I knew there were a lot of things I would not be able to do with out a good jointer in the workshop. I found this monster in Connecticut. For those of you who don't know, a jointer is a key piece of machinery in a wood shop because it flattens wood planks so that they can be used to make square and precise joints in furniture. Most shops have 6" wide jointers, if you're lucky you'd have an 8" one, mine is 16" wide (wood workers are drooling at this) and it's 8' long and weighs about 800 lbs. I have no idea if that's accurate but the guy I bought it from said his crane on his truck said it was 800 so I take his word for it. It took a crane, three men, and a prayer to get this safely into my basement workshop by way of a 25 foot long ramp.
To get it off the dolly I had rigged two chain hoists from the ceiling joists, had my assistant lift it from the chain hoist simultaneously with mine, and miraculously we got it seated onto the concrete blocks we had placed within a half inch of perfect.
I had 220 v. wired for it, and its working great. (Could use new blades though). Anyone care to help me change 'em?
I looked up the history of my jointer and to my amazement it was made prior to 1893 ! YES, prior to 1893! It was powered originally by an overhead pulley that was likely geared to a waterwheel as most machine shops were located near rivers at the time. The J.A.Fay company which made my machine was in Cinn. Ohio and at some point I will look up the serial number still visible on the maintenance door of the machine to see if I can pinpoint an exact date of manufacture. It's truly amazing that machinery that functions within tolerances of thousanths of an inch still works perfectly after 100+ years! Here is some history about my machine's manufaturer : http://www.owwm.com/MfgIndex/detail.asp?ID=304
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