I bought a bandsaw to attach to my Shopsmith, and then realized that I wanted it powered independently. So I built it a standalone base.
The bandsaw cost $100 on craigslist, and I got a treadmill motor for free. I had to buy some lumber, a couple of pulleys and a v-belt, and miscellaneous hardware -- another $100, total. So I think I did okay.
Most of what I did is described in the galleries below -- all of the pictures have captions.
The design for the construction of the base was completely inspired by this youtube video. The guy that does that video series likes making simple stuff from simple materials (mostly 2x4's), and loves using pocket screws. I've certainly seen pocket joints all my life, so how is it that I hadn't heard of a pocket screw jig before this? They're pretty much Dog's gift to quick sturdy construction, as far as I can tell. There's no way this would have come out as nicely if I hadn't got myself one.
As you may have noticed, I have a small shop. Coexistence with the laundry machines in the background of some of the other pictures means I need to keep sawdust to a minimum. (My Shopsmith table-saw/disk sander lives out in the garage.)
The Shopsmith bandsaw shouldn't be run faster than 1000 rpm, which gives it a blade speed of just under 2900 fpm (feet/minute), which is plenty fast for wood. As I understand it, aluminum should be cut at around 1000 fpm (350 rpm), and steel way down at 100 fpm (35 rpm). If all I wanted to do was cut wood, then a standard 1750 rpm motor and a two-to-one pulley setup would work just fine. But I wanted the option of changing speeds, and getting down into the 300 rpm range was going to require big pulleys, and/or an idler setup. (For a bandsaw with 11" wheels, fpm = rpm × 3.14 × 11 / 12, or, fpm = rpm × 2.88)
Happily, it turns out that good quality variable speed motors can be had for free. People give away treadmills all the time -- usually after they realize they need help to get them out of the house. About a week after I started thinking about the bandsaw, someone in my neighborhood put a working treadmill out on the curb, so I grabbed it.
In addition to the motor, I saved the heavy duty casters and their axle bolts. I also pulled some electronic components off the console board to add to my spare parts collection.
Tip: Bring a friend. Treadmills weigh between 150 and 200lbs. And they're big: mine just fit in the back of our Subaru Forester."
Tip #2: If you can, get a treadmill which uses a slider control to control the speed. Newer models now have "speed up"/"speed down" buttons, and the motor controller may not be as simple to use. (The slider on older models is just a volume control (potentiometer), and you can just replace theirs with one of your own.)
A couple of things needed to be done to mate the treadmill motor to the v-belt drive pulley.