All American Precision Filing Machine
A friend of mine showed me his die filer, which was the All American model shown here. He showed me what it did and said if I ever had a chance to pick one up it was a good machine to have in the shop. So I did a little research and decided to keep an eye out for one. They are rather hard to find, and in fact when you do find them they seem to bring top dollar. To make a long story short I was looking for a larger lathe, and was scanning the local want adds one day and happened to come accost an add for a large lathe in the St. Louis area. The add also mentioned that there was a die filer available also. So I called to look at the lathe, and the gentleman told me that I would also have to take the die filer as a condition of buying the lathe! (LUCKY ME!, As my wife would say)
I had mentioned on one of the forums at the time that I was looking for info on this die filer. A fellow HSM on the net offered to send me a photocopy of the manual. I lost his contact information so can not give him proper credit here. I have scanned it in and converted it to a pdf, and include it here.
If you have any additional information on this machine that you would like to share, please forward it to me for inclusion on this page for all to enjoy!
- Honing Attachment Manual Photos 1 2 3
- Sawing Attachment Manual – Shop Note Photos 1 2
Possible Sources for Machine Files
Victor Machinery lists 8″ parallel machine files, that are Made in USA
- Victor Machinery
- Federal File Co also Lists Machine Files on their Site.
- Machine Shop Discount Supply As some file Selections.
6-6-2009 – Such Luck! The wife and I were out hitting a few yard sales. I was looking over a few tools at one of the sales and guess what I found? Asking price .25 each!
This is one of the nicest samples of this machine I have seen. It is not mine, the photos are included here with permission from the owner, who originally posted these photos on the Practical Machinist board. Here is a link to his post. http://www.practicalmachinist.com/vb/showthread.php?p=1035851&posted=1
I came across one of these while buying other tools at a garage sale it looks all there. I have no use for it and was wondering what the goig or asking price is for these, any help would be appreciated
Thank you,
Wayne
I have seen them go from 300.00 to 800.00 depending on the condition and finding someone who is interested in them.
Dale
Many years ago when I came to the United States from Scotland, I already had the knowledge of making third class blanking dies by simply using a band saw, a drill press, bee’s wax, and a Die Filing Machine.
Third class blanking dies are ideal, when only a few hundred, or even several thousand blanks are required at a very low cost, as the material used for the tooling is 1/2″ thick cold rolled steel case hardened, and the only time a die shoe is required is to make the die, never to produce the parts.
I could make a complete punch, die, and stripper plate in two days, ( plus ) heat treating time….. while holding tolerances of plus or minus .005″. .
Such tooling was ideal for experimental manufacturing requiring blanks ranging in thickness from .020″ to .090″.
However, it would appear that those good days are long gone, there is practically nothing manufactured in the U.S.A., and it would be even cheaper still to make a template in China and have a dozen or so there being paid three dollars a day hand file parts to scribed lines.
Nevertheless, I am on the lookout for a reasonably priced die filing machine, and files ………… just in case.