Buch's Cornsheller Restoration

Mike Mathieu

Member
Messages
116
Location
Midlothian,Va
Hi everyone

Most of you who have read my posts know that I like to restore old antique cornshellers. I have done a couple of Hocking Valley shellers so when I was asked to do a restoration on a Buch's sheller I just couldn't resist. Very similar to a Hocking Valley but with a few distinct differences this was a fun project. The first challenge was identifying this as a Buch's sheller. Clue one was the use of a wire mesh chaff screen which was exclusive to a Buch's and also the rounded edge flywheel

Wire Mesh Chaff Screen. Round Edge Flywheel
cornsheller 005.jpg cornsheller 004.jpg

The woodwork was in pretty good shape for measuring purposes and is made from white oak for the frame and poplar for the box.

Carcass with metal removed
Buch's cornsheller 003.jpg

Woodwork done
hockingvalleywip004.jpg

The paint job is probably the most time consuming part of the restoration. After trolling the web to find suitable photos of the Buch’s sheller to get the details, I then have to make the custom stencils. Each stencil is hand drawn, then cut out using an exacto knife. Once this is done then each stencil is placed on the spray painted parts of the sheller and using a foam brush the paint is applied . After the stencil is removed, I do any touch up and filling in with an artist brush until it looks good and uniform.
Hand Cut stencils
Buch's cornsheller 017.jpg Buch's cornsheller 018.jpg

Once all of the stenciling is done I do all of the pin-striping on the frame and begin assembly.

Buch's cornsheller 004.jpg

So here is the Buch’s Pennsylvania 3 cornsheller completely restored to working order and looking good.
Buch's cornsheller 015.jpg Buch's cornsheller 016.jpg Buch's cornsheller 013.jpg

A little piece of history brought back to life
 
Pretty neat and a very nice job on the restoration.

A few years back I grew a bunch of indian and field corn just for the heck of it. After manually shelling a few bushels I can say that something like this would have been a huge improvement and a pretty big deal.
 
Great job on the restore. We had one growing up. Dad loaned it to a friend and it went to ashes when their barn burned. Good to know they can be use for walnuts too. :thumb:
 
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