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When I first looked at the saw, it was obvious from using a
straight edge that there was a big hump in the table (maybe
~2mm), just to the left of the throat plate opening. I figured
I could either live with this or get the table reground. When
inspecting the table from the bottom side, there were marks to
indicate the arbor pulley had at some point done some serious
rubbing on the underside of the table. At that particular
location, the table casting is quite thin. I think probably the
height stop for the pivoting casting wasn't set properly,
which allowed the arbor to be raised until the pulley actually
hit the table. Maybe when the saw was run this way that spot
on the table got very hot and warped the casting. Who knows
though, maybe it was always that way.
Warped, pre-grinding
I did some looking around the Boston area and found a place to
do blanchard grinding in Chelmsford for a reasonable price. I
borrowed my friend Brian's car and drove the table up there
one day at lunch.
This place was called "Grindco", and was sort of in the
boonies (to someone who doesn't get out of Boston much except
by air). The building was made of cinder block and had a
gravel floor.
Tell me this place doesn't look weird
Inside, there was almost nothing in the building except three
or four blanchard grinders, and two identical twins who ran
the shop. One of them had apparently had a tracheotomy or
throat cancer, which was too bad. This added to the sense of
the bizarre when I was trying to work out with him why I had
wandered into his building with a piece of cast iron.
One of the Grinding Bros
This table of mine was a tiny speck of metal compared to what
they normally grind in there, which were giant pieces of flame
cut steel plate, like 30cm thick and several meters
long. Neither of the guys knew what these steel pieces were
used for. My table set went on one of the small grinders, but
they had one machine with a four meter diameter table.
Blanchard Grinding Platter
Anyway, these guys did a great job for me on what was probably
an annoying distraction from their regular work. Total cost
for the table plus wing, ground side by side, plus a cleanup
pass on the backside of the two: $90.
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