Who are these strange fellows?

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Manbench Industries; Purveyors of general mayhem since 1994, a blog to follow the crazed, possibly deranged projects and emotive musings, of an undergraduate engineer, and an apprentice organ builder who have always felt they were born in the wrong age. Follow us as we, re-write history, learn lost skills, discover strange new worlds, break things, rant at things, mend things, make new things and generally find ways of passing the day instead of doing "proper work" !

Tuesday 27 November 2012

'Dont Fret' ..... Hobbies "Gem" Fretsaw Recondition.


As good a place to start as any,....the end of the summer saw a brief interlude before "proper work" had to commence so this was the chosen way to pass the days.  Bought at GDSF 2012 for a mere 20 Squids, we believe this is a 1940's or 50's model. A basic reconditioning, ....complete disassembly and re-finish of all parts. A new belt was fitted as the last had seen some use and was beginning to slip and the decision was made to give the flywheels a tasteful new gloss red finish, .... because its a good rule that if its a flywheel it should be red ;) Back together now and a great little machine, should last another 60 odd years me thinks.

The Carpenter

4 comments:

  1. Hi there. I was very interested to read your article as my Dad has just bought one of these which also needs refurbishing. Could you tell me where you got the new drive belt from as I'm having trouble locating one for him?
    Cheers,
    Mandy

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    Replies
    1. Hi There,
      Working for a family Organ Building business, we tend to have all manner of new stock belting in, thus for me to find some suitable wasn't too much of an issue. The type I used was a Rounded belt secured at the join with a staple I made from some Steel Wire. I'm not sure where we'd purchase this from now as as I've mentioned we still have new stock thats been in store probably more than 30 odd years! That said if you like I'm sure we could sort you with some, we often supply materials. Feel free to contact our office (details at:- ) http://www.deanorgans.com/

      Tom,

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    2. *Rounded Leather Belt, Sorry forgot to say it was leather!

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  2. I have one of these for renovation, short of the flywheel and drive belt!

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