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Thanks, Tarnished! The gang drills do not have the rear guards, and I'm fine with that; they are amazing to look at, but fragile and fussy to adjust. Plus, changing speeds becomes a whole process. The fence idea is one I got from an acquaintance. I've found it handy to have, and all my drill...

She is the best. We were at a local industrial surplus dealer and I was looking at a grinder that was in much worse shape than the online photos indicated, a bit upset at the possibility of a two-hour roundtrip being for nothing when Amy got my attention ; I looked over to see her standing...

I mostly have Porter-Cable machines from the '20s-'40s, but there are some Delta Milwaukee/ Delta Rockwell machines in both the wood and metal working areas of the shop, like my gang drill/ mortising setup, And the 1947 1460 wood lathe, Then there's the generation pedestal grinder that my...

Square wave, congratulations on the drill press; I have the same version of 17" ( the model number is 17-210, slow speed, production table, M2 taper spindle) and have nothing but good to say of it. I actually repair power tools and stationary machines for a living. What I like to do with return...

You still have the makings of a cool, vintage air compressor; if it were me, I'd test the tank ( I recently did my Devilbiss with nothing more than a sacrificial gauge, a pressure washer and a handful of pipe plugs). If it passes muster, I'd pull the head on the pump and clean out the carbon...

What's the issue with the motor? Repulsion induction motors are pretty hard to kill. - James Huston

Unit Electric was in business from 1946-1948, when they were bought by Porter-Cable, who wanted to add routers to their power tool lineup. The two motor units, the UB and larger UC, were sold for the next three years until they were supplanted by the 511 and 514 routers that Porter-Cable...

The B-6W isn't much shorter than me, say 6'2" or so with the shroud. I'll have to take some more recent photos of the deck crawler and the B-9. Porter-Cable did nothing but war work for both World Wars, and made any number of items for the war effort from fighter plane disposable fuel tanks to...

I just found out about this thread; I have a few machines in the shop that were Navy property during the Second World War, but the one I'm currently rebuilding is this, It's a Porter-Cable B-6W wet belt grinder. This machine was made during the war ( you can still see where the war finish...

While there's a lot missing to restore it as a grinder, you have the makings of a decent wire wheel or even a buffer ( although the arbors on a dedicated buffer are longer). The biggest issue is to determine what voltage it is wired for; the fact that there a four wires coming out of the motor...

Most saw sharpening companies will open the bore on a saw blade at little cost. - James Huston

The tank should have a date of manufacture on it; I think mine was about 1934 or so. -James Huston

Here's my c.1928 Hutchinson "Handy Hutch" table saw/jointer ( 12" saw, 6"jointer) . I got it from a fellow in Maryland, and a friend was kind enough to bring it to Ohio. Hutchinson was based in Norristown, PA, and eventually partnered with Porter-Cable around 1929 or so. It's a tilt top saw...

Cypherian, it's a 130 pump. - James Huston

Honestly? The Delta can do some minor resawing here and there with the addition of a riser kit, but the biggest limitation is the design; there's a good reason that most band saws have a solid frame, because effective resawing requires fairly high blade tension and an aggressive blade with a low...

I'm in the middle of swapping my 1939s Hobart Bros. Compressor for my new 1945 Devilbiss 60 gallon vertical tank. I hydro-tested both before putting them into service, and both passed with flying colors. My experience ( and I've repaired a lot of compressors in twenty years of being a power tool...

Looks like your quintessential Delta 14" band saw from the late '40s. It's a very good machine for it's class, which is why there were so many clones from SE Asia. The bearings are all common sizes, and there's prescious little in the way of hard-to-find parts, as they were made in gigantic...

RiechmannsRelics, you have a B-5 type 2, made about 1928 or so. Yours appears in need of restoration, but they're an easy machine to work on. Very early Porter-Cable sanders, like the B-5, B-4, and B-10 sometimes go for hundreds of dollars in good shape, but can be found for far less if the...

Bumping this post, because vintage power tools are my life, I'm restoring these three floor edgers built by Porter-Cable in the '30s and early '40s. I have a drum sander as well, and have put them to work on our house, a 1929 bungalow with all hardwood floors. -James Huston

I have the match to it, only in aluminum. About ten years later, I found a restorable example of the B-10 sander to go with it! -James Huston