Bandsaw Table Twisted!

[DTB1985]

Hi all,

So I posted a while back with a Kity 613 that I've acquired and am in the process of repairing.

So far I've got all the main bits working including new bearings all round, lots of de-rusting/seizing, a fresh coat of paint (although I wouldn't call it a work of art), made a table insert and repaired the power switch. I even recently turned it on for the first time (with the help of a very long stick) and it worked to my surprise.

The problem is (and I realise I should have checked this earlier) that it seems someone has hung a 2 ton acme weight from one corner and bent the table. With a straight edge on the table it's noticeable lower on the front right.

So having searched this wonderful forum it seem putting a sacrificial board on top with shims or levelling compound to get it flat again could be a way to go but I'd really like to see if I can unbend it first. I appreciate I'm unlikely to get it perfect but hopefully fairly close might be possible.

Essentially I bow to the collective might of the forum and ask if anyone has experienced something similar and thinks it might be possible it correct? My main concern is in trying to bend it back I crack something however I hope with a gentle touch and slow progress I might stand a chance.

Regarding how I might achieve this I was thinking either a pry bar or take the table off, wedge it under something just before the point where the bend it and them use a trolly jack to very gently bend it. Again opinions welcome.

Thanks to anyone who get this far.

 

[Ttrees]

Have you tried adjusting the bolts for mounting the table ?
There was another twisted bandsaw table thread here very recently if you look .
On my saw there is 4 bolts for mounting the table ...adjustment for the drift angle ...but there is also
4 nuts for lifting the the table out of warp ...I only went at these since, and managed to flatten my table

 

[monkeybiter]

Does the table have an alignment bolt or similar that spans the slot you use to fit a blade?

 

[sunnybob]

Whatever you do dont use a pry bar. All the force is on the tip that the bar will touch. cast iron will break.

 

[Beau]

Think the Kity 613 has a cast aluminum table, mine did. Would of thought it would be very easy to end up breaking it in trying to straighten it. On the other hand if it has bent and not broken maybe it would go back. Sorry not much help

 

[Rorschach]

Sounds like a recipe for a broken table. I think I would try shimming/building up the surface first if it were me.

 

[stuartpaul]

Would it be possible to get it skimmed? Obviously depends how much you want removed and how much would be left but there must be an engineering place near you that could advise?

I would have thought any form of prying/jacking (whether iron or aluminium) would lead to fracture and breakage.

 

[Jasper42]

Why not level it off with car body filler then fit a wooden top over it?

Austin

 

[mbartlett99]

You don't mention how much its out - which is kinda important. Cast ally will bend back a little - using the bolts underneath - but be slow about it, little by little. Ally is of course soft as hell - you can even use a sander to take off high spots. If you can't get the bend out talk to your local machine shop about skimming it.

 

[DTB1985]

Hi all and thanks for the many replies. Sorry its take a while to get back.

So regarding table adjustment the table is mounted to the trunion by two pressed metal brackets:

I do wonder if one of these is warped as when I got the bandsaw they were both seized to the main block and if someone had pushed down on the table edge to try and rotate the table and pushed hard enough they may have distorted.

Other than these bolts there is no adjustment in the table and as there so close the the centre of the table and its some fairly light weight pressed steel vs a thick cast block I'm not sure I would be able to use them to pull the table back into alignment however I'll defiantly try.

Heres a few more pics to show the extent of the problem:

I'm also going to remove the table from any mounting and see how flat it lays when on its own. I'll post pics of that when I get round to it.

At the edge of the table its out by between 2-3mm which is a lot :shock: and you can tell how twisted this section is because back at the middle the section right of the slot is actually slightly higher than the table. As such I defiantly couldn't sand this out of it and its why I feel the table itself must have had some massive stress applied to get it to where it is.

Any cunning suggestion welcome and again thanks for all the input

 

[DTB1985]

Jasper42: Thats definitely is an option, I'd just rather see if I can get the original tabled sorted first and keep that as a backup option.

 

[Beau]

Can you flex it flat by hand? I realise it would spring back but it might be possible to have some bracing on the underside that you screw on when the blade is in place that holds it flat while in use. Hope that makes sense

 

[DTB1985]

The bed will flex by hand at least a bit so in theory thats possible. I did have a think about that but its need to be sturdy. Thinking something like a bit of square section metal but not sure how I'd fix it yet. It'd need to be fixed in 4 places (2 either side of the slot).

 

[Beau]

The bed will flex by hand at least a bit so in theory thats possible. I did have a think about that but its need to be sturdy. Thinking something like a bit of square section metal but not sure how I'd fix it yet. It'd need to be fixed in 4 places (2 either side of the slot).

Have an idea based on a mod I have done to my bandsaw. Will take some pics and get back to you.

 

[Beau]

OK so I needed to fit a fence to big old Wadkin. To do this I bonded some ply to the underside of the table with epoxy resin. Then planed the ply level. The tricky bit for you is the table would need to be sitting level when planing the ply level but sure with some ingenuity this could be done. The ply has some T nuts fitted in to the top before it was bonded in place so I could then attach my fence. If you did the ply blocks the same way and used some hefty angle steel instead of the fence you might get it to sit level. If the table is bend front to back as well which it probably is you could do something similar only permanently attached as no need to remove some of the bend leaving less for the removable one to do.

 

[DTB1985]

Thanks for the reply and taking the time to take pics for me, very kind of you. Also nice mod, always love seeing how people manage to make stuff keep going and it being a nice big Wadkin who wouldn't.

That looks like something I can work with, I'll start formulating a plan and see where it takes me. Obviously more suggestions welcome but whichever way I go I will be sure to post my results.

Again thanks to the community.

 

[Beau]

Thanks for the reply and taking the time to take pics for me, very kind of you. Also nice mod, always love seeing how people manage to make stuff keep going and it being a nice big Wadkin who wouldn't.

That looks like something I can work with, I'll start formulating a plan and see where it takes me.

Your welcome and hope it works out for you as IME the Kity 613 is a very good little bandsaw.

 

[pollys13]

I had an Axminster engineer come over to me on Friday. I gave up trying to adjust the sliding carriage on the tablesaw. So they very nicely sent the guy over to help out. Using a precision straightedge I noticed the sliding table had a very small dip in it. I didn't think this would be crucial in use, engineer agreed.

Fast forward a few sentences into the conservation. He was saying that they have had in the past, had a table out of shape. Might seem a bit brutal but used a big dead blow hammer and gave it a good few wallops to bash it back into shape....... I think metal working engineers see things a bit differently to fine furniture making artist craftsmen I think he said the same sort of idea when you can push a dent out of a car and just pops back into shape. That said yours might be quite an extreme if you are a customer of Axminster perhaps contact and ask?