Wadkin Knife setting jig for BAO/S 12

[Alan Bain]

I've now got my new (well to me) BAO/S 12 set up in the workshop and running well. New knives are unsurprisingly required and they have also arrived but turns out I don't have the knife setting jig. Dalton-Wadkin say they sell them, but on phoning was told they had sold the last one and don't have a drawing and they were made by a one-man-operation now retired.

I happen to have a well equipped workshop - there's a little Boley jig borer at the other side of the workshop so Imagine making a pair of these is no trouble if I had the dimensions. Most look guessable (or measurable) apart from the projection of the knife. It is possible that this is to make the 4in cutter arc.

Does anyone happen to know (or even better have jig for sale, but I know that isn't very likely!), but a photo would help

Alan

 

[kinsella]

Alan,
Good luck finding one as i recall looking at other brands, not cheap. I'm just about to get the same machine up and running, 3Phase. But I'm guessing you've had a PT before. I have an older Axminster Perform PT and I've never bothered with the setting tool. I used to use the steel rule method but now use a dial indicator in a 3D printed jig, but it could just as easily made out of timer. Good explanation here

 

[nolly47]

hi
ebay item 333757083180
save you messing about

 

[Alan Bain]

Alan,
Good luck finding one as i recall looking at other brands, not cheap. I'm just about to get the same machine up and running, 3Phase. But I'm guessing you've had a PT before. I have an older Axminster Perform PT and I've never bothered with the setting tool. I used to use the steel rule method but now use a dial indicator in a 3D printed jig, but it could just as easily made out of timer. Good explanation here

Yes, this is a 3 phase one as well. Worked nicely after a quick reversal of a pair of wires to make it run the right way, the joys of having a 3 phase supply to the house!

It is actually my first PT; unsurprisingly I have used them before, but tended to rely on using other people's machines in return for metal machining assistance on the lathe/mill/grinder but then the current situation made that a lot harder and I decided the time had come for a PT to enter my life and I prefer good solid cast iron machines.

 

[julianf]

My planer is way smaller, but I guess the blades are held in in a similar manner.

I had no setting jig, as the previous owner had lost it.

I got a set of those magnetic blade holder things, took the springs out from under the blades, and used the magnetic things to lift the blades into an even position. Then tightened the fixings.

Checking with my verniers shows everything as it should be.

I don't know if your device has springs behind the blades, but I found the whole thing so much easier once I'd removed the springs and relied on the magnets alone to hold the blade before tightening up the fasteners.

 

[Alan Bain]

hi
ebay item 333757083180
save you messing about

Sadly I wasn’t quick enough here! Was hoping the listing still existed to let me grab the photo but seems like it doesn’t!

 

[Trevanion]

Sadly I wasn’t quick enough here! Was hoping the listing still existed to let me grab the photo but seems like it doesn’t!

Wadkin BAO Cutter Setting Tool | eBay

 

[Alan Bain]

Wadkin BAO Cutter Setting Tool | eBay

Thank you!

 

[Alan Bain]

Well here's the jig for setting the knives on the BAO/S that I finally made. In case anyone else wants to do this the main diameter is 3.875" measured off the cutter block and the knife cutting circle is designed to be 4" so the additional depth is 62.5 thou which I ran in over an arc of 30 degrees. Hacked out of an old slide valve casting in iron (which was rejected and put in the scrap bin) on my poor little jig borer.

 

[Bretonfox]

Well here's the jig for setting the knives on the BAO/S that I finally made. In case anyone else wants to do this the main diameter is 3.875" measured off the cutter block and the knife cutting circle is designed to be 4" so the additional depth is 62.5 thou which I ran in over an arc of 30 degrees. Hacked out of an old slide valve casting in iron (which was rejected and put in the scrap bin) on my poor little jig borer.

Hi Alan (from another Alan!)

I don't know if you're still around these parts but I wondered if I could check some numbers with you? I have a Wadkin BAO that came with disposable Esta Bruck knives which are great in many ways but I think create a smaller cutting circle, which I'm trying get the rollers and bars shimmed to work with better.

You mention your BAO/S cutterblock is 3.875" and the cutting circle is supposed to be 4" (same cutting circle as the BAO). But doesn't that mean that each knife should project from the block 3.2mm, not the 1.6mm or 63 thou you mention? As just one knife would create the cutting circle, it's not a distance split between two knives. Does that makes sense?

I'm trying to find out what knife projection the rollers and bars are designed to work with as they are not easily adjustable, and I have to take the machine apart to shim them, so would rather get the numbers right by calculation if possible!

Al the best,
Alan

 

[Fitzroy]

The other Alan was last on Dec 2023. His projection is correct as the cutting circle and block size are the diameter, whereas the blade projection is in addition to the radius, so is half/double depending on how you think about it.