Thread: bought a 14" saw - think i over paid

have a yarn to crapatec they should have drive belts to suit, as for rusted blades don't bother with cleaning in my humble opinion blades that size are not too expensive and you should be able to get new rubber for that size blade and pulley

Yes; unfortunately you paid about twice it's worth. Sorry....

That model is a generic Made-In-China under several brands; we have one at the Bundaberg Woodworkers Guild branded Carbatec. The wheel bearings are standard sized sealed ball bearings you can pick up from any bearing supplier and are probably ok; don't buy them from Carbatec. The upper and lower guide bearings WILL be shot but again they are cheap. If you still have the old belt it should have markings you can match up; if no markings take it to an industrial parts supplier who can measure it up. If you don't have a belt I can get you the size next week sometime when I'm back at the guild.

The saw is ok for light roughing out work but is fairly flimsy; 3/8" blades are about the limit it will take. The fact that the lower shaft is adjustable in all 6 directions indicates that the overall build quality and assembly tolerances were somewhat on the poor side... The adjustment on the upper guide is a PITA, you really need to totally strip it down and clean it up; and reassemble everything while pinching the mating surfaces together with finger pressure or the slop is unbearable. And regularly lubricate the sliding sections with WD40.

This thread has info on drive belt sizes, I have bought from them as well, got 2 of them sitting on the gear stick in the Ute right now and no not for sale.

BAS-350B drive belt

Originally Posted by Chief Tiff

The saw is ok for light roughing out work but is fairly flimsy;.

that's probably where i'm at with it realistically.

Might be worth just sinking a few hours into it, cleaning it up, replace a few bearings and belt and put it back in facebook for what I paid. Not sure. for the handful of times a year it might get used it might be ok.


re belt:
i've actully found a guy on ebay who is selling belts for these machines (and others) so trying to get in contact with him about getting one with out having to pay postage.

so pulled a few more bits down,

just about every bearings has a nice "click/clunk" feel to it as you rotate them around.... so cactus. local bearing chain store quoted $108, questionable quality Ebay ones came to approx. the same price. the smaller bearing shops I would usually use seem to have packed up shop so will have to do some hunting around to see if I can get them a bit cheaper, or see what I can organise through work or call places like carbatec etc and see if they have a generic bearing that fits. but $108 does replace:

6x guide/thrust bearings (608Z)
2x belt tensioner bearings (6001z)
4x wheel bearings (6203z)

the z in those bearing codes just stands for steel shields, you obviously want some decent sealing on the bearings to stop the fine wood dust chewing them out.

found a new drive belt for $30 from a local guy who is an ex tool repair man in kind of just specialises in belt replacements.

Steel seals aren’t dustproof, which is probably why the bearings are shot

Get “2RS” suffixed bearings not “Z”; they have a rubber seal on each side.

If you get cheap Chinese bearings from Aliexpress or Banggood you’ll get the machine running again at minimum cost, enough to determine whether or not it suits you. If it’s not working for you then you can pass it on at minimum loss. Cheaper bearings will work fine in the short term; only the guide bearings are subject to appreciable wear and load and they can be replaced fairly quickly. It’s worth buying those in a pack of 10 or so.

And do some internet research on how to correctly tension the clades on a band saw. That funny red indicator and corresponding scale that may be hidden on the machine somewhere is about as accurate as throwing rocks with your eyes closed. Half of the problems people run into with bandsaws (after you make certain the wheels are parallel and running true) can be traced back to blade tension, usually not enough of it. It takes some work with precision measuring devices and a calculator but it's worth it in the end.

Originally Posted by Old Hilly

And do some internet research on how to correctly tension the clades on a band saw. That funny red indicator and corresponding scale that may be hidden on the machine somewhere is about as accurate as throwing rocks with your eyes closed. Half of the problems people run into with bandsaws (after you make certain the wheels are parallel and running true) can be traced back to blade tension, usually not enough of it. It takes some work with precision measuring devices and a calculator but it's worth it in the end.

thanks for the tips. I have a band saw book by Mark Duginsky that I need to read so hopefully it can steer me in the right direction, but even it probably can't wave a magic wand and make an average band saw good.

Originally Posted by havabeer69

thanks for the tips. I have a band saw book by Mark Duginsky that I need to read so hopefully it can steer me in the right direction, but even it probably can't wave a magic wand and make an average band saw good.

No, but it can make an "average" bandsaw work much better than it did when it left the factory. A well-tuned "average" bandsaw will probably work nearly as well or better than an expensive saw that you just unpacked and switched on.