thresher belts

hi

i have a 2inch ransome threshing machine and i want to make some flat drive belts for it what do i use

tom hardy

Flat belts are available for all sorts of items - old cassette platers, microwaves, etc. Toothed belts like-wise - nothing stopping one from removing the teeth.

If you want to make your own, are these to be welded, glued or jointed (like the originals)?

When I ran a Southbend lathe leather belts and the joiners where still available from agricultural merchants and the industrial power transmission suppliers. Try "Fenners" which I believe is now branded as "Erik's"

I once contacted these people who sold me a flat belt to use on my Austin 7 fan drive.

https://www.chiorino.com/en/worldwide.php?stato_link=United%20Kingdom&sel=Europe

Phil

I came across somebody making them from book-binding tape a while ago - seems to give a reasonable scale appearance (even better in a tan colour IMHO):

How about this from simple search for canvass belting, which is what they made them from back in the day.

The original threshing machine probably used a leather belt. Why not keep it original ? The ends of the belts did not use metal joiners but were laced togeter. They are quieter, no clack noise when the join runs over the pulley.

I have an old Southbend lathe with a flat belt drive. The belts are made from new material but are laced together. They get a lot of use and the lacing does wear thru but last for 3-6 months before replacing which only takes a few minutes.

The ends of flat belts were also glued to together.

Paul

Edited By Paul Lousick on 21/02/2021 11:24:03

Paul,

These belts were approx 40ft long

40ft sounds about right. A steam traction engine would be about 20ft away from the threshing m/c and the belt would be made from a number of lengths of leather, each laced together.

An old leather belt thinned down with a simple jig and cut to the correct width. I have used old leather shoe laces thinned down for some decorative bits on bowls by doing this. I can't show the jig as it went in the bin and I need to replace it when I get around to it.

Not a seamstress (or person) but Bias Binding?

Howard

Not sure if it's a date thing, or a location thing, but all the belts hung up in the back of the barn on my grandfather's farm in West Wales were canvas. (There were about half a dozen: about 8" wide and rolled up into a coil about 3' across.) These would have last seen use in the 1940s or 1950s - my mum was born in the 1940s and remembers the threshing machine coming to the farm.

In the 1970s he still used flat belts to drive a feed mill and a terrifying circular saw from the tractor. These belts were also canvas with metal 'claw' joiners. The belts were dressed on the inside face with what looked like an oversized lipstick - the outer case was about the size of a 'Smarties' tubs and made of orange cardboard.

Edited By Andy_G on 21/02/2021 14:25:39

You did actually follow the link that I posted?

One of the mills that I enjoyed using in the training school had flat belt drive. The "tick, tick" of the fasteners passing over the pulleys was most soporific!

At 1/20 scale the criss-cross sewing has to be the method to join them

Canvas flat belts seemed to work best with a big difference in tension between tight and slack sides, since T1 - T2 needs to be large to transmit the power. Hence film of T E s driving thrashing boxes always had a big sag in the slack side of the belt.

Howard.

I remember my father helping with a threshing machine being used for threshing wheat. The tractor was a Fordson major and the belt was extremely long. The threshing machine was made of wood and angle iron, and was used back in the fifties because it left the long straw for thatching.

thanks for all the ideas

tom

There's a threshing machine in action in this episode of "Dad's Army" around 17 minutes in.

Rob

I think that the Saddler in Ware still makes belts for machinery. I was there once and the owner told me that they had a commission to make belts for the luggage conveyor at an Airport.

Sadly, the shop is rarely open these days because they prefer to sell by Mail Order.

MC

I did, until I read that the belt was twisted to keep it on. Lost interest at that point. Clearly written by someone who has b-all experience of them.

Belts were given a twist to reverse the rotation. Belts were run on domed pulleys which kept them running centrally.

LSM sell it along with the crocodile clips would think the 1/2" or 5/8" governor belting OK for your 2" model rather than the flywheel drive belting which would be too wide.

Edited By JasonB on 23/02/2021 13:19:29