Thread: MC900 maintenance

Well, I have a couple of vice-grips, some Quik-Grips, and a couple of G-clamps - so it would have been one of them

Tiger, upon having time to remember what I did, the way around the problem is to:
1) loosen the fixed pulley & slide it along the shaft away from the circlip as far as possible, thereby reducing the amount of compression required.
2) put on sliding pulley, spring assembly & circlip
3) slide fixed pulley back & tighten grubscrew, should be easier to pull it into place & operate the allen key than trying to squash springs etc.

Hope this helps

Simon

Originally Posted by Bagmann

I agree with the above, having just done this the belt needs to be removed. But just to ask a question while on the topic of the old MC900, has anyone ever chaged a motor in one?

Cheers

Simon

IIRC, Skew has mentioned re-locating the motor to reduce intrusion in the working space.

Perhaps he can be persuaded to reveal the details, if he can recall them.

Cheers,
Joe

Originally Posted by joe greiner

IIRC, Skew has mentioned re-locating the motor to reduce intrusion in the working space.

Perhaps he can be persuaded to reveal the details, if he can recall them.

The simplest method is to simply by an appropriate motor that spins in the opposite direction. Then a little bit of metal-work to mount it so the reeve pulley sits in the same place, but with the motor on the opposite side.

In my case, a lay shaft was put there instead, with a pulley cluster on the opposite end. The motor was moved to the top of the headstock, so it takes two belts: one from the motor to the lay-shaft & another for the reeves drive to the headstock.

Would've worked better if the maths had been done right in the first place, though. (It ain't a good idea to choose pulley sizes for a 1440RPM motor when you have a 2800... )

But as to remembering the helpful little details - like putting that damned pulley back on...

my Hafco WL18HD which was a "special" they brought out had the motor on the other side (not protruding into workspace). I have since changed it to EVS but the motor is somewhere in the shed along with brackets etc.

When it had the reeves pulleys about every 3 months i would remove the guard, blow it out with air and spray with inox/WD40/CRC whatever was around. I found if you make sure the guard is always on the problem of sticky pulleys is reduced.

Another little trick i did was fit - under the spring - on the motor shaft a collar that stopped the pulley opening up further when on the lowest speed setting. This meant the belts didnt come loose when loaded up. As for removing the circlip, remove the belt and it is quite easy.

Hope that helps

Cheers

Thanks, Skew. I thought it was more complicated than just moving the motor topside, because the shaft length wouldn't change.

And, y'know, your 1440 is 1725 here, because of the frequency difference.

Cheers,
Joe

I've just stripped my lathe down, It's quite an old version of the MC900 that I inherited from my Grandfather.

Well looks like the 2 bearings in the headstock have pritty much had it... After a bit of belting I finally managed to get these out, The only one that was the pain though was the bearing thats inside Half of the Top pully, I was trying to knock it out and the casting on the end of the pully where the circlick sits broke off. So I rang Carbatec and order another (can't get one, They come as set ). then i noticed that the other pully connected to the motor had a BIG crack down the side.. So I've also ordered the other set of pullys....

Since I have the lathe apart anyway and I'm waiting on parts, is there anything else maintenance wise I should do to the motor or lathe whilst I've got head all apart ???

Put a spare belt in there.

As luck would have it, Tiger's other thread on Access Panel (t=47550) provides pictures of Skew's modification, which I hadn't entered in my index of WWF threads. And now I've saved the pictures, too.

A second copy of my HF34706 (sister to MC900) has been riding around in the back of my truck for about a month, waiting for space in my sliding-block puzzle of a shop.

Thanks, Skew and Tiger.

Cheers,
Joe

Finally got a chance to change the bearings..... The main shaft is now spinning nice and smooth now...

And as luck 'wood' have it I pulled the speed selector apart and gave it a good cleanout, The bottom guide groove was full of dust etc at each end... after cleaning it out I now have an extra speed slower and an extra one faster

I've just got to wait for the pully things to arrive and i can start spinning up some more mess