My grandfather recently passed away and he had both the SuperShop and ShopSmith. Unfortunately, I do not have the space to keep both and was wondering if anyone knew if there is a market for selling either. I would hate for either pieces of equipment to be scrapped but I am afraid there isn't much knowledge anymore about the capability of these tools.

 

My grandfather recently passed away and he had both the SuperShop and ShopSmith. Unfortunately, I do not have the space to keep both and was wondering if anyone knew if there is a market for selling either. I would hate for either pieces of equipment to be scrapped but I am afraid there isn t much knowledge anymore about the capability of these tools.

- jmosborne24

There are a lot more Shopsmith owners than Supershop, but you likely could sell either, with price depending on condition and accessories (and of course location). You could try listing both and selling whichever one gets a buyer. You can list on craigslist or facebook/marketplace for free. You could also list on Ebay with local pick-up.

On the other hand, perhaps someone here may be interested. Why not tell us where you're located and what accessories are with the Supershop. Photos always help.

 

Yes, there is a limited market for both machines, like Ted said, depending upon location. Urban and suburban areas are generally productive.

I finally broke down and put a reversing switch in my Fox machine and I'm glad I did. Now I'm using it to spin a 3/8 steel rod to make thread for hand screw clamps, which take LH threads on one end and RH threads on the other. At the lowest speed settings, it has enough power to spin the rod on a continuous hand held die stock feed. 7 1/2" of RH thread and 9" of LH thread opposing. The extra is for the handle. These will have 12" capacity and the jaws are made from some very interesting red oak. I found rafter cutoffs that had been tossed into a steel barrel and had been soaking in the accumulated rain water so long that they were black all the way through from the chemical reaction of tannic acid from the oak and steel from the barrel! Gonna be really pretty when oiled. London pattern handles--wish I had more darkened oak to match the jaws

DanK

 

I'm seeking advice: My aging brother has given me the task to find a new home for his Fox Super Shop. He bought it new in the 80's and parked in the corner of the garage about 12-15 years ago. It worked great for him. About 5 years ago he went out to check on it, turned it on and the motor quickly clicked off. He had someone look at it who agreed that the wiring had "failed" and shorted out. The insulation is brittle to the touch.
I'm not wanting to fix it so I'm wondering if I should just sell off the attachments. Or do you think there might be someone wanting to buy it to fix it and use it. I'm up in the Twin Cities area. Thanks!

 

You could try listing the entire machine and accessories on Craigslist and Facebook/Marketplace to see if there's any interest, explaining that motor and perhaps the controller are fried. I'm sure an enterprising person could mount a DC motor and controller to get it working, but exact replacement parts are not available. Smithy built Supershops in Asia for a few years after Fox stopped building them, but not many of the parts are interchangeable. Perhaps a Smithy motor would fit, but I have no idea about that. If you have accessories like the bandsaw, jointer, belt sander, they will fit both the Fox and Smithy supershops.

 

Ted724 thank you. I'll try a local woodworking facebook group to see if anyone is interested. Then CL.

 

Ted, I saw a reply of yours stating that the Super Shop is 400 lbs heavier than the Shopsmith. Do you know aboutr how heavy the Super Shop is? I may have to scrap it eventually. And, no, my brother didn't have the bandsaw, belt sander, or jointer, but he loved the disc sander! His is a Model SS20 Serial # 1551. Thank You!

 

The Supershop is not 400 pounds heavier than the Shopsmith. Rather, it's perhaps about 250 pounds heavier. Smithy listed the weight of the Supershop at 480 pounds, but I don't know if that was the shipping/gross weight of the machine or after it was set up. I believe the Shopsmith is about 220 pounds.

Why not tell us where you are located, TMarv. Perhaps someone on the list would be interested in what you have.

 

I'm in the Twin Cities, (MN) if anyone up here is interested Thanks for the info on weight.
I just posted it for $350 on several sites around the area. Otherwise I'll try to sell attachments and scrap the rest. Thanks again!

 

Re: weight, Ted is probably right about the Smithy Supershop weight. I've never owned one. Fox Supershop was considered roughly 600 lbs shipping weight. I had to be aware of that as a Fox dealer, even though I never shipped one. Always delivered in person. That would include the crating and the extra weight of the castings and the lateral feed motor and such. The Fox castings were generally heavier until they eventually could afford to pressure cast which saved a lot of machining and made the product a bit lighter and better looking. I've never compared the weight of the sanding disc for example. Fox cast theirs in clunky aluminum and fitted it to a 4" steel face plate for arbor. Later versions of the Supershop were just a thin steel plate. Details like that add up.

Anyway, good luck with the sale. I'd be glad to help more if I were closer. Don't know how to be helpful from southern Indiana! It would break my heart to see even a Smithy scrapped. Part it out, maybe?

DanK

 

A Shopsmith weighs around 130 lbs for a basic unit. Quite a bit different than 480. I am in east TN and would take it but have noit figured how to get it. I do have a friend near the Twins. He had picked one up previously from Rockford IL. But because he now knows how heavy, he might not want to repeat the experience! I looked on CList for Fox and Supershop and Super Shop and no listings. Did you list on CList?
I repair Shopsmith and other select tools for over 20 years now and used Shopsmith tools for over 45. I replaced some with Supershops- 3 Fox and 1 Smithy. I might need to do a road trip to come get it is also a possibility. To move them I have put into vertical to relieve the tension on lift spring, then unbolt the 4 bolts on each end holding then to base. Then they can be moved. The base is easy. The rest a bit more difficult. I would like to see some pictures of it please. Feel free to email directly to danimal713@aol.com. thnx, Dan

 

A Shopsmith weighs around 130 lbs for a basic unit. Quite a bit different than 480. I am in east TN and would take it but have noit figured how to get it. I do have a friend near the Twins. He had picked one up previously from Rockford IL. But because he now knows how heavy, he might not want to repeat the experience! I looked on CList for Fox and Supershop and Super Shop and no listings. Did you list on CList?
I repair Shopsmith and other select tools for over 20 years now and used Shopsmith tools for over 45. I replaced some with Supershops- 3 Fox and 1 Smithy. I might need to do a road trip to come get it is also a possibility. To move them I have put into vertical to relieve the tension on lift spring, then unbolt the 4 bolts on each end holding then to base. Then they can be moved. The base is easy. The rest a bit more difficult. I would like to see some pictures of it please. Feel free to email directly to danimal713@aol.com. thnx, Dan

- Dan, I posted on several local Facebook groups including one called Minnesota Woodworking(or Woodworkers) I don't do anything on CL. And I've forgotten how Photobuckeet works, LOL. So I'll email you some photos. Thanks.

 

I have never disassembled a Fox Supershop to travel with it. I had a 1 ton Dodge van (think high floor) and later just a Chrysler van. I rolled the unit crosswise to the vehicle and not too close. By moving the carriage and headstock to one end, I was able to lift the light end and "twist" it into the floor of the van. Then I moved the carriage and headstock to the "high" end in the van and then I could lift the end still on the ground to almost level and it rolled easily in all the way. Retract casters and tie down. As a dealer this was my method of delivery. This method gets awkward with more than one person, but it can be done. YMMV.

DanK

 

I picked up a Supershop a few weeks ago and LOVE it!
But yesterday the main carriage stopped traversing, the hand crank just spins.
Anyone know how to open it up and fix it?
I took the hand crank bolt cover off and it is all tight and turns with the crank.
I think the intermediary gear must have somehow dropped out.

Also: Anyone got any of the optional accessories for sale?

 

UKMerlin, there is a pan on the bottom of the carriage that you'll need to remove to access the mechanism and that should give you a better idea of source of your problem. It may be as simple as a roll pin has dropped out that holds a gear in place. There are six screws around the lower edge of the carriage that you'll need to remove in order to drop the plan.

What accessories are you looking for?

 

Ted724 Many thanks, will give that a try.
For accessories I think I would like to get any of the original options, I think they might include the band saw, a metal turning chuck, the metal turning tool platform. I don't remember off the top of my head what else there was. Not sure if the auto travel was an installable option or a base model option.

 

So it turns out that the casting housing the gears has cracked.

 

If you don't have a manual for the Smithy Supershop, you can find one here-http://cncmanual.com/?s=supershop There is a separate parts listing that is available at this site as well. Smithy still has a few parts for the Supershop, so it may be worth a call to them.

Accessory tools seem hard to come by, but if you look through some of the back postings on this thread, you'll see where you can adapt some Shopsmith gear to work on the Supershop. I believe the accessory tools sold by Smithy were originally designed to fit the Shopsmith clones that were made in Asia. For the Smithy, they simply used an adaptor plate and tubes to mate with the Supershop. I've cobbled together a wooden platform that allow me to mount most Shopsmith tools (but not the jointer) to the Supershop. I posted photos of the platform in this thread.

That's a bummer with the cracked housing. Perhaps you can fix with something like JB Weld.

 

After seeing the photo, I doubt if JB Weld alone would be sufficient to fix the problem. Perhaps some sort of "L" shaped bracket, held in place by screws, along with some JB Weld would fix it.

 

Ted724 I found a local welder that will come next week, I will get them to weld the crack and then put a gusset across that corner. I contacted Smithy, they do not have the specific part, but did tell me it is actually aluminium which is important to know for the welder.

 

Many/most Shopsmith accessory tools should be able to mount to the SuperShops using an adapter plate that bottom tubes fit the SuperShop and top tubes fit the Shopsmith tool both mounted to a plate in between. There are also drive hubs for sale on FeeBay. I helped Stius76 develope them for Fox and Smithy. Here is a current listing
https://www.ebay.com/itm/254582456860?hash=item3b464c021c:g:ZPAAAOSwXbheqIyg
copy/paste into a browser.
Someone told me a rumor that Smithy might have scrapped all the Smithy spare parts which is a shame but probably not enough demand.

 

Someone told me a rumor that Smithy might have scrapped all the Smithy spare parts which is a shame but probably not enough demand.

- DantheToolman

I can confirm that. I spoke with a Smithy engineer a few weeks ago while looking for a few parts for an older Midas machine. I asked about Super Shop parts and he did confirm that they had purged their inventory. In the purge they even mistakenly scrapped a part for the Midas machines and were having to re-stock that. (That's how the topic came up…I had ordered that part online and it successfully went through checkout, then they called me to tell me that it was not in stock.)

 

They still have one optional tool for it, the Jointer but although they have 20 that they have never sold, they still want $400 for them and they are very heavy and would need pallet shipping.

 

I finally yielded to the temptation to put a reversing switch on one of my Fox machines. I'm glad I did because then I could use it to spin 3/8" rod threading for a batch of large hand screws. Both left and right hand threads are needed on the rod and it was VERY time efficient to spin the rod held firmly in a 1/2" three jaw chuck. It can't reasonably be done in one single pass because too much force is involved to hold the hand stock die holder. But by opening the split dies for first cut, closing a bit for second cut, and finishing to spec with third cut, it worked out well. 9 1/2" LH on one end and 7" RH on the other yields a big 12" capacity for the hand screws. It took about 75 seconds for each of the six passes required to finish the rod. I cut the RH first so I could spin a coupler and lock nut on the RH end to put in the chuck for spinning the LH threads without damaging the threads in the chuck.

DanK

 

I m seeking advice: My aging brother has given me the task to find a new home for his Fox Super Shop. He bought it new in the 80 s and parked in the corner of the garage about 12-15 years ago. It worked great for him. About 5 years ago he went out to check on it, turned it on and the motor quickly clicked off. He had someone look at it who agreed that the wiring had "failed" and shorted out. The insulation is brittle to the touch.
I m not wanting to fix it so I m wondering if I should just sell off the attachments. Or do you think there might be someone wanting to buy it to fix it and use it. I m up in the Twin Cities area. Thanks!

TMarv- I was not able to see any listing for this. Has it sold or still available? If still available, can you please send some pictures? Easiest is text to my cell 630-723-9267. Also include the attachments/accessory tools. Smithy sold a belt sander, jointer, and bandsaw if any of those are part of this. thnx!
- TMarv