Hedgemaster Hedge Trimmer 1950's

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Finished cleaning up this find from a garage of a friend of a family member was was retiring and fleeing south to a warmer climate, abandoning much of his accumulated "junk".

These are 1950's hedge trimmers that are a rather outdated configuration, with a switch on the cord instead of a trigger and blades that only cut on one side.
However, a few interesting features (uncertain how useful as I've never used hedge trimmers before) are:

1. The handle can be spun and re-attached in 90 degree increments.
2. The blades can rotate 360 degrees and are locked at any position by a set screw.

The design is extremely simple - it's quite literally a motor and gearbox on a stick. I like the efficiency.
The guts of it are:

• Ball bearing on front of rotor in gearbox, bronze bushing with felt wick in rear of rotor
• Steel worm gear screwed onto rotor shaft
• Brass bull gear in gearbox driving a cam shaft sitting in a pair of bronze bushings

The original grease had lost practically all its oil and the entire trimmer was covered in black grime. I was very surprised to find after cleaning that nearly all the original green paint was intact below the grime. I cleaned all the gearbox and then re-oiled and repacked it. All of the blade edges were still sharp except at the extreme ends where it had been dropped and blunted, but I resharpened with a file. I oiled the blades with bar and chain oil.

It was missing a switch when I got it and the cord was disintegrating. I replaced the cord and added a lamp switch on the cord.

The motor is a little baby, only rated for 1.2 amps. After the restoration, it draws 0.85 amps no load, but did great cutting a random evergreen bush in my yard.

 

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Photos of the guts:

 

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