Author Topic: This gentlemen, is a shaper...... wow!  (Read 9593 times)

Offline Artie

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This gentlemen, is a shaper...... wow!
« on: March 02, 2011, 11:17:58 PM »
Some of you may remember that I bought my first shaper a year or so ago. Im completely taken by them and am now looking for another... (long story, but he said would you take lots of money for that machine and I said yes..sort of..like I said, long story).

So looking for another shaper preferably Southbend or similar, when I came across this.. mother of shapers... and YOU can buy it right now on Ebay for the sale price of $265,000 USD... I mean... a steal right?  :thumbup:

South Wales, wait...NEW South Wales... Batemans Bay.

Offline dsquire

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Re: This gentlemen, is a shaper...... wow!
« Reply #1 on: March 02, 2011, 11:51:29 PM »
Artie

Nice Video, thanks for posting it. Oh by the way, we like long stories and I imagine that a few others would like to hear it as well.  :D :D

Cheers  :beer:

Don

 
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Offline Tugwilson

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Re: This gentlemen, is a shaper...... wow!
« Reply #2 on: March 03, 2011, 01:46:38 AM »
this silly price for a machine which may be worth it but would have to be used by a manufacturer not a hobbiest like most of us on here.
I was looking for a milling machine a few weeks ago and come across one on e-Bay, in had a box of cutters and other bits and peaces so estimate the value at around £680 to 800 GBP. this price based on what else was available and the cost of most of what I could see in the box. mind you this was second hand and i was working on new. the final price for this was £2,010.00. now explain the sense in that if you can. I have purchased a new machine (same dimensions and ability) with new cutters, rotary head table, clamps and vice. total expenditure £758.00. talk about auction fever.

Tug

MrFluffy

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Re: This gentlemen, is a shaper...... wow!
« Reply #3 on: March 03, 2011, 04:06:05 AM »
It would have to be making chips 24/7, and you would have to have the work for it, at which point it probably would turn a profit in the short to medium term.

Nice video, and always gives me ideas, but one thing Im slightly unsure of is in that video, the forming tool is a gear like cutter which takes cuts of multiple teeth at varying depths in one pass, but he types in the number of teeth and diameter into the nc gear controller setup. Would it need a change of forming tool for each change of parameters? Or would one tool cover a range of tooth pitches?


Offline Artie

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Re: This gentlemen, is a shaper...... wow!
« Reply #4 on: March 03, 2011, 04:44:23 AM »
As far as the machine goes I thought it was an extraordinarily high price for a second hand reconditioned machine (so the ebay blurd goes), yes its an amazing machine but that IS a lot of money... that was my point I guess.

The long story is simply that about 20 odd years ago I sold my automotive workshop and since then have 'used' it for personal purposes. All my machines live there, I help him maintain his shop and he pays the power the machinery use. Works for both of us.

10 months ago I opened a new office on the south coast (im 600k's inland) and the office has been storming ahead to the point that it outperforms the head office (where I live) so much so that I have decided to swap things around and live at the coast and road trip to the country office.

So here is the story, my mate who now owns the workshop doesnt want to lose all the equipment so has offered a substantial amount if I just take the stock and 'special tooling' and walk out. To which I have agreed. Here is one of the reasons why I am not posting on my build thread lately.

Soon I will need to buy a whole heap of new toys and hence why I found this shaper for sale on ebay. Its an opportunity to refine what I have. I will buy a slightly smaller lathe, a better quality mill and a slightly larger shaper. As I now know heaps more about the machinery having used it all in paractical situations Im am able to choose exactly what is required rather than an element of guesswork like I did when I initially bought everything.

This will occur when I have sold one house, bought another, moved and built a shed (if not already in place). No hurry but a break in 'hostilities' I guess.

Cheers all.
South Wales, wait...NEW South Wales... Batemans Bay.

Offline philf

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Re: This gentlemen, is a shaper...... wow!
« Reply #5 on: March 03, 2011, 07:56:59 AM »
It would have to be making chips 24/7, and you would have to have the work for it, at which point it probably would turn a profit in the short to medium term.

Nice video, and always gives me ideas, but one thing Im slightly unsure of is in that video, the forming tool is a gear like cutter which takes cuts of multiple teeth at varying depths in one pass, but he types in the number of teeth and diameter into the nc gear controller setup. Would it need a change of forming tool for each change of parameters? Or would one tool cover a range of tooth pitches?


It looks as though you type in the number of teeth of both the gear and the cutter to synchronise the rotation of both (as though they were finished gears, meshed together). This being true, one cutter could cover any number of teeth in the gear (providing that it could fit inside the gear and have clearance to rotate).

Phil.
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MrFluffy

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Re: This gentlemen, is a shaper...... wow!
« Reply #6 on: March 03, 2011, 08:37:56 AM »
That's how it appears to work, but in the video it gives the illusion of having more than one tooth in the workpiece on any single cut, thus surely the cutter would change pitch with the pitch being cut or the 2nd and 3rd teeth engaged would be in the wrong place.
Strikes me as something you would set up to make 100000 of something so probably not a concern, especially if you have that much money to spend on a shaper :)

Artie, Im sure if you need a hand tool shopping you'd find a few willing volunteers here :)

Offline RichardShute

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Re: This gentlemen, is a shaper...... wow!
« Reply #7 on: March 03, 2011, 06:27:03 PM »
That's how it appears to work, but in the video it gives the illusion of having more than one tooth in the workpiece on any single cut, thus surely the cutter would change pitch with the pitch being cut or the 2nd and 3rd teeth engaged would be in the wrong place.


It's not an illusion. It is analagous to cutting an external spur gear with a rack cutter as in a Sunderland gear cutting machine. As Phil says, as long as there is room for the cutter to rotate within the ring gear you could cut any number of teeth.

It is a pretty high value capital item, but I don't see you'd necessarily need to be using it to make zillions of items. The programming was pretty quick so a smaller number of high value 'specials' would probably be more profitable. Maybe a few hundred helicopter gears at $10k a time or something like that.

Richard
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Offline dsquire

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Re: This gentlemen, is a shaper...... wow!
« Reply #8 on: March 03, 2011, 10:08:35 PM »
Artie

Thanks for the rest of the story. I wish you well with your business and new house and future shed. I am sure that you will find the suitable equipment to fit in it. Thanks  :D :D

Cheers  :beer:

Don

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Never let it rest,
'til your good is better,
and your better best

MrFluffy

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Re: This gentlemen, is a shaper...... wow!
« Reply #9 on: March 04, 2011, 05:07:03 AM »
That's how it appears to work, but in the video it gives the illusion of having more than one tooth in the workpiece on any single cut, thus surely the cutter would change pitch with the pitch being cut or the 2nd and 3rd teeth engaged would be in the wrong place.


It's not an illusion. It is analagous to cutting an external spur gear with a rack cutter as in a Sunderland gear cutting machine. As Phil says, as long as there is room for the cutter to rotate within the ring gear you could cut any number of teeth.

This confused me so much I went and read up a bit on gear shaping machines, from :-
http://www.mechanicalindetail.info/gear-manufacturing-machines/gear-shaping-operation.htm

"Actually a rotary cutter is correct only for the number of teeth for which it is designed and where in practice one cutter is made to cover a range, the sears at the extremity of the range arc necessarily inaccurate."

Which clears up my confusion, the cutter in the machine covers a range of diametral pitches, but will generate pitch inaccuracies at either end of the range (as its diametral pitch begins to differ from the pitch of the cut gear), so it'd need a few different pinions to cover a wide range and the odd toolchange.

Sort of on topic artie...

Offline philf

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Re: This gentlemen, is a shaper...... wow!
« Reply #10 on: March 04, 2011, 06:51:27 AM »

This confused me so much I went and read up a bit on gear shaping machines, from :-
http://www.mechanicalindetail.info/gear-manufacturing-machines/gear-shaping-operation.htm

"Actually a rotary cutter is correct only for the number of teeth for which it is designed and where in practice one cutter is made to cover a range, the sears at the extremity of the range arc necessarily inaccurate."

Which clears up my confusion, the cutter in the machine covers a range of diametral pitches, but will generate pitch inaccuracies at either end of the range (as its diametral pitch begins to differ from the pitch of the cut gear), so it'd need a few different pinions to cover a wide range and the odd toolchange.

Sort of on topic artie...


Hi Mr Fluffy,

I looked at the article and the rotary cutters referred to are your normal gear cutters where you cut one tooth at a time. Gear shapers can cut gears of any number of teeth with 1 cutter. A cutter (whether it is a normal or shaper or hob type) is designed to cut just one DP or Module.

Phil.
Phil Fern
Location: Marple, Cheshire