Photo Index - Oliver Machinery Co. - #115-RD (before)

Machinery Photo Index

Manufactured/Badged by:
Oliver Machinery Co.
Grand Rapids, MI

Machine Specifications
Machine Class:	Wood Working Machinery
Machine Type:	Band Saw
Machine Size:	38" Wheels, 10 HP DD
Submitted By:	Chuck Hess

Machine Specifications
Description/Model:	#115-RD (before)
Date of Manufacturer:	1955
Serial Number:	84336 (View SN Registry Entry)
Last Updated	4/19/2009 9:18:52 PM

Comments:

Oliver 115-RD 38” Combined Band Resaw and Scroll Saw (before). Serial # 84336, 1955. 4-19-08.

Hey,
Well here’s our new example of the rarest Oliver bandsaw. This is the only one I’ve seen in person and it has the cool meter pegged! It is a 10 HP direct drive, 38” bandsaw with a 2 speed 2 HP swing away feeder. It turns a 20’ long band at 570 RPM, giving it a blade surface feet per minute of 5668. “Da Hulk” as it has been dubbed, will take a 2 ½” wide band and do 21” under the guide. The feeder will do 8” x 17 ¾” tall and the feed rates are 10 or 20 fpm. All the bearings are running in oil baths. This one has the cool target on the upper door, the lower door is 2 pc cast iron and is one of the biggest differences I see between this and the 36” #116, except of course the feeder assembly and overall size. It came with an original Oliver manual, must be the only one in capitivity.
The previous owner of 20 years looked on the internet, and found me, saying he was downsizing his operation and wanted to sell his saw. He was the second owner of the saw and it has never been in a high production situation. We quickly made a deal, became the third owners, and the strap monkeys and our friend Matt and I headed out on the 1500 mile round trip to fetch her. We left Thursday morning and returned Friday evening, having a very smooth trip and beautiful weather for transporting large band saws. There was not a forklift on site for loading but they had it in front of an overhead door (which they had to remove the door and cut a notch in the header for the saw to go through) and with our drop deck trailer, the load out went pretty quickly. In the words of one of my mentors; a nice trailer is a beautiful thing. Matt later told me that when I was backing the trailer up, the guy that was there with the owner and said "that's the guy from the internet, that's the guy from OWWM!" refering to me. My 15 seconds of fame, but they were very nice to us and gave us a full shop tour. the previous owner is a wood lover and we had much to talk about and he sent us away with a few gifts from the woodpile. The feeder on this saw definitely changes the balance and it tends to want to tip forward, there is a lot of cast iron in that mechanism. At one point we passed a guy hauling a Northfield unipoint radial arm and I hope he didn’t hurt himself trying to get a better look at this saw as we passed by.
So once back at the shop, we unloaded the saw on Saturday AM. We took our time and were very careful when handling the saw, the brochure says 4500 pounds, but like I said before the balance is a little weird on these. Anyway we bolted the saw to 4 x 4s to add some stability, and got her unloaded without incident.
The saw is in stellar condition except for the paint which is peeling off, but there is almost no rust on anything. We are going to fire it up for some test cuts and then do a teardown and paint job (as soon as we finish a job and the sander we are working on now). There is a little debate as to whether to paint it graphite gray or Oliver teal, the boys vote for graphite but I'm leaning towards teal; operators are standing by so give us your opinion! This will be installed as our main resaw replacing the Y36 snowflake that that has been holding that position. We are starting to do a lot of resawing for the area instrument makers and chair makers and this saw should take us up a level. I really like the idea of having both sides of the feeder powered and supporting the full height of the cut.
Life is short, Enjoy your projects!
See ya!

Photo 1:

Comments: Nice leg!
Source: Mines

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Photo 2:

Comments: back shot
Source: mines

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Photo 3:

Comments: Lower doors open
Source: Mines

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Photo 4:

Comments: da Badge
Source: Mines

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Photo 5:

Comments: Compared to the #116
Source: Mines

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Photo 6:

Comments: Back compared to the #116
Source: Mines

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