Wednesday, July 1, 2009

Update on #385: Saw Loader























So the cool thing about having an Xtracycle with the PizzaLoader hack is that you are rarely stopped from an impulse purchase because of an inability to bring back the spoils of the hunt.

Today I was at the Habitat for Humanity RE-Store, where they sell used and overstocked donated building supplies to raise funds for their homebuilding projects. I have been looking for a motor to motorize a grinder that I bought for wheat; I checked with Habitat and they didn't have any. But as I was checking out, there was a table saw sitting on the incoming donations counter --- it took me a minute to realize that there might be the perfect solution --- not only would there be a motor there, but the whole thing was in a housing, with the electrical controls already set up; all I would have to do is bolt the grinder to the top and figure out some gear ratios to bring the speed down to the appropriate rpm for the grinding wheel (which comes with a groove on the handle for a belt for just this purpose).

So I asked the guy how much he wanted for this, and he looked at it and said "Well, there's no blade or fittings for a blade so -- $30" -- well I would have taken the blade out anyway, so perfect!

As I hauled it out, I realized that I hadn't even considered how to
get it home --- I just assumed it would be doable, and it was easy:
two bungee cords to the pizza loader and I was off, about two miles from home.

Now to hack together some reduction gears for the grinder!

Photos courtesy John Gear.

This Xtracycle was originally featured as #385.

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