Thread: Robinson VZ/T Thicknesser

Nice machine there Rob.
I bought the Robinson 24” square cutterblock thicknesser from Patternmaking at Ultimo TAFE in the late 80s.
It was a good machine but loud.
We were in a big co-op workshop with a seperate machine room.
I also had an old Macson jointer and then a 24” wide Oliver jointer.
I replaced them with the Bursgreen 18” UOS under and over when I bought the Concord ‘shop.
H.

A 24 " Jointer Henry . Huge Jointer! I suppose 24 inches means a long time in between sharpenings ? Or does the far side of the blades not get used as much ?

I used a 12 inch square head thicknesser years ago . Wolfenden . Very loud . I got kick back and hit twice on that thing mucking around with trying to feed things that were to short for it . Tought me never to stand directly behind or ever go bending and looking for whats stuck in a running thicky . And don't try stuff too close to feed roller spacing in length. Don't know why it took two hits to figure that out . One should have been enough. I was in My 20s .

I took the cover off . There's a pair of pressure bars that rest on the timber as it passes in and out before and after the top rollers that are not shown .

The aluminum pates either side of the head are where moulding knives go if you want to do that.


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Started polishing the table and rollers. Wire brush on angle grinder, orbital sander then honed high spots flat with a coarse sharpening stone . Had a better idea later for the bed rollers by making a sanding form which worked well . Got some pictures of that . The straight parallel lines in the table are lines from the metal shaper I assume ? Or some sort of grinder when it was made. The deeper waward lines are where nails or stones have been dragged through . Same with the rollers
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First broken thing I have to fix is this stud which was the same as the next picture . Its the two stops that prevent the table being raised into the spinning head . As far as I know that's the only serious broken thing on it .
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Brushed up on info about removing broken studs by asking some friends and watching some YouTube . I never knew you were supposed to Belt those easyouts in hard with a hammer . Not hard enough to break them because their brittle of course .
I heated the area and quenched it with WD40 as recommended.
Drilled a hole in the middle of the 5/8 stud by first drilling a small pilot hole with my pen sized air powered mini grinder that holds small long carbide mill bits I suppose you'd call them .
Then a trick I saw on YouTube was to drill the 4 or 5mm hole for the easy out with a left twist drill . The broken stud sometimes comes out while doing that . I didn't have a left hand drill bit but remembered a grinding trick I saw where a right hand drill bit is re ground to cut left. I did that but used a diamond wheel on an old masonary bit .
It got a hole in and down the middle but didn't shift it and it went blunt . Then I found the hole wasn't that good anyway for the easy out so grabbed a normal HSS bit and drilled deeper and rotated it to give me a cone I thought would match the easy out . The stud started shifting in deeper while I drilled. A 50 / 50 good bad thing .

These machines are threaded with very close fitting screws and holes . Not much slop at all . So with my new found method of belting the easy out for grip the stud finally started shifting out little by little . The easy out came loose 5 times so more hammer work and after it got about half way out I knew I had it . Phew. This is something I have failed at too many times in the past.

The good stud on top in right picture has had its thread ground short by someone for some reason ? I'm keeping it . I think it has a fair bite and as long as the thing is done up tight and that shoulder is firm its doing its job I hope. Ill keep and eye on it I think.

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Rob

Pictures of the table flip

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I had only access to clean what was on top so far and had looked under with a torch to try and see past the mess as to why nothing worked freely . She was all choked up . Rise and fall of table was hard and stiff and worse approaching the ends of travel . Table bed roller adjustment was stuffed.
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Later Green paint re sprays had covered everything including surface rust on threads and to keep her working previous owners had oiled what should really be a dry lube situation I think.
With an under performing dust sucker on it as well , fine dust coated everything and dried out . Being what I think was hardwood dust its a bit like liquid Masonite was sprayed on to dry out everywhere.

The duct outlet for dust is 100mm diameter which is way under the square mm area of the next choke point in , the rectangular top of the hood. 150mm diameter pipe will be a lot better suited.
200 mm could be used but would mean cutting away at the nice solid Cast Aluminium Top of the machine . Not something I really want to do.



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This picture below says it all for me . Its saying "Dont oil me FFSake"

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This Big Knob when turned acts on those gunked up bars and turns them , The bars have the offset turning on the ends which makes the next cast block down in the picture ( or up if the table was up the right way ) act on the bed roller shaft raising or lowering them . All four ends shift at once in unison . Ive found now that its clean and back together that it doesn't work so well upside down as it needs gravity to sit every part in its correct position .

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My new best friend for the last week . Even though it wants to blind me!
That and smaller brushes in the angle grinder and battery drill .
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Here's the Motor and badge .

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I got the equivalent grease delivered that Shell make now for the bearings in electric motors .
Ill use it in my Wadkin motors as well .

First thing I did once the table was upside down was photograph it all then take all the bits off .
I worked on the bed rollers first .

I made a sanding form up as just the go over I gave them with the random orbital sander while
in the table was not good enough at flattening the raised rim around each crater made by all the
nail or stone hits they had received . I tested that out by passing a fine file over a few and that showed
they were all high still around each mark. I wasn't sure how bad this may effect my wood that passed through .
I think Id have never noticed it probably. It could have left a pattern of fine marks down a board but anything
that's show wood going over the rollers would be hand planed scraped and fine sanded any way .
I did them while they were out and I could though .

An Oak block roughly shaped to match the roller with a plane from my set of rounds and hollows , then a layer of sand paper , a sheet of plastic and some Plasti Bond , Good Quality Bog . I clamped it down and when dry and set hard I placed a piece of 80 grit paper over the roller, grit up, and sanded the bog to match the roller radius perfectly . The 80 grit was then flipped to sand in line with the rollers . This worked well . The paper rode the high spots down until level with the rest of its surface.

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I got a nice surprise when I opened up those rollers .

1 .There was only evidence of graphite ever being in there. No Grease or oil .

And 2 . the roller shafts were painted in Robinson Grey that had not been
spattered with anything else and hadn't seen the light of day since 1963 .
The perfect opportunity to match a colour . I had been picking at different parts
looking at paint and that would have been good enough but they were all contaminated a little .

By mixing my two Wadkin greys , a light , too light for any Wadkin grey, and a good
darker grey , then finding I needed some yellow, I surprised myself with what I think was a perfect match .
I also tried versions with some of my Black and White tins of paint. The other one was best though.

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You can see the tests in these two pictures.
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Below is Two close ups of picture 2.
With the best match in there.
To see it on the right I circled one in yellow to show a very close test
with slightly too much yellow in the mix.
And in the black circle with yellow reduced was the final best one.
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These tests however were made by mixing drops of paint in a dish .

Getting the ratio spot on for the roughly 2 to 3 liters I mixed was a little harder .

A scraped off a section of Green on the body of the machine back to original Grey, and
the second picture shows with a spray of my larger paint mix on its left .
Its wet and close but not as close as my small drops test. I may add a touch of white and just nudge it closer .

This Paint is a fast dry enamel BTW.

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The wire brush in the drill was used at scrubbing the cast iron body of table.
Then a wash down with metho and steel wool.
The loose working parts were done with wire wheel then fine tuned with a fine file and fine
sand paper and light oil solution. Everything was then buffed .
Everything was taped up for spraying .
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Charging the buffing wheel with rock hard straight Carnauba wax friction
applied a fine hard wax finish which left a nice shine and a protective layer on unpainted parts.
The working sliding parts that run against each other were done with a hard Carnauba wax / Graphite mix .
They are SLICK ! And slide beautifully . I think fine dust will easily blow or wipe off that like it does on a
finished waxed piece of furniture .
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The table is all done except for one little knob I have to turn which is a lock for the bed roller knob.
I haven't seen one original in any picture Ive collected . They've all lost them! Just the one in the VZ/T brochure.
Not sure if I'll copy what I see here or do a smaller similar knob to the large one above it?
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And this is the table all back together. It feels great to adjust. It'll be better the right way up though.
Looking forward to that.

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Wire brushing the unpainted steel parts has always had me wondering how I could coat them with something to preserve the look . I started playing with the idea of waxing like I do my cast iron surfaces and how I've read others use paste wax on their metal .

That lead to me playing with solid Carnauba Wax . I use the stuff in making furniture waxes . Blending it with Beeswax for wooden polished surfaces.
I also made mixes for machine tops blending Carnauba and Paraffin wax 50 /50 with pure turpentine . That leaves an impressive coating which protects and leaves timber gliding across the tops .

Carnauba by itself is so hard you can barely scratch it with your finger nail. Its normally mixed and diluted down with solvents like Pure turpentine to get it to a paste and mixed with other waxes. To get around that I tried using some of the Carnauba cast into a solid block . Using it to charge the spinning stitched cloth buffing wheel and then the friction heat build up on the metal part spreads a coating . It sort of layers it on in waves of varying thickness but I found giving the part a go over with steel wool evened that out and the parts buff up and shine like never before . Here's a picture of the solid wax and two steel parts . One is just wire brushed the other friction buffed with the solid Carnauba .

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I played with the moving parts and found they also slide nicely with the Carauba. After cleaning the mess under this machine which was caused by oils and sawdust build up I was just thinking of only using Graphite on the moving dry parts . But then I thought of using the Carnauba and mixing Graphite with that . Friction applied with the buffing wheel .

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The look of it melting in the second picture is on a hot plate in an Aluminium pot . Looks evil like doesn't it!

Next picture is it sitting in a cool bath of water.

Last Picture . It cracked into 4 parts on cooling . Its as solid as a hard plastic . I'm not sure if the Graphite made it even harder?
The only way you'd get it on the parts is with the buff or a heat gun possibly .

The parts are sliding well and Ill see how they stand up to the fine surface rust that untreated parts seem to get from being handled or just moisture in the air. Its all the moving and raw unpainted parts under the table in the picture below that have been treated this way so far, except for the rollers. They were just wiped over with the parrafin /Carnauba paste wax. I wanted to leave them with the 80 grit straight sanding lines that the sanding left them with and not buff them up .

Carnauba is the ingredient in quality car polishes. Its for shine and protection from the elements . Id like to apply to some steel test parts and leave outside to see what happens but haven't got around to that yet.

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Rob

Hi Rob,

Thanks for sharing your restoration process with us all. I'd really like to try your Parafin/Carnauba mix on my machines. I am still yet to find a good protective coasting for my cast iron tops.

Really enjoying this restoration mate!

Cheers S&S

Did you get this thicknesser up and running and how are you finding the quality? Do you have any pics of the finished restoration (which looks good from what you have posted)

Over the week end I did a bit more fiddling with my JTA (Wadkin Bobbin Sander) One thing I did that was very rewarding was to sand back the thick surface rust on the Disc Bench. The machine had been sitting uncovered in the open for some time before I bought it. First I used a knotty wheel on a angle grinder then moved up to a disc on the angle grinder. The knotty wire wheel hooked in to the rust and left a nice rust free surface. But when I used the sanding disc on the angle grinder the rust colour came back???? The knotty wire wheel only "moved" the rust it didn't get rid of it.??? so I dug out a portable belt sander......well that got rid of the rust!! It left the surface with long scratch marks that I didn't particularly like. I then moved on to a 5" Random Orbit Disc Sander. That got me a surface that I could live with.

So now what do I put on the surface to keep the rust away.....good old Silver Gleet. The cast iron bench was sat on a wheel barrow while all the activity went on and it was in sunlight and got quite warm. The Silver Gleet was rubbed on liberally with a rag leaving any surplus on the surface to dry/harden over night (this is my usual practice with the goo) next day same rag with a little goo on and Robert is your father's brother. We got some rain, while the machine was under the carport to work on , and showed no evidence of rain drops at all

So what I am saying is the Silver Gleet seemed to like being applied to the sun warmed/hot cast iron. It didn't just sit on top but "soaked in" so I think only slight application of the goo should keep in good order

Originally Posted by Camelot

Did you get this thicknesser up and running and how are you finding the quality? Do you have any pics of the finished restoration (which looks good from what you have posted)

No work done on the Robinson thicknesser for a while. A year ago I got stuck into my dust extraction, and in between the Woodwork and keeping clients happy I keep going back to that.
You can see that part of the dust work from post 61 in this thread.
Questions about a second hand set up.

A couple of weeks back I got my RD 16" Wadkin buzzer and DR Bandsaw hooked into the dust system
My EC Tenoner, table saws PK and AGS will be after that and Radial arm saws and lathes will be last. Then it'll be back onto the Robinson thicknesser that will be replacing My Delta.

Here's the Dust set up on the RD and DR.

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Fitted a bar and fence to the DR as well which is something I have missed a lot since the previous bandsaw .
Its an old fence off a Aussie made table saw that I bought for this use . Since this picture Ive fitted a long wooden fence onto it .

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Originally Posted by chambezio

Over the week end I did a bit more fiddling with my JTA (Wadkin Bobbin Sander) One thing I did that was very rewarding was to sand back the thick surface rust on the Disc Bench.

I was once again having to take rust from a surface a while back and I normally shave it off with a sharp chisel first then sand using light oil as well .

This time I tried something different and poly glued a cheap Al oxide sharpening stone to a Metabo orbital sander . Used that with plenty of light oil. It works pretty good . Ill add a picture later .

Originally Posted by chambezio

...First I used a knotty wheel on a angle grinder then moved up to a disc on the angle grinder. The knotty wire wheel hooked in to the rust and left a nice rust free surface. But when I used the sanding disc on the angle grinder the rust colour came back???? The knotty wire wheel only "moved" the rust it didn't get rid of it.??? so I dug out a portable belt sander......well that got rid of the rust!! It left the surface with long scratch marks that I didn't particularly like. I then moved on to a 5" Random Orbit Disc Sander. That got me a surface that I could live with...

I try to avoid aggressive methods like powered sanding discs and belt sanders, and I go very gently with powered steel wire brushes. I don't want to wear the surface down if I can avoid it.

I shave the rust off with a Stanley knife blade in a holder. You have to work it inch by inch, but it's quite satisfying. After cleaning the rust dust off I sand lightly with wet & dry using WD-40 for a lubricant. I'd rather have the table slightly dull and still see the manufacturers machining marks, than bright and shiny because I've taken heaps of iron off.

Once the WD-40 is wiped off and the surface is completely dry, I wax working surfaces (currently using Briwax), figuring the wax will get into the pores of the iron and partly fill any pitting.

For other exposed surfaces that are not working surfaces (machined bars, etc.) I wipe with a very thin coat of BLO and allow 24 hours to dry. I've tried camellia oil, and lubricating oil on these surfaces, but find the BLO far superior in preventing the return of rust. Results for those of you in dry parts of Aus may differ.

Cheers, Vann.

Thanks for the reply & update, I was hoping you might have got it up and running.

Dust extraction is something I need to sort for when I build my new place, I am going to look at planning for the machines that will sit in the middle of the floor space and then cast the ducts into the concrete slab, so I need to be happy with the layout,

Originally Posted by Camelot

Thanks for the reply & update, I was hoping you might have got it up and running.

Dust extraction is something I need to sort for when I build my new place, I am going to look at planning for the machines that will sit in the middle of the floor space and then cast the ducts into the concrete slab, so I need to be happy with the layout,

If My 20" Delta broke down I'd have the Robinson running in a few days. The Delta keeps on slogging away at the work though. I am looking forward to putting the Robinson back together and getting the Delta out . I'm sick of walking around it and seeing it in pieces.

Doing the dust has been a huge amount of work. I used to have an under floor set up in the old workshop . It was a raised wooden floor . Its great being able to have piping under a floor. Being happy enough with positions to then cast the pipes in place would be good .
I found deciding machine positions was one hard process. I got the first most important half done and then kept changing the second half with better ideas.
Think I'm done now . I Just moved the EC Tenoner again yesterday a meter to the left which let me move the table saws a meter which solved the drum sander and then the spindle moulder section problem. That makes three times Ive had to re do the over head piping to tenoner. Its not too hard to do. Its just up high. Scaffold helps.