There is a Lee 16x48 planer (or planer mill, not clear) advertised
locally at a price that seems attractive - but I don't really have any
familiarity with planers or planer mills, just vertical and horizontal
types. Is this likely to be at all useful for the home shop, or just
absurd? Stairs are not involved ;-)

--
Cats, coffee, chocolate...vices to live by

On Mon, 27 Feb 2006 14:46:41 GMT, Ecnerwal
wrote:

There is a Lee 16x48 planer (or planer mill, not clear) advertised
locally at a price that seems attractive - but I don't really have any
familiarity with planers or planer mills, just vertical and horizontal
types. Is this likely to be at all useful for the home shop, or just
absurd? Stairs are not involved ;-)


Id love one..but its not something that Id use much. But if I had to
redo a lathe bed..or make new fingers for a finger brake from
plate..that would be the tool to have.

And they are neat to watch run.

Shaper on super steroids

Gunner



"A prudent man foresees the difficulties ahead and prepares for them;
the simpleton goes blindly on and suffers the consequences."
- Proverbs 22:3

Last planer I used was a 40 foot Mesta. I was making feet and swing
gear sections for a 220 cubic yard bucket walking drag line at
Bucycrus Erie's Pocatello plant. Feet were 75 feet long, 12 feet wide
two inch thick abrasion resistant steel sole plates and the swing
gears sections were 10 feet wide, 7 feet high, two feet thick and
eight of them were lined up on the planer bed. The chips came off the
size of truck coil springs, blue hot with razor edges and flew 20 feet
through the air before hitting the roped off area of floor. Planers
can be fun to operate. You should have seen the lathes there, eight
foot diameter chucks, eighty feet between centers, with a seat on the
cross slide. They were WWII leftovers used for turning 16 inch battle
ship gun barrels and liners. Fun place to work if you don't mind 200
ton weldments and enormous gears going over your head on the traveling
cranes.
A good machinist can do an incredible amount of work on a planer. If
you already have a lathe and a mill and you get a good buy on a planer
or a shaper, go for it.
73 Gary



On Mon, 27 Feb 2006 19:23:26 GMT, Gunner
wrote:

On Mon, 27 Feb 2006 14:46:41 GMT, Ecnerwal
wrote:

There is a Lee 16x48 planer (or planer mill, not clear) advertised
locally at a price that seems attractive - but I don't really have any
familiarity with planers or planer mills, just vertical and horizontal
types. Is this likely to be at all useful for the home shop, or just
absurd? Stairs are not involved ;-)


Id love one..but its not something that Id use much. But if I had to
redo a lathe bed..or make new fingers for a finger brake from
plate..that would be the tool to have.

And they are neat to watch run.

Shaper on super steroids

Gunner



"A prudent man foresees the difficulties ahead and prepares for them;
the simpleton goes blindly on and suffers the consequences."
- Proverbs 22:3
Gary Pewitt N9ZSV
Sturgeon's Law "Ninety per cent of everything is crap"

if you have the room snap it up , if not post the info so someone else can

Yeah, he asked the wrong group.

Most of us would happily have a large high quality machine tool
around that we don't use all that much if we have the space. The
rest of the details don't matter!

Gunner wrote:

Id love one..but its not something that Id use much. But if I had to
redo a lathe bed..or make new fingers for a finger brake from
plate..that would be the tool to have.

And they are neat to watch run.

Shaper on super steroids

It NEVER occured to me until a minute ago that thete had to be a lathe
out there capable of boring and rifling barrelstthat bid and still work
to tolerance

i wonder how or who Gerald Bull used to machine the HARP and Superguns

Gary Pewitt wrote:
Last planer I used was a 40 foot Mesta. I was making feet and swing
gear sections for a 220 cubic yard bucket walking drag line at
Bucycrus Erie's Pocatello plant. Feet were 75 feet long, 12 feet wide
two inch thick abrasion resistant steel sole plates and the swing
gears sections were 10 feet wide, 7 feet high, two feet thick and
eight of them were lined up on the planer bed. The chips came off the
size of truck coil springs, blue hot with razor edges and flew 20 feet
through the air before hitting the roped off area of floor. Planers
can be fun to operate. You should have seen the lathes there, eight
foot diameter chucks, eighty feet between centers, with a seat on the
cross slide. They were WWII leftovers used for turning 16 inch battle
ship gun barrels and liners. Fun place to work if you don't mind 200
ton weldments and enormous gears going over your head on the traveling
cranes.
A good machinist can do an incredible amount of work on a planer. If
you already have a lathe and a mill and you get a good buy on a planer
or a shaper, go for it.
73 Gary



On Mon, 27 Feb 2006 19:23:26 GMT, Gunner
wrote:


On Mon, 27 Feb 2006 14:46:41 GMT, Ecnerwal
wrote:


There is a Lee 16x48 planer (or planer mill, not clear) advertised
locally at a price that seems attractive - but I don't really have any
familiarity with planers or planer mills, just vertical and horizontal
types. Is this likely to be at all useful for the home shop, or just
absurd? Stairs are not involved ;-)


Id love one..but its not something that Id use much. But if I had to
redo a lathe bed..or make new fingers for a finger brake from
plate..that would be the tool to have.

And they are neat to watch run.

Shaper on super steroids

Gunner



"A prudent man foresees the difficulties ahead and prepares for them;
the simpleton goes blindly on and suffers the consequences."
- Proverbs 22:3

Gary Pewitt N9ZSV
Sturgeon's Law "Ninety per cent of everything is crap"

The superguns were smooth bore and made in sections that had flanges
which bolted together.
73 Gary



On Tue, 28 Feb 2006 21:51:26 -0500, Brent Philion
wrote:

It NEVER occured to me until a minute ago that thete had to be a lathe
out there capable of boring and rifling barrelstthat bid and still work
to tolerance

i wonder how or who Gerald Bull used to machine the HARP and Superguns

Gary Pewitt wrote:
Last planer I used was a 40 foot Mesta. I was making feet and swing
gear sections for a 220 cubic yard bucket walking drag line at
Bucycrus Erie's Pocatello plant. Feet were 75 feet long, 12 feet wide
two inch thick abrasion resistant steel sole plates and the swing
gears sections were 10 feet wide, 7 feet high, two feet thick and
eight of them were lined up on the planer bed. The chips came off the
size of truck coil springs, blue hot with razor edges and flew 20 feet
through the air before hitting the roped off area of floor. Planers
can be fun to operate. You should have seen the lathes there, eight
foot diameter chucks, eighty feet between centers, with a seat on the
cross slide. They were WWII leftovers used for turning 16 inch battle
ship gun barrels and liners. Fun place to work if you don't mind 200
ton weldments and enormous gears going over your head on the traveling
cranes.
A good machinist can do an incredible amount of work on a planer. If
you already have a lathe and a mill and you get a good buy on a planer
or a shaper, go for it.
73 Gary



On Mon, 27 Feb 2006 19:23:26 GMT, Gunner
wrote:


On Mon, 27 Feb 2006 14:46:41 GMT, Ecnerwal
wrote:


There is a Lee 16x48 planer (or planer mill, not clear) advertised
locally at a price that seems attractive - but I don't really have any
familiarity with planers or planer mills, just vertical and horizontal
types. Is this likely to be at all useful for the home shop, or just
absurd? Stairs are not involved ;-)


Id love one..but its not something that Id use much. But if I had to
redo a lathe bed..or make new fingers for a finger brake from
plate..that would be the tool to have.

And they are neat to watch run.

Shaper on super steroids

Gunner



"A prudent man foresees the difficulties ahead and prepares for them;
the simpleton goes blindly on and suffers the consequences."
- Proverbs 22:3

Gary Pewitt N9ZSV
Sturgeon's Law "Ninety per cent of everything is crap"
Gary Pewitt N9ZSV
Sturgeon's Law "Ninety per cent of everything is crap"

On Tue, 28 Feb 2006 21:51:26 -0500, Brent Philion
wrote:

i wonder how or who Gerald Bull used to machine the HARP and Superguns
These were done in relatively short sections and bolted together
using flanges and high strength bolts. I don't know if these
were smooth bore or rifled, and if rifled, how they maintained
the "index" from one section to the next. I don't think I would
want to be any where near the gun when they fired it.

Unka George

I've always been interested in a home shop-sized one but have never
encountered one that wasn't built with battleships in mind. That's the
size you usally see in the old books with guys standing on the tables
with large wrenches doing setups. Probably after affordable mills were
developed, the smaller planers were scrapped out. Have made do with a
small shaper. How much does something that size weigh in at?

Stan

In article . com,
wrote:

I've always been interested in a home shop-sized one but have never
encountered one that wasn't built with battleships in mind. That's the
size you usally see in the old books with guys standing on the tables
with large wrenches doing setups. Probably after affordable mills were
developed, the smaller planers were scrapped out. Have made do with a
small shaper. How much does something that size weigh in at?

I have not gotten an answer to that question (weight, or the overall
size of it) yet. It did seem like it was potentially "manageable",
though I'm still probably looking at riggers to get it moved effectively.

--
Cats, coffee, chocolate...vices to live by

Fine historical pieces both, looks like belt-shifting table reversing
or fast and loose pulleys. Just the thing if you've got a
high-ceilinged basement and overhead lineshafting... In either case, a
looong way from where I'm at.

Stan

Oh man that's a keeper. I love the stories of how you built stuff from
nothing. Just great to see it is still alive and fresh in the minds of
those that made this country the genious that it is.

On Thu, 02 Mar 2006 16:39:23 GMT, Ecnerwal
wrote:

In article . com,
wrote:

I've always been interested in a home shop-sized one but have never
encountered one that wasn't built with battleships in mind. That's the
size you usally see in the old books with guys standing on the tables
with large wrenches doing setups. Probably after affordable mills were
developed, the smaller planers were scrapped out. Have made do with a
small shaper. How much does something that size weigh in at?

I have not gotten an answer to that question (weight, or the overall
size of it) yet. It did seem like it was potentially "manageable",
though I'm still probably looking at riggers to get it moved effectively.

Probably about 2,500 lbs., just guessing on how my 3' one set down my
truck. Their terrible and no good, where is it and how much?

Only main problem that I have faced is getting the "cross bar" dialed
in less than .0005" over 1.5'. Was thinking of putting on a slab of
aluminum and planing it true. Could do that with the original platten,
but afraid to, cause it is so old and not sure how much wear the tool
could take before it was finished.

Very fun and usefull tool BTW.