The Dinosaur Surface Grinder Made It Home!

SPAknives

Well-Known Member
Well my family & I left Tuesday to go check out this surface grinder in Salt Lake City wich is about 125 miles away from where I live. We got there I went in & looked at it. It is kinda old and looks old but from what could tell every thing seems to be very tight and have excellent tolerance. The man who was selling it said who would have kept using it but he needed more width and leangth for his machine shop. He told me he would knock 50 bucks of throgh in a new wheel, a diamond wheel dressing stone, and some scotch pads to clean some of the greese off of it. So I couldn't pass it up. For $450 I thought it was a pretty good deal. However the table has to be ran manually from side to side. It used to be power feed but he said he wasn't sure what happened to the power feed. He had been using it manually for the past 20 years. From what little bit I have dug into it I think it may just be a contacter switch that has quit working. So I brought it home and took it to my works shop and used the high pressure pressure washer to clean it up a bit which worked realy good. I finally got it moved in the garage today. I am realy excited to get it up and running. It is a 6"x18" Reid Surface grinder. Even though it is pretty rough looking everything moves up, down, left, right, forward backward very easily with the manual controls. This one has two motors one for the grinder and the one that isn't working that runs the table.
You other fellors that have surface grinders, are yours ran manually or does yours have a hydraulic or power feed tables. How do you have yours wired. I was planning on using a static phase converter, but most static phase converters I see say they can only run one motor at a time. So if I get the motor to the table running a static phase converter may not work with both motors. I thought about buying a cheap VFD to run the 1hp grinder and a static phase converter to run the table motor. But anyway like I said I don't know if the table motor will even work. As much as I am going to use it I probly can get by with running it manually. Sorry for being so long winded so heres the picks.
 

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Wow, I thought I was the only one who wanted a surface grinder that bad. I drove twice that far to get a "1956" Gallmeyer & Livingston that needed a "little work". That was about three mouths ago. Last week we finally finished rebuilding our 1942 surface grinder and it was worth the time and effort. So take your time, fix it right and enjoy.
 
Mine is all manual. That is pretty much fine for what we do, but the grinders we have in the school shop are very similar to yours.

Once I ran one automatic, I was shall we say, annoyed that I didnt get one like that! :) It's a realy, realy nice luxury feature, but if your just gonna grind a blade flat here and there, it's not a big deal.

Congrats, I hope it comes back together without a hitch! :)
 
Shane, I run my Norton surface grinder (Hydralic feed) and spindle motor with a static phase converter, I start the hydraulic motor first then the spindle, has worked fine for 5 years. That being said you can buy a VFD for just a bit more than a static converter. the trick is that it should be at least 1.5 times the h.p. rating of both motors combined.
either way will work.

Jerry
 
Thanks for the help guys!
Good Info Jerry! Thanks for the help. That is what I was looking for. I just talked to a guy that supplies static phase converters and he also said it will work just fine. Thanks, Shane
 
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