Office of Steam Forum for Model & Toy Steam Gas & Hot Air Engines

I went back and watched your videos on those transmissions.  Wow, that was a lot of plunge cutting on the lathe to make all those steps in the pulleys!  Awesome build!

Over the long holiday weekend I watched some of the Jensen shop tour videos on YouTube and noticed in the background an old South Bend lathe and it looked like the machinist was in the process of making some belt pulleys.  It looked familiar to me because that's what I was doing just the day before on my (not quite as) old South Bend lathe!  The amount of run time on their lathes to make all those parts for so many years must be mind boggling.

Hi Doug , I toured the Jensen factory & they allowed me total access to film anything I desired, I took the approach that this might be my only chance I would have & filmed it with the though in mind to show everything that an enthusiast would want to see. I didn't see anything at Jensen Mfg. that looked like it had been purchased in the last 50 years (except metal stock) it is definitely a step back in time to go there.
Re:making pulleys, it is a lot of plunge cutting & time consuming & none of my pulleys are exactly the same as they are all custom made. I think about all the time it takes to make a Jensen #25 for example...I marvel at how they can sell them for the price they do.
I watched several of your videos on your site & found them very interesting , good work there.