Cattail Foundry
Emanuel King
167 West Cattail Road
Gordonville, PA 17529
My "free" Crescent 16 inch jointer suffers from a few, um, missing parts. Among them are the babbitt bearing caps. I have searched high and low for replacements without luck. I finally posted a plea on the OWWM forum (msg #44682) for someone to lend me a set so that I could see if they could be reproduced. Much to my delight (and surprise) Scott Smith emailed the next day that he had a set that I could borrow which he then sent me. Based on the recommendation by Dave Potts, I sent them to the Cattail Foundry in the Pennsylvannia Amish region. I included a hand knob from an old Fay and Egan #1 Saw Bench that I needed a copy of.
I really had no idea what to expect, but I knew Dave P. wouldn't steer me wrong. Given the Amish lifestyle, it is somewhat hard to communicate with Cattail. I included a note that I would like to reproduce the three items. I also expressed an interest in -- if not too costly -- getting two copies of each item. My thought was that someone out there someday might need a set of caps as well. I really had no idea of what their price would be to reproduce the pieces...
The original pieces:
Weeks passed and no reply from Cattail. I was starting to get nervous since, after all, the two bearing caps I sent to Cattail belonged to someone else! I was beginning to consider a day trip to the foundry (aka milking barn) to talk to the folks in person.
Then low and behold in today's mail a box arrived from Cattail. The originals with an estimate? No, the box was heavier than the box I sent them! I anxiously opened it to find the originals plus two copies of each. I marvelled (briefly) at the quality of the castings, then searched for a note or invoice. And there it was -- a bill for $84 which included 12.95 for shipping! Life is good -- 100 year old, 'irreplaceable' cast iron machinery pieces duplicated for $12 each. Of course holes need to be drilled (and tapped in the case of the knobs) and the bearing cap bottoms need to be surfaced. But these are relatively easy steps. Needless to say, I am thrilled and I HIGHLY RECOMMEND THESE FOLKS!
The originals and their clones:
On the left are the original pieces. The top is the far-side babbitt bearing cap for a Crescent jointer. In the middle is the near-side bearing cap for the same machine. At the bottom is a hand knob from an old Fay and Egan #1 Improved Saw Bench.
Another view:
August 20, 2004