There's so much history in these humble, elegant cane mills. I can see why folks want them. Getting them back into like-new condition is a pleasure to watch.
Methodical, professional, thoroughly impressive job, Keith. You're bringing an important chapter of southern history back to life in the Carolina community this Mill once served. Thank you for your dedication to restoring these vintage machines.
Interesting piece of historical machinery. I grew up in the 50's and 60's just 35 miles south of Chattanooga, TN in a small Georgia village and never knew about Chattanooga Plow Company. I remember seeing the mules turning the sorghum mills on small family farms each fall but didn't know these mill were made so close to home. I always learn something watching your channel.
That was fun! I went to look for current (new) cane mill offerings, and of course the design has changed a lot. It looks like they're generally turned horizontal these days. The simpler ones look like a big pasta maker, and then some bigger, more complex versions. None of them come with a mule, however. :-)
You have repaired quite a few Sugar Cane Mills . Cleaning, Brazing when necessary, new hardware and pour new Babbitt. The Babbitt appears to be challenging. Preventing the molten Babbitt from leaking when pouring it. As always anything you repair, ends up working good as new or better than new.
Some of the most original content you'll find on youtube when it comes to old machinery and teardown/repairs... At least that I have seen! Everyone's got a lathe and can make chips. But can you pour babbitt and roll sugar cane? You really should have more subscribers.
Another great video, Keith! It's always fascinating to see the inner workings of these old machines, and your explanations and demonstrations make it easy to follow along. Your attention to detail during the teardown process is impressive, and I'm excited to see the progress you'll make in the restoration. Thanks for sharing your expertise with us!
Just watched Eric's (H.T.R) content on the vertical steam engine. I'm an avid fan and now I've came across your shop and I'm glad to be able to expand my horizons with another machining/mechanics walk through subscription! Thank you for the knowledge and God Bless
Woohoo! Rusty iron getting taken apart and restored! Sadly, up here in Canada, rusty usually means a solid block of rust in the vague shape of the item. I'm rather jealous of the "ease" that "rusty" things come apart down in the southern states. Thanks for sharing 🇨🇦
Sorghum is still grown today, in Illinois at least, for use in making syrup--not so much as silage any more. So are sugar beets. I've noticed beet sugar is more common in grocery stores now. The house I grew up in started life as a sugar beet cookery in the 1820s...
Keith, I see you using CRC Knock'er Loose. Have you ever tried a product called Free. I had a hinge on my Jeep Wrangler tailgate and I tried oil, Marvel Mystery Oil, a couple different rust penetrants (generic, Sea Foam Deep Creep, others) and then purchased a product called Free. It was a few months since any applications so it was not the other stuff doing the job as the vehicle is parked outdoors all the time. Free broke free the hings in a few minutes, tailgate worked easy and no noise. It was so bad that I thought one day the hinge was going to break off. It was not cheap but nothing good ever is. If you try it, be cool to see what success you get in a video.
Keith, love your videos, have learned alot from you. Sorry, kinda off topic, but could you give a shout to Andy Rawls, he could really use your expertise
Keith, thanks for these videos. I have one just like it. I’m missing the shrouds and plates that cover the top and bottom bushing cups for the two small rollers. I noticed you may have similar issues with the same items. Could I get them when you get yours cast?
It may be another Cain mill. But it has many new challenges. The bent shaft is interesting and converting the bearings. Making new castings. Looking forward to the end results.
This hurts my soul... the cane mill is great, don't get me wrong... but Keith switching between "Big Iron" (Lucas HBM), and this "Little Iron" Cane Mill... messes with my "anticipation of chips" complex...
Will you give your mill to the Agricultural Museum? So they can have another demonstration? You seem to be the national expert on southern cane mills! TM long time watcher
I know its probably the wrong way to do it, but what would happen if you just put this entire thing into your tank of Evaporust and let it sit for a few days? Would they be much easier to take apart and ready to repair quicker?
The problem is, the acid (citric acid is the magic stuff in the evaporust, which is just a fancy way of selling regular citric acid at a premium price), so the acid would be used up quickly in semi-closed spaces with this amount of rust, and couldn't be "replaced" where it'd be needed - so not much action, just sitting there, I guess. To remove this much of rust I'd rather use phosphoric acid (another, much more effective and tad more aggressive rust remover), put this whole thingy into some plastic tray, add poured the acid all over it, but then again it'll be an overkill of sort or "solution in a search of a problem". The way Keith did it was the most optimal way IMO.
I have a question. I know you have a tub with about 40 gallons of Evapo- rust. Why didn't you dunk the assembly -sans rollers for about 3 days and those bearings would have fallen out
Really cool to see. As many of these as are being sent to you, it seems there is a business opportunity for some enterprising young person. What is the status of the stoker engine? Will we see that moving forward soon?
Would it be easier for the large roller to cut the shaft ends off and bore out for a new shaft? Straightening and welding up the pits and turning back down seems a lot more trouble...
Keith, how are the rollers attached to the shafts? If they're just shrunk on, it seems to me that it would be quicker and easier to just replace them, rather than all the work of building up and turning.
Do you mean on the back burner as the Diresta saw is? I am originally from Northern Ohio, I remember some friends of my family grew sorghum in a small plot (probably about 5 acres). I don't remember seeing this type of machine in use.
OK, when I saw this project I thought that early on you would take that over to your Evaporust vat and just soak the whole thing over night after maybe getting a little rust off of it. Would soaking it in Evaporust before disassembly necessarily be a bad idea?
Im wondering if the restoration is more functional than original would getting those bearing caps water jetted out of steel be a hardier upgrade... Looks like the cast ones were a bit brittle in this application???
I'm not Keith but I'll drop my twopence here anyway, since I know the answer and this is my way of helping authors (Keith in this case here) to deal with the overwhelming number of comments. Short answer - well, that depends WHICH specific babbit alloy you gonna use (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Babbitt_(alloy)#Babbitt_alloys) but generally speaking "not really". Long answer: the babbit alloy that should be used for this application (high load, slow speed = high tin content) won't contain much lead but it'll contain some. But then again the squeezed juice should never come in contact with the bearings - the lower tray is designed in such way that the juice should just flow out and never get into bearing wells. Or, to put it this way - the grease in bearings of the motor in your food processor probably isn't food-safe either, but then if the food actually gets "in contact" with them (= into the motor) then "food safe or no safe" will probably be the least concern of yours in this scenario. Other companies used babbit in their designs of cane mills, and we have no records of any "lead mass poisoning" back then, so I assume it's "safe enough". And at any rate a tiny speck of babbit once or twice in your lifetime will do you less harm than drinking fructose-syrup loaded Coke every day... ;-) Anyway, back to the mill - parts of the "guards" or "dykes" on the bottom tray - ones that are supposed to keep the juice out of bearing wells are actually rusted away, but they can be easily rebuilt with a bit of brass and a touch of oxyacetylene torch.
One thing about chain falls, they can be very slow, which is an advantage many times. Electric wenches more generally have on and off while some may be variable speed. We had one that had fast and slow, but sometimes slow wasn't slow enough.
@@grntitan1, You know, I’ve heard that before but I didn’t know if it was true. Now that I’ve read it on the internet, I know it’s true! Lol Have a good Monday!
I love old machines, Folks I am gonna tell ya the fact of what we all are gonna have to do is To Tell of this so called Bird Flu only is hurtful to Birds of Water, So it's time to get Chicken's like we all used to have I am not going to pay that much for eggs, and I am putting in a garden this year like we all did in are Youth!!
My reaction to babbitt is you're doing what's easy rather than what's right. Not what I've come to expect from you. The bronze inserts are what make this mill unique. Remaking the authentic bronze bushings shouldn't be difficult. Buy bronze sheet the same thickness as the thick part of the bearing. Bend "U" around a rod the same diameter as the shaft. Then mount the shaft in a rotary table on the mill, offset the axis the appropriate amount & mill the crescent shape. Or use a 4 jaw in a lathe & do same. Last resort braze the ID of the bearing caps & turn the bearing surface to ID. It would be fairly easy to make a mandrel for the lathe - similar to a crankshaft. Then make the blank 1" longer than needed & use excess on the ends to secure it with either clamps a la carbide inserts or just a couple hose clamps. MOFWIW
_"doing what's easy rather than what's right"_ - well, a valid point (to a point...), but then one has to draw a line somewhere, hasn't he? Shall we "restore" old rusty bolts, or just throw them away and replace with new ones? Shall we painstakingly repair some broken part (a bearing cover or such) or just cast new one? Or - heaven forbids! - just made one from a piece of sheet metal? Also, there's this person called "customer" who's paying for the restoration and who (I assume) just wants to have a functioning mill for reasonable amount of money, a mill that will be used occasionally only - if ever. Babbit bearings would be perfectly suitable for this purpose, the original bushings were made of brass because back then those mills were "run of the mill" (pun not intended) heavily used common homestead utensils, often pushed hard to their limits while in use - and bronze bearings are harder and would last longer under those circumstances. And then when they got worn out, any "both-lefty" Joe out there could visit a local hardware store, buy a new pair of mass produced bushings for couple of cents, and install them himself using just a hammer and a screwdriver (plus a hefty dose of cursing). Pouring babbit is totally different kettle of fish, requiring skill and quite cumbersome, thus "Joe-replaceable" ready made bronze bushings made a lot of sense BACK THEN. But nowadays you can't get them any more, and Keith is a seasoned all around machinist, so for him pouring new babbit bearings would be a piece of cake. And at any rate, as I mentioned earlier, the mill probably will be hardly ever used, and even if it'll be the new "non-original" babbit bearings would work just fine, and then... And then, last but not least... Well, lemme put it that way: no one of us is getting any younger, and at a certain stage of our lives we are "not getting any younger" much more than we used to, and if you're not getting my drift just take a look at Keith's videos from just two years ago, and "spot the difference". Tasks that used to be "easy things to do" few years back somehow are just not the same few years latter. Wonder why...? Dunno about you, but I noticed "a slightly different working style and movements", but I won't elaborate on it. "Word to the wise", as they say. And then there's this quote from "The Master and Margarita" - "Yes, man is mortal, but that would be only half the problem. The worst of it is that he's sometimes unexpectedly mortal-and that's the crux!" - and being the customer (and the owner of this mill) I'd seriously ponder over the meaning of this sentence... but I digress here.
Keith why are you losing so much weight so fast? I lost 70lbs after I quit drinking, but I think I lost way too much and I'm scared. You got something going on? I'm concerned for you.
Honestly I was thinking the same thing. But then again I think word has gotten around down south that he's the guy to restore these things. And I'm sure he's making good money doing it. So you can't really blame Keith.
