Thread: Wadkin RB Stand Type Buzzer

In October last year I bought this seized wreck for $60, for parts.

RB 504.jpg

I think it's probably spent at least 10 years exposed to the damp New Zealand weather (along with three other radial arm saws).

Here you can see the 1/2" rod that sits parallel to the arm, for positioning the travel stops. This shows the extent of the rust where the rod passes through the traveling carriage.

RB 506.jpg

In addition to a supply of knobs, Whitworth bolts, and a handwheel, this saw provided some parts suitable for a 2hp RB buzzer - including 2hp switchgear identical to this (but with contacts in better condition).

RB 505.jpg

And various tags and tag screws - including Earth tag, lubrication tag, wiring schematic tag, and a serial and test tag.

RB 507.jpg

Wadkin CK 1011 of 1946. R.I.P.

Cheers, Vann.

In January this year I came across this neglected Sagar under/over. I was told it was going to be scrapped.

RB 510.jpg

RB 509.jpg

RB 508.jpg

My second RB didn't have a fence, so I offered some money and became the owner of a rusty fence.

The RB still has the bracket for its fence rod.

RB 511.jpg

My initial thoughts are to acquire a rod to fit the bracket, and mount an adaptor plate on the back of the Sagar fence. It would be a non-tilting fence. However, I brought home not just the fence casting, but also the tilt components and the rod, handwheel and bracket. If practical, I'll fit the lot. If not practical, it'll be back to plan A.

This is getting close to a workable project.

Cheers, Vann.

It'll need a motor. The CK radio alarm saw 2hp motor is probably munted (and doesn't have conventional mounts anyway).

I have a Brooks 2.5hp motor that wouldn't look too out of place (the original motor would have been English Electric).

RB 513.jpg RB 512.jpg

The footprint isn't right - but an adaptor plate would rectify that.

I very recently purchased this 2hp motor - but haven't taken delivery yet. If it's better suited, it might get the job of powering the RB.

RB 514.jpg

Cheers, Vann.

It'll also need On/Off buttons.

I acquired this off a damaged 1974 Wadkin CC.

RB 516.jpg

Now freed-up, cleaned-up and painted. It would have once been labelled "Wadkin Controls" but that lettering has long gone.

RB 515.jpg I should have taken a better photo before it got dark .

It's not the right era for this machine, but it'll do until something more appropriate comes along. At least it's a genuine Wadkin part .

Cheers, Vann.

Originally Posted by Vann

...It's not the right era for this machine...

So what is the right era?

It had the second style of fence which appeared in the mid-1930s but was replaced by the RD style fence by 1950.

A better indicator is the style of handwheel. The handwheels are spoked which makes it later than RB 519 of 1946. The handwheels are 5-spoke cast-iron, which I believe changed to 3-spoke aluminium in 1949.

However I noted an even better indicator on the base. Early stands had no opening for the On/Off switch.

RB 517.jpg RB 255 of ~1934.

Later an opening was provided for the On/Off buttons.

RB 518.jpg RB 418 of 1938.

This flush opening was last seen on RB 567 of 1947. After that the base casting was modified to provide a raised rectangular boss for the On/Off buttons. Note that RB 563 (4 numbers earlier) has the raised boss - also note that RB 563 was tested later than RB 567 (maybe it's base was defective and they had to wait for one from the next, modified, batch?)

RB 519.jpg RB 611 of 1948.

In conclusion: the handwheels dictate that this RB is later than RB 519 of 1946, while the button opening indicates it's earlier than RB 563 of 1947.

So this RB looks to have been numbered somewhere between 520 and ~567, and manufactured in 1946 or 1947 (as such, that 1946 CK tag isn't totally wrong ).

Originally Posted by Vann

...
RBA 418, test 10699, of 1938 - United Kingdom - Wadkin Ltd. tin tag;
RBA 464, test 14604, of 1940 - United Kingdom - Wadkin Ltd. tin tag;
RBA 485, test 19730, of 1943 - United Kingdom - Wadkin Ltd. tin tag;
RBA 497, test 25435, of 1945 - United Kingdom - Wadkin Ltd. tin tag;
RB 512, (test no. unknown) - United Kingdom - Wadkin Ltd. tin tag;
RB 519, test 27047, of 1946 - United Kingdom - Wadkin Ltd. tin tag;
RB 563, test 29408, of 1947 - United Kingdom - Wadkin Ltd. tin tag;
RB 567, test 29231, of 1947 - New Zealand - Wadkin Ltd. tin tag;
RB 611, test 30332, of 1948 - United Kingdom - Wadkin Ltd. tin tag;
RB 620, test 30372, of 1948 - New Zealand - Wadkin Ltd. tin tag;
RBA 666, test 32855, of March 1949 - New Zealand - Wadkin Ltd. tin tag;
RB 677, test 32956, of 1949 - United Kingdom - Wadkin Ltd. tin tag;
RB 733, test 35300, of 1949 - Wadkin Ltd. tin tag;
RB 734, test 35301, of 1949 - New Zealand;
RB 745, test 35560, of 1950 - United Kingdom - Wadkin Ltd. tin tag...

Cheers, Vann.

I completed and fitted the "Brookhirst" door today.

RB 520.jpg

The door is a particularly poor quality casting (maybe cast during WW2 for this 1946/47 machine?). On the left of the next two photos (taken some months ago) is the "Brookhirst" door off CK 1011 of 1946 - a very fine casting. On the right is the door off the RB.

RB 521.jpg Note the ripples and voids in the RB door.

RB 522.jpg Note the mounting bosses for the switchgear on the inside of each door.

On the CK the switchgear spans almost the full width of the door. The RB has mountings for a narrow switchgear panel roughly half the width of the narrower door. The CK switchgear won't fit the RB door. I intend to mount it to the back wall of the switchgear compartment.

Also note the standard "Brookhirst" door off the CK has a groove cast into it, around the inner edge. This is to mount a rope seal (to reduce dust entry). The RB door is simply machined flat around the inside edge. I've now glued a layer of cork to help seal against dust.

Cheers, Vann.

So with the base nearly finished, and my son coming round for tea, we lifted the base off the saw stools, and lifted the main casting and wedges onto the base.

RB 523.jpg

RB 524.jpg

Then this morning I fitted the infeed and outfeed tables.

RB 525.jpg

RB 526.jpg

And you may recall the Sagar fence I picked up in January. I positioned that on top as well, to see how it might fit.

RB 508.jpg RB 528.jpg RB 529.jpg

RB 527.jpg

Still a long way to go. I'll have to design an adaptor bracket to fit that fence. I haven't started on the motor shelf, nor the motor - and I'll need to obtain a suitable double vee pulley for the motor. Then there's wiring, and the contactor (which needs all the contacts cleaned, then mounting). A blade guard, and pointers for the depth-of-cut scales. And numerous other small tasks.

Cheers, Vann.

Originally Posted by Vann

...Still a long way to go. I'll have to design an adaptor bracket to fit that fence...

I made up an adaptor bracket.

RB 530.jpg RB 531.jpg RB 532.jpg

It wasn't really designed, it just sort of grew. The angled plate is from a piece of 1/4" plate I had. The longer piece is 12mm bar - I needed the extra thickness as I wanted to tap the bar, as there is no room for a nut behind one of the two holes. Joining them was my first weld in maybe 18 years and the almost finished product involved a lot of grinding, and some filler .

It fits on the fence like this:

RB 533.jpg The bracket is in primer for this trial fitting.

And the whole thing bolts together like this:

RB 534.jpg All those bolts need to be shortened.

You can see the reason for the angle here. I wanted the fence to go back as far as possible - and it allows the fence to go back to 1/4" from the back edge of the table.

RB 535.jpg I've picked up the two existing holes for the original Wadkin fence bracket.

In that position I get 9 1/2" inches of clear table.

RB 536.jpg

Not bad for a 9" buzzer .

With the fence fully back the adjuster bar sticks out a long way. I don't know if I can afford that much wasted space behind the machine. With it adjusted fully forward (so that the table is fully covered) it still protrudes nearly 5" (it came off a ~16"-20" wide Sagar planer/thicknesser)

RB 537.jpg RB 538.jpg

As the narrowest timber I'll be buzzing will probably be in the region of 3/4", I think I'll be looking at shortening that bar by ~6".

Cheers, Vann.

Note: kindly excuse my use of imperial measurements - I've always felt that something designed in imperial should remain imperial, ever since I was given a job, shortly after metrification, that required cutouts at 914mm centres.
So that's 914mm, then 1828mm, then.. umm... 2742mm, then... Hold on, if I flip the ruler over that's 3', 6', 9', 12' etc .

The livery (or colour scheme) for this machine uses the appropriate grey - the lighter of the two Wadkin greys - RAL 7011. To break the all grey colour (even the machined surfaces dull to grey) I decided to pick out the handwheels in red (same colour as used on the raised "Wadkin" letters).

I'm still not sure they're a good match .

RB 527.jpg

I used the same red on the handwheels of my (still incomplete) Wadkin LP - but being an earlier machine, the LP has the earlier darker grey, which doesn't look quite so clown-paint-ish .

aLP 73.jpg

And I spotted this Wadkin overhead router on ePay in the UK. It uses the lighter grey with red handwheels - and doesn't look right to me . Maybe I should have gone for black, like wallace does on his machines.

RB 539.jpg

Well I'm not going to repaint the handwheels now. Maybe later?

Cheers, Vann.

I've painted the fence adaptor bracket - black. I looked through my meagre supply of random BSW bolts and found some 1½" bolts and a single 1¼" bolt to use (rather than cut down the precious 2" genuine Wadkin-made bolts I'd used for the trial fitting).

RB 536.jpg "BSW" How cool is that!

I've seen metric bolts with an "M" on the head, but I think these are the first I've seen with "BSW". I painted them (black) to keep the dreaded rust at bay. I've recently tried blacking bolts by heating and dipping in oil. Unfortunately I threw out the old used car oil, but the results using clean oil just aren't as... black .

I then assembled the adaptor bracket and the handwheel bracket.

RB 531.jpg RB 530.jpg

Originally Posted by Vann

...I think I'll be looking at shortening that bar by ~6"...

In the end I cut off 5¼" instead of 6". I'm not sure why - I guess I can cut more off later, but it's much harder to put some back on.

RB 534.jpg

It would have been nice to move the whole fence 2" towards the outfeed table to achieve this at the table lip...

RB 533.jpg

...but that would have required moving the fence to here...

RB 532.jpg

...which in turn would have required either drilling a new hole in the table (as the bracket would need to be cut away where the existing hole is), or loosing the use of an inch or two of table width. I'm not going to do either at this time. Lets see how it performs in service (whenever that happens ).

And now - the fence, fully assembled.

RB 535.jpg
Well, fully assembled apart from that missing ¼" bolt below the handwheel, and the clamping bolt that goes through the brass handle .

Anyway, on to the next task.

Cheers, Vann.

Originally Posted by Vann

...one o the worlds great procrastinators (me ) is working on another buzzer. Another Wadkin buzzer. Another Wadkin RB buzzer. It's a form of avoidance - I'm avoiding finishing my other one, 'cause I can't make up my mind on a few things...

Yes well, after a lot more procrastination, I've got back into this machine again.

First, a decision: The cutterblock from this machine is staying in this machine (i.e. it's not going into my other RB buzzer as originally intended).

So with that decision made I got my A into G and fitted replacement studs.

I'd been advised that the studs should be fitted in balanced pairs, with the two studs in any pair weighing within 0.2g of each other. Being concerned that the studs that came out of the earlier RB cutterblock were very inconsistent - with shorter and longer threaded lengths each side of the 'shoulder' - I decided to get my new studs CNC machined, rather the risk the variations of hand machined studs. This required a minimum order of 50 studs (to be anywhere near economic).

The studs that came out of the other cutterblock were 2" long, with 1' threaded and screwed into the cutterblock, then a 1/8" 'shoulder' (unthreaded portion), then 7/8" thread to take the nut.

Unfortunately, this cutterblock had shorter studs at 1 7/8" - with 7/8" threaded portion either side of the central 1/8" 'shoulder'. So I needed to cut 1/8" off each of the 6 studs. When I'd done that I had two pairs, but the last two studs were very different weights. A couple of weeks ago I fitted the four studs.

RB 540.jpg

Yesterday I cut down a seventh stud. I then had studs at 59.2g, 60.5g and the new one at 60.3g. A touch up on the grinder and I had two at 60.3g (because I'm anal and wanted to achieve better than within 0.2g ).

I'd made up a stud fitting tool, because I didn't want to use two locked nuts in case I distorted the threads (did I mention I'm anal? ). It's a bit of brass hex, drilled at tapped 5/8" BSW at one end and M12 at the other.

RB 541.jpg

The stud is inserted until it bottoms out and then backed out half a turn - then the M12 bolt is screwed in until it locks the stud.

RB 542.jpg

I then put a few drops of threadlocker on the exposed end...

RB 543.jpg

...and screwed the stud into the cutterblock.
RB 544.jpg RB 545.jpg

Then holding the brass 'nut' with a spanner I unlocked (unscrewed) the M12 bolt and then I could unscrew the brass 'nut' leaving the stud behind.

RB 546.jpg

One side done...

RB 547.jpg

...followed by the other side.

RB 548.jpg

Note that, before inserting the studs I'd had to run a 5/8"BSW bottoming tap down each of the holes to clean crud/rust from the threads.

Cheers, Vann.

Originally Posted by Vann

Yes well, after a lot more procrastination, I've got back into this machine again...

And what got me back into working on this machine?

Three weeks ago I bought a Wadkin CC radial arm saw.

CCdave.jpg

I owned it for about four days.

I don't have room for a beautiful BIG radial arm saw like this - but I've been keeping an eye out for parts for people. Dave in Featherston needed an end cover for the motor on his CC.

CCdave1.jpg

Bob in Dunedin wanted a yoke casting (the one behind the wheel) for his CC.

CCdave2.jpg

And Auscab in Melbourne needs a stroke stop for his CC.

CCdave3.jpg

And I would keep the blade as a spare for my PK, as well as various bolts, knobs, etc.

But when I rang Dave to see if he still wanted the end cap, he told me he was after a second CC for his workshop - so I sold it to him for the $74.50 I bought it for (so now he still needs an end cap for his first CC). Far better to find a home for a complete saw than to part out a good machine.

While chatting with Dave I asked if he knew of somewhere local where I could buy a twin belt pulley that might be suitable for my RB buzzer motor - and 10 minutes later I was the owner of one of the exact diameter required.

RB 551.jpg
Motor pulley - 6¼", left. Cutterblock pulley - 4¼", right.

I think it's actually a genuine Wadkin pulley as it's stamped "RD 10" which I believe is an RD part number - and the RD takes the same size pulley as the RB. Moreover, the bore, and the square key sizes, fit the proposed motor exactly.

With that, I now have all the parts I need to get this buzzer running (not complete - it'll still need belt and cutter guards - but enough to get it running). That's what got me motivated to progress this machine .

Cheers, Vann.

Having (finally ) fitted the studs it was time to put the cutterblock back into the buzzer.

First step was to take off the fence and remove the bearing caps.

RB 549.jpg RB 550.jpg

I then lowered the cutterblock into place and refitted the bearing caps.

RB 552.jpg

Then I fitted the moulding knife 'clamshells' and put the fence back on.

RB 554.jpg RB 553.jpg

I didn't take any photos but the moulding knife 'clamshells' are each held on by two special 5/8"BSW bolts. The heads of the bolts are machined round and then two sides are milled to parallel, but at an angle to form a dovetail (like the arrangement for attaching the ripping fence to a Wadkin PK). The dovetail heads are inserted into the round recess at the left hand end of the cutterblock face...

RB 547.jpg

...and can then be slid along to hold moulding knives in any required position. Once again I weighed the bolts for the purpose of balancing the head. The four bolts that came off the head weighed: 65.8g, 65.3g, 65.2g and 63.8g . They certainly weren't matching pairs (within 0.2g of each other). I paired the 65.3g and 65.2g bolts, then carefully ground both ends of the head until I had the heaviest bolt from 65.8g down to 63.9g - and paired it with the 63.8g bolt. I reused two of the nuts, and selected two new ones to also keep those within the 0.2g limit.

Next jobs are to find the spacer, key and nut for the pulley - and to fit the knives and the other two 'clamshells'. Oh, and maybe remove that pesky surface rust from the steel lips of the infeed and outfeed tables.

Cheers, Vann.

Originally Posted by Vann

...I didn't take any photos but the moulding knife 'clamshells' are each held on by two special 5/8"BSW bolts. The heads of the bolts are machined round and then two sides are milled to parallel, but at an angle to form a dovetail (like the arrangement for attaching the ripping fence to a Wadkin PK). The dovetail heads are inserted into the round recess at the left hand end of the cutterblock face...

Here's a better picture - stolen from wallace's recent RB restoration thread.

BNhJiLC.jpg

Cheers, Vann.