Van Norman 555
- Thread starter Kman1983
- Start date
rsanter
Well-known member
look for a VFD
even if you do not plan on changing the speed, they are better than a static converter
bob
even if you do not plan on changing the speed, they are better than a static converter
bob
I'm gonna wake up an old thread instead of starting a new one.
I was given a Van Norman 555,Van Norman 333 and some type of boring bar without a motor that I believe was used with the 333.
I could use the 555 in my shop,but am having a hell of a time figuring out HOW.
I haven't wired it in yet because of this,but it was taken from a guys shop that still used it with a 3 phase convertor.
The guy died about 10yrs ago and they hadn't messed with anything. It was disconnected from power and hauled over with tooling and some type of stand I think goes with it and the 333.
Any help or info on this thing would be freaking awesome. The grinding wheel on it looks fine,plus it came with a brand new uninstalled wheel.
I would like to use it to flatten various surfaces,though I doubt it is accurate enough to do a block deck.
Intake/exhaust flanges on heads and manifolds would be nice though.
Never even seen one in action,pretty sure it's not as simple as turning it on and just moving the piece over the wheel.
Is it?
I was given a Van Norman 555,Van Norman 333 and some type of boring bar without a motor that I believe was used with the 333.
I could use the 555 in my shop,but am having a hell of a time figuring out HOW.
I haven't wired it in yet because of this,but it was taken from a guys shop that still used it with a 3 phase convertor.
The guy died about 10yrs ago and they hadn't messed with anything. It was disconnected from power and hauled over with tooling and some type of stand I think goes with it and the 333.
Any help or info on this thing would be freaking awesome. The grinding wheel on it looks fine,plus it came with a brand new uninstalled wheel.
I would like to use it to flatten various surfaces,though I doubt it is accurate enough to do a block deck.
Intake/exhaust flanges on heads and manifolds would be nice though.
Never even seen one in action,pretty sure it's not as simple as turning it on and just moving the piece over the wheel.
Is it?
vpd66
Well-known member
I never operated one, but one came up for sale locally and after doing some research I passed on it. I found out that back in the day they were called a "flying rock". You are right,all you do is pass whatever you want surfaced across the the spinning stone. Not the most accurate what but I guess back in the day they were designed for smaller service stations for manifolds and flywheels. There is sort of some tribal knowledge on how to run them and you can get a fairly flat surface, but not accurate enough if you want say .010" off a head.
txvwnut
Well-known member
Not knowing exactly what the 555 looks like but I used to use and old Kwik-Way surfacer and was pretty much a turn it on and and move a dial and lever. Of course that was after you got whatever you were surfacing setup and fixtured, that's actually 90% of the job the other ten is the afore mentioned lever and dial touching. I had done heads intakes and blocks in that KW before it got retired. Dad even setup a differential with a flange so we could surface flywheels with it. How well you do your setup will dictate how well of a job the machine will do.
I'll post pics up of it tomorrow.
Also the other items,any info I can get on them will help.
Pretty sure I have the setup to bore a block maybe,not well enough for my tastes but they said he did alot of stuff in there.
One is some type of rottler boring bar but no motor or anything,I suspect it was used with the 333 somehow as mentioned.
There is also a heavy duty stand/fixture that was used with one of them,maybe to set the block and boring bar looking piece.
Or maybe to fixture a head on the surfacer?
The 555 grinder looks like a metal table with a horizontal wheel in the middle of it.
That's all there is to it,it immediately makes me think of the sitdown pacman games that used to be everywhere back in the day lol.
Also the other items,any info I can get on them will help.
Pretty sure I have the setup to bore a block maybe,not well enough for my tastes but they said he did alot of stuff in there.
One is some type of rottler boring bar but no motor or anything,I suspect it was used with the 333 somehow as mentioned.
There is also a heavy duty stand/fixture that was used with one of them,maybe to set the block and boring bar looking piece.
Or maybe to fixture a head on the surfacer?
The 555 grinder looks like a metal table with a horizontal wheel in the middle of it.
That's all there is to it,it immediately makes me think of the sitdown pacman games that used to be everywhere back in the day lol.
txvwnut
Well-known member
That surfacer is a lot different than the old Kwik Way that I used. It appears you set the wheel to a height just above the table and slide want you need to surface across it manually. That 333 I have no idea how or what it does and the boring bar seems to missing a bunch to make it a workable piece.