RCP and I too will follow this thread.

 

[Tim9]

Yeah RCP, I think you have a real early Rhodes. Your vise table box looks much bigger than mine. That’s a big plus because that is one of the mods on my to-do list to get more abilities to mount larger items. And mine has lettering which was now calling Rhodes a company whereas yours looks like it was just an early build from a guy named Rhodes who was just starting out. Good save.

 

[RCPDesigns]

Got a couple coats of paint on it, inspected the sliding surfaces and replaced the felt oil reservoirs under the ram. I put the ram on my surface plate and, surprisingly, it was flat. Given the wear in the middle of the X-axis lead screw I really expected the ram to be in bad shape. That lead screw will need to be replaced at some point but that looks to be a relatively easy job that I'll save for later. I'll go ahead and get some measurements on it and the nut while they're apart. The unit obviously saw a bit of work over its 115+ years though I'm sure it had been sitting for nearly a decade when I came across it. I could only see a hint of flaking on one small part. The good news is I only found a couple of gouges and I think they'll be fine repurposed as oil grooves.