Does anyone know anything about Alba 1S shapers?

[Beardy MikeParticipant @beardymike]

I picked up a shaper this morning; proudly emblazoned on the side is “Alba type 1s”. There seems to be plenty of information on both 1a and 2s, but Google comes up with nothing at all on the 1s.

It seems much closer to the 2s than the 1a in that it’s floor standing rather than being on a stand. The stroke length plate indicates up to 13in which strikes me as unusual compared to more normal 12 or 14in nominal strokes. I’ve not had it stroking yet, so it possibly is a 12 or 14 in reality.

It’s presumably pretty old – it’s set up for flat belt drive. I’m hoping that I can get a poly-v belt to grip the pulley and give me a sensible ratio. I’ve seen the average speed for line shafts as 2-300rpm. Is this likely the correct speed at the machine, or would the pulleys have been different sizes giving a final gearing?

Thanks,

Mike

[bernard towersParticipant @bernardtowers37738]

I think your speed ideas are probably a little optimistic, I run my shapers from 55 to 95 rpm!

[Beardy MikeParticipant @beardymike]

The 2-300 rpm number wasn’t in relation to the main ram speed, but the input flat belt pulley. There’s a 4 speed gearbox plus some other gearing in between. The 50-100 strokes/min number is useful though -i can turn it over by hand, count how many pulley turns equate to a ram stroke then do the maths.

I did have a quick play this afternoon, and can get the ram travel up to just over 14″ at the absolute maximum. I’m guessing that it might therefore be a nominal 14″ model (although I’m not sure how effective it would be set like this). Perhaps the 1s was an early model that was the forerunner to the much more successful 2s, but with the same nominal specs?

[Beardy Mike]

On 4 February 2024 at 14:05 Beardy Mike Said:

… The stroke length plate indicates up to 13in which strikes me as unusual …

I doubt if this is significant … but I will throw it in anyway:
13” was, I believe, the standard stock-length for Silver Steel

MichaelG.

[Beardy MikeParticipant @beardymike]

I got out to the garage and had a play turning it over by hand. By counting the revolutions per ram stroke and comparing it to the specs for the 2S I’m pretty confident that the correct drive shaft speed is 470rpm. The fact that my calculations for top and bottom gear agree to within 1% makes me think that I must be on to something.

The motor plate says 2830rpm, which I assume really means 3000 with no load, slowing by that much at full load. By my reckoning a 40mm pulley on the motor should be about right. Too small for flat belt, but within a normal range for J section poly-v belt.

I need to figure out motor mounting, but I think it should be fairly straightforward to get this thing cutting!

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