It is currently 28 Mar 2024, 22:31
Cabinetman wrote:They were really involved complicated machines, and considering how few of any one sort might be sold it may be why he gave up on them.
The drive cord/wire? On the seat shaper is really fine and unfortunately reminds me of the old dentists drills aagh!
AndyT wrote:Well, those are interesting! Definitely very specialised, with a tiny market to sell to. They look substantial machines too, even if they idea of a guard seems not to have bothered them too much.
I thought I would look in a book to see if I could find any other machinery from Broom and Wade or other companies in High Wycombe. The book in question is fairly rare, it's "The History of Chairmaking in High Wycombe" by L.J.Mayes, published in 1960. It traces the trade from the classic 'bodger in the woods' through increased mechanisation and consolidation and is an excellent book of its type, and possibly one that you don't have a copy of yet Dan, even though it has some pictures of early woodworking machinery? (And there don't seem to be many of those... )
The captions speak for themselves. I'm afraid I can't make out the maker of the adzing machine, even in the book. The horizontal borer seems to say "Dexter & Co Wycombe" suggesting there was at least one other specialist maker in the town, and Mayes says that most of the machinery shown is by them.
He also notes that "for the first half century of the machine age an operator with all his fingers was a rarity."
AndyT wrote:More good stuff.
I've been trying to think of any other place where the same scale of work is done, to need a mortiser on that scale.
The Canal and River Trust still have one other similar workshop in the Midlands, at Bradley, near Bilston.
But I don't know of any more large scale timber work of this sort being done anywhere. And if the machines last 90+ years, demand is definitely going to be on the low side... Is there any contemporary maker offering kit like that? The world must need at least one, but if other countries are like the UK it's possible that they have all closed down.
kirkpoore1 wrote:Andy:
Mortisers of that size were used by railroad car manufacturers. The early 20th century Greenlee catalogs make some incidental mentions of this. I would expect that Pickles exported them to places like Australia and India which had to build their own rail cars even if locomotives were imported.
I’ve never seen an American hollow chisel/chain combo mortiser. A North American factory would have enough space for two machines if it needed both. I have seen them with attached drills but those were the old style reciprocating solid chisel mortisers.
Kirk
AndyT wrote:Thanks Kirk.
It's easy to forget how much timber there used to be in railway rolling stock.
I think your signature line should read 'Son of Scrit'
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