Looking to expand my skillset
 

Hello all. My name is Johnny, and my shop is Whiskey Bay Customs. I am a Canadian living in North Carolina, I have been restoring and customizing classic vehicles for nearly 20 years now and have recently purchased my first reciprocating machine. It's a Gairu MB-5 Nibbler No.527. My hope is to get any information I can about the machine, company, anything really, so that I can get it up and running, expand my metal shaping capabilities and evolve into and even better builder. I look forward to interacting with so many talented metal shapers, and I hope to learn as much as I can.

Cheers!

Hi Johnny
welcome to allmetalshaping

Steve

Welcome to the forum, Johnny.

Did you buy the MB-5 that was just on Greensboro(?) Craigslist? I bought a slightly larger Gairu MI-8 in Aug. we can talk more about them if you want to call, email or even get together. I'm in Spartanburg.

Thanks Guys.

I found this Gairu MB-5 on Craigslist and brought it home from Sanford NC.
I'm looking for any technical information that I can about it, which I already know to be easier said than done. I used a Phase-a-matic converter to wire it in and I got it up and running, but I'm currently at a standstill because I want to finish servicing it before I really get into using it. I know that it needs oil, and a good cleaning, but I don't know what oil it takes. I know that the tooling size is unusual and am looking for any common solutions. Any help would be appreciated.

The po of my Gairu had no paperwork. He said he used 30w oil without detriment. I bought a copy of a Pullmax P7-P8-P9 manual from RockHillWill for comparable general information. My MI-8 uses 26 mm (1.04") tooling and only came with a set of slotting tooling. I have a section of 1" square stock and will make the tooling I need, whether with it or after buying actual 26mm square stock. You should be able to make whatever tooling you want and weld/attach it to appropriate dimension square stock.

There's a good range of Pullmax & similar machine models and tooling in Timothy Barton "Metalshaping the lost sheet metal machines #3", but the whole series is fantastic. Faye Butler's book on Pullmax machines & tooling is the benchmark book, especially regarding making tooling specific to sheet metal shaping. Eventually, I'll spend $75 and order one.

If you search internet industrial surplus, equipment liquidators & auction sources in Spain, you'll find the greatest number of used Gairu machines including MB-5, MI-8 and others. Some have pics of likes original tooling. In general, it's no different than regular Pullmax tooling. You can try asking questions to folks via those websites, but writing & speaking fluent Spanish seems to be necessary for any response.

I would like a manual for mine, but am not holding my breath. If it needed a full rebuild, I would be more concerned.