Older Unisaw added to the shop

[brandom11]

Thank god for a little bit of rust and a missing blade! I was at an Auction yesterday and just picked up a delta Unisaw serial number

122-3968 for an amazingly low price. Winning bid was fifty dollars. even with then 10% buyers premium and sales tax I was out the door for fifty nine dollars and change. As I told my wife "it was too cheap not to buy" Yes is is three phase but I couln't resist the intact cabinet with the cast iron base and the cast iron motor cover. the both seem much cooler that my current unisaw of mid 80s vintage instead of the late 50s. Along with the saw came a mitre gage that reads "THE DRIVER LINE" geared self indexing mitre gage patent no 2,010882. it seems to be pretty cool and features preset angles and allow you to dial the angle you want with the geared knob and then lock it into position with the top knob without deflecting the angle at all. Also wear a couple of throat plates for a dado blade. It is missing a fence but that should be no problem to add a good biesemeyer. This saw even had a blade guard in good working order that my current saw lacks. The handwheels were hard to turn but are now smooth once i cleaned the accumulated sawdust and gave them a light coat of grease. The arbor seems tight without any play and spins freely.

A couple of questions. I want to pick between the two saws and make one for the shop.

My preferences are to keep the base and cabinet of the older saw. But the single phase motor of the newer saw. Can I just switch motor and the switch and starter apperatus? The old saw has an oval opening and the newer saw is more rectangular.

Once I clean up ther table of the older saw it looks like it will be the better table. The newer saw has the t mitre slots and the older table does not. Is there any huge benefit to the t slots vs plain? any reccomendations for a fence system?

[bridgerfafc]

first off, YOU SUCK! cast base unisaw with the motor cover for fifty bucks

second, the miter gage is a walker turner, not a delta.

third, either the miter gage or the cast motor cover are worth a good bit more than what you paid for the saw. did you get the louvered dust door too? that's also valuable on the collector market.

fourth, keep the old saw. to be most correct, from a collector's piont of view, keep the 3phase motor in it and run it with a VFD.

fifth, get yourself on over to

there you can find out a lot more about your new score.

[woodstuff]

I need a 3 Phase motor like that if you want to sell it. If you aren't too far away to ship to the Dallas area

I will email you if your email addy is good, Thanks

woodstuff

[skeez]

the 3PH motor is probly 1725 RPM and the newer 1PH is probly 3450RPM so you may have to change the motor pulley and the belts too. use the pulley and belts from the newer saw. the arbor is the same or close enough i believe. I converted one a few years back but I had to buy the extra parts! not cheap but I am happy with the results.

skeez

[Charley]

You definitely rate a big YOU SUCK for this one !!! Fifty dollars ? (grumble, grumble)

If I were you (I wish) I would fix up this beautiful old saw, buying it whatever it needs, including a new 50" Biesmeyer fence, while leaving your new saw completely intact (you've got to have something to use in the meantime). You could run the 3 phase motor with a phase converter or buy it a new single phase motor. Either way you are still money ahead. When you finally get that old saw all fixed up you can then make a decision which of the saws you want to keep for yourself (my bet is on the old one). Then you can sell the other saw to one of us needy people here for a full recovery of all of the money that you have invested in fixing the old saw plus a nice profit for your effort. I could sure use a Unisaw. I'll tell you what, I'll buy whichever saw that you decide not to keep (if you live near enough to me to make picking it up reasonably possible). If not to me I'm sure someone on this group will be very happy to take it off your hands for fair money.

Charley

[Frank Drackman]

Very nice!

[brandom11]

Hi all wasn't even thinking of the gloat but I take the "YOU SUCK" with the highest of regard. I was stunned when it was announced sold $50.00 to bidder no 855. What made it even more surreal it the next item was a shiny tiny aluminum ryobi with fold down wheels that went for $85.00 and then two roller stands that went for $35.00. Just a funny crowd, there for the skis and other stuff, not a closed cabinet shop or other auction that brings woodworkers together and prices up.

Any way a freind came over tonight and I have it out of the truck and into the shop. I'll try to get a few photos posted.

It does have the louvered dust door but it is missing the knob. Do I search for the original part or chuck up a chunk of wood in the lathe?

What I'm thinking about is just lifting swapping the whole assembly, motor and all out of my newer saw and dropping it into the base of the older saw. a neighbor has an engine hoist. Has anyone tried this? any suggestions how any where to wrap a strap? I'm kinda thinking to bloch up the assembly and bolt in some eyebolts where it mounts to the cabinet.

My other thought is to just switch motors for now any needs pulleys just to see how well it cuts.

Brad

[Jim Behning]

I have a late 80's Unisaw with a three phase motor.Not all that many hours of use on the motor. If you want to buy the motor send me an email removing the deoesthisblockpork. I live in Atlanta. Maybe you were looking for a vintage 3 phase motor.

[Heath Roberts]

Good buy--I have a 50's-vintage Unisaw, which I love. Unfortunately they're not always as cheap as you might hope, especially if you want to 'do it right'.

There's really no point in swapping internals. The old cabinet won't have enough clearance for the new motor to tilt.

If you want the old saw, either find a single-phase 'bullet' (old- style) motor or get a variable frequency drive (VFD) that has a single- phase input and three-phase output. I'd go with the drive--this one should work:

people cut the old cabinets to fit new motors--to me, doing that destroys the 'vintage' value of the saw, which seems near-criminal-- just sell it to someone who will appreciate it and use the money to get what you really want.

You'll also want to check for arbor wear before you spend any money, just so you know what you're getting into--I think you can have the arbor rebuilt for a couple hundred dollars.

Just install the new-style motor in the old cabinet--it'll work fine as long as you don't try to tilt it more than a few degrees. I think you'll be able to leave the new pulley on the new motor, and leave the existing pulley on the arbor, but I don't have diameters handy, so calculate those ratios before you start--I don't think you want the blade turning at twice design speed.

[Joe Brophy]

I built a static phase converter using one of the phase converter configuration instruction plans you can usually find for free online. I have configured static phase converters for 3hp and 5hp unisaws, usually they will fit into a metal utility box about the size of a lunchbox. I try to use all "run" type capacitors if possible as they are in metal cans vs plastic for most "start" capacitors. Mount the box close to the regular on/off switch and set it up so there is a momentary contact switch in the converter that you hold in while turning on the normal on switch, the phase converter switch is released when the saw spins up, usually about 2-3 seconds. A good source for all the caps and heavy duty switches is surpluscenter.com. They also sell phase converters but IMHO too expensive, given that static converters are so simple to construct and the components used inexpensive and readily available why not save money and build you're own.

The VFD is a great solution if you can find one that is less than the cost of buying a new single phase replacement motor and swapping out the 3 phase motor. Sometimes you can find them on ebay or craigs list. Since there is no additional cost justification for a (list price) VFD on a tablesaw, unlike a lathe, drill press, or bandsaw where the capability of varying the speed is an almost mandatory requirement, usually VFD's are a spendy solution. VFD's usually are the preferred choice when the issue involves a 1hp or less 3 phase to single phase requirement economics (using new components), unless one shops for a used single phase replacement motor which seem to be more available and can even be found at garage sales.

A final note on static phase converters: Using this approach you will only get about 75% of the rated HP of the three phase motor. However, in a busy shop with many different individuals using the unisaws we did not ever have a situation where the saw didn't have more than enough power for any task it was called upon to accomplish, again this is using a 3hp and a 5hp unisaw operating their (stock) 3 phase motors via static phase converters on single phase power over a 3+ year period. Good luck and best regards, Joe. (Feel free to email me should you have additional questions as I don't always have the time to keep up on my newsgroup reads.)

[Robert Bonomi]

authoritative answer: "Yes."

[Robert Bonomi]

I say again, "yes".

One can _never_ have too many Unisaws.

More seriously, how old, and how new? and in what condition? are they identical in all other ways -- hp, fence, etc?

One last thing, trying to decide based on _color_ won't work.

[Markem]

,

,

Can you take both?

Just wondering?

Mark (sixoneeight) = 618

[Lew Hodgett]

Did you forget, old age and treachery beats youth and talent every time.

Lew