James Nasmyth's planing machine for hand or power

Planing machine for hand or power with mangle motion, by Nasmyth Gaskell & Co., Manchester, 1857

This small machine, which was formerly the property of James Nasmyth, was built by J. Nasmyth & Co, and in its arrangement and detail it is almost identical with some of the larger machines made by them about 1 840. At that time the firm was also making rack-moved planing machines with quick return motions, but for sizes up to ft wide by 8 ft travel the gear shown was considered to give a quieter and quicker action.

The frame is a somewhat massive casting, with two V-guides with the apex uppermost. The two standards are bolted to the main framing and are connected by a cross girder which carries a central screw by which the height of the cross slide is adjusted; the cross slide has an internal traversing screw, for moving the tool rest which is capable of angular adjustment and has a hand-feed motion. The tool holder has the usual hinged box for preventing damage to the tool in the return stroke.

The table of the machine is a single casting, with slides planed on its lower surface corresponding with the fixed guides; the upper part of the table has six longitudinal T -headed grooves for receiving the bolts for securing the work. The table is moved to and fro by a mangle-wheel motion, there being two chains passing from the lower side of the table over fixed guide pulleys down to a chain wheel, round which they pass in opposite directions before being secured. The shaft of this wheel carries at one extremity a wheel with lantern pins, or teeth, into which a small pinion on the driving shaft gears. The pinion end of this shaft is carried in a sliding bearing, so that the pinion gears alternately inside and outside of the segmental lantern wheel, thus reversing the motion after a definite length of travel has been effected. The length of stroke can be altered by changing the number of mangle-wheel teeth, which are single pins secured by nuts. In the machine shown, a hand-driving mechanism has been added and the loose pulley removed. The transverse travel of the toolbox is automatically given by a pawl feed, receiving its motion from the lateral play of the pinion shaft.