Bucyrus Erie crane truck

[Jared]

Cool! I'm planning to do the same thing on my 25B when I get back to it. I have a shaper I plan to use to cut the gear teeth- after I get it running, that is. How will you cut the teeth?

I don't think the center shaft does anything to keep the house centered on the swing circle; the hook rollers do that. As far as I know, it is just a way to transmit power down to the tracks. I wouldn't get too worried about building that part into your machine. Before hook rollers came along, cranes had upper and lower rollers to support the weight of the house and the center shaft did double duty as power transmission and keeping the house from falling off the circle and my understanding is it was nothing but trouble.

[Mikem]

So much to learn and figure out !

[JAMMER]

How are you planning to cut the swing gear, by broaching it?Ed

[Krewmember]

Yes the plan is to use broaching to cut the swing gear. I only have a lathe so I'm going to use a profile tool in a boring bar holder and just slowly scrape away until I get to the right tooth depth and since I'm using aluminum for the swing ring I should not have too much trouble. As for indexing. My lathe has a gear reduction that can lock the spindle, so I can just enable the gear reduction cut a tooth and then disable it go to the next tooth on the gear reduction or skip a couple to divide, that way i can use my lathe as a poor man's indexing head


The only reason I was planing to add a center shaft was for rigidity. As I do not know how tight I'm going to be able get the hook rollers. I will just have to see how it works when I machine the parts and do some tests.




Shawn

[sparkycuda]

Love this build! Just a clarification about the center shaft and hook rollers. Center shaft does transmit propell power to lower works, but the house is also centered by the bushing around the shaft housing. Hook rollers control the tilting of the house on the ring, so clearance is needed between rollers and ring path. Roller clearance allows front rollers to contact on bottom flange and rear rollers on top flange, when lifting. If they are adjusted in too far, lack of clearance will prevent rollers from turning during house rotation.

[Krewmember]

That makes sense. Thanks for clarifying that.

[Mikem]

So the rollers need enough clearance to roll but not to tight not to loose . Hmmmm

[Jared]

Originally Posted by sparkycuda

Love this build! Just a clarification about the center shaft and hook rollers. Center shaft does transmit propell power to lower works, but the house is also centered by the bushing around the shaft housing. Hook rollers control the tilting of the house on the ring, so clearance is needed between rollers and ring path. Roller clearance allows front rollers to contact on bottom flange and rear rollers on top flange, when lifting. If they are adjusted in too far, lack of clearance will prevent rollers from turning during house rotation.

Oops! My bad. I guess I've been away from it too long. Looking at my drawings I see I made provision for a center bearing.

[Mikem]

You have a drawing for this piece ? Would you share it ? Mike