Hey guys, it’s been a while! I haven’t had much time over the past year or so with work and school and haven’t even got the chance to touch a trap since the little like I sat out last season. Anyhow, I’m back with a question. If only it were about trapping. I’ve been looking for answers everywhere including some pretty popular machinists and contracting forums but most of the content just doesn’t have the traffic to get me answers. Tman always seems to have plenty of people who know a thing or two about metal work, so I figured I’d check here.

Anyhow, I recently acquired a 5” gutter machine for next to nothing. It functions great and runs gutter perfectly. The only problem is that it runs a scratch on a few different sections of the metal even after oiling. This is the older style machine with steel rollers, so I knew as soon as I saw the scratching that the rollers would need some work. A couple of the rollers have a few scratches and dings that look like the source of the issue. Basically, I was just wondering how difficult it would be for a machinists to chuck it up on the lathe and either repolish them or take just enough to smooth them out. For you guys with experience with similar machines, my other big concern was if taking the small amount off would hurt the function of the machine in anyway? Thanks!

Got pics?

How bad are the marks on the gutter? The machine I ran put the outline of a screw on the gutter. We ran it anyway and never heard a complaint.
Amazing as it may seem we ran 100,000 feet of gutter 1 year.
This was 40 years ago and the machines were almost new.
just

Seems to me....A scratch would mean it's rubbing on something stationary, A damaged roller would leave an evenly spaced "Dink".

A number of the older machines were designed for .027 aluminum, if you run .032 thickness it does not flow through good. I use to borrow one that needed 2 guys pulling on the material so the rollers would not spin on material and scratch it.

Try chucking it in your drill and use some emery cloth. It would take a no more than a few thousandths and may knock down some burrs.
Depending on how machine is set up you may be able to emery cloth right in the machine. Good luck.

Thanks for all of the help guys. I should’ve mentioned that it’s more of a series of dings rather than a scratch. I got ahold of a guy that actually restores them and he said he just takes jb weld, fills the dings and scratches, and then sands it back down. Sounded easy enough so I tried a couple rollers. I’ll let you guys know how it turns out after I sand them. I’ll also take some feeler gauges and check to see if it’s setup for the .024 or .032