Wood bearings

[hedgerow]

Mister Ed If you were a little closer I have a good supply of Osage Orange out in the pasture. It does a good job of keeping me warm in the winter and heating my domestic water in the summer. I burn about fifteen cord a year in my boiler. I am sure it would make some nice wooden bearings.

[windybob]

Lol ya know, when that stuff is seasoned, it's almost impossible to drive a nail in it. It also burns so hot it burns blue. Pops and sparks a lot. I used to burn it in the winter also. Fun stuff!

[Windcatcher530 Dan]

Mister Ed while you're deep frying those bearings in peanut oil throw in some chicken for dinner.maybe some fries too

[Todd]

Glue the two halves together with brown grocery sack and Elmers glue. I also use a clamp if possible and a spade bit. Drill the hole and then separate the two halves and sand the paper off. Maple bearings will not absorb any oil in the short term.I boiled some maple in oil for a week and got about a 1/32 inch of penetration. End grain dose not matter. Drilling the oil hole is what matters. All of the wood bearings I have duplicated has been with the grain. The maple acts almost like babbet because the shaft is going to turn on a thin film of oil. Just like babbet bearings the maple will wear the shaft more than the bearing if not supplied with surface oil. Also the end grain bearings will collect metal particles in the cells of the wood and wear the shaft.

What Paul said is correct. It is difficult to get them to absorb oil in any substantial amount by boiling, unless you have a lot of patience. It is true that hard maple bearings will last as long as babbitt if properly oiled. We had a Star 15 at the museum that was put up in 1995 that I rebuilt in 2009 that had maple bearings, guessing they were made before I came along but they were fine and I reassembled them and they are still running today. In my experience, in Indiana humidity and weather, the wheel rots before the bearings get bad.

[rocar-ks]

I have made them out of hard maple for mills as well as other vintage restorations. Interesting thing is when you insert the bearings in hot oil you have to weight them down as they want to float. At first. As millions of micro bubbles flow from the grain almost causing a froth in the hot oil and as the bubbles subside you no longer have to weigh the parts down. They sink. So.... did I replace air with oil? Or just drive out moisture? Don’t know but they are very serviceable for our low speed use. Also use caution heating the oil
Rod k

[Merlinn]

Has anyone used ironwood? I used it for blade guides on my sawmill.One on each side of the blade, close to the teeth. It was swinging a 52 inch insert tooth blade. The blocks were about 2” square and just cleared the blade. Rarely had to adjust them and they were hard as rocks.

[windybob]

Where do you buy that wood at?

[Mister Ed]

Has anyone used ironwood?

Where do you buy that wood at?

Ironwood is generally the hardest wood in any given location, its not really a specific species. I think around here, Hornbeam is typically what people call Ironwood (also called Blue Beech around here).

As millions of micro bubbles flow from the grain almost causing a froth in the hot oil and as the bubbles subside you no longer have to weigh the parts down. They sink. So.... did I replace air with oil? Or just drive out moisture?

I'm suspecting as the water vapor heated up and turned to steam, that was mostly what was escaping (maybe a little air as well). I used to trap quite heavily. Each year I would "boil" my traps in wax. When you put the traps in the hot wax, the wax would roil due to the moisture that the steel was giving off when heating. When the bubbles subsided ... the traps were done.

[Windcatcher530 Dan]

Here's a question if you use to hard of a wood will the oil penetrate it?

[Mister Ed]

Here's a question if you use to hard of a wood will the oil penetrate it?

It could certainly be a catch 22 couldn't it.