My Boy, the Groundhog

So I'm working on caulking in my newly installed door.  Caulk is tricky stuff.  It takes a steady hand.  And you get pretty sticky after awhile.  So, as I bent down to pick up my damp rag to clean up my hands, my cell phone popped out of my shirt pocket and slid between the crack of the deck and the house.  Oh bummer.

Yup it's down there.  

But also down there are a couple 

of long abandoned groundhog holes.  

Hmmm.  What to do...

It was too tight of a squeeze for me to get under the deck.  

Good thing I have a skinny boy to the rescue!

He has my phone in his hand and he's turned around!

And finally, he's coming out.  

We got him cleaned up and gave him his due reward.

Band Saw Restoration - New Pulley!

I ended up buying a new pulley because that old hunk-of-junk pulley wobbled so much.  Buying a new one also allowed me to size it properly to get near the right spindle speed for the driven wheel.  That is, the book says the band wheel should spin at 640 rpm to produce a band velocity of 2050 feet per minute.

My old wobbly pulley was too big and that made the band wheels go too slow - around 500 rpm.  My new pulley is awesome nearly in all ways:
1.  6.25 inch diameter
2.  Cast iron
3.  No wobble

New Awesome Pulley:

But there was one problem - the standard keyway in a pulley for a 0.750 shaft is bigger than what I have on my 0.750 shaft.

The woodruff key in my 0.750 shaft is 0.125 inch, and the keyway in the pulley is 0.187.  So, there's alot of slop.  No problem - off to the machine shop!  I made a "C" shaped shim.  It goes around the woodruff key and fills up the void of the pulley's keyway.

This is a small thing, for sure.  The wall thickness of the "C" is 0.031 inch.  It took a bit of thinking to figure out simply how to hold this in the vice as I machined it.  But, in the end of the day, it fits real cozy as seen below:

While I was at it, I made a new insert for the table.  I made it out of steel, but I am now wondering if I should have made it out of aluminum.  I imagine the steel plate will quickly wear down my teeth if there should be any rubbing.  We'll see how it goes.

So the new awesome pulley is mounted, and the keyway is tight.  I mounted my motor and slung around my new Fenner Drive Powertwist Plus belt.  I'm a big fan of these belts simply because they are adjustable.  If it's a bit too long or short, it's a breeze to change.  I don't have time for multiple trips to get just the right length solid V belt when I mis-measure.

The speed works out nicely, too.  A 6.25" pulley driven by a 2.25" pulley with a 1725rpm motor yields a spindle speed of  621 rpm.  That's pretty close to the specified 640 rpm, so I'm happy.  Turning on the motor to drive the new pulley did produce a slight vibration.  Very slight.  I found the stand is only sitting on 3 of the 4 legs.  I can fix that.  

My Two Boys

Band Saw Vibration

I've got quite a bit finished on the Atlas 912 Band Saw restoration project.  Lately, I've been working on all the driven components rather than just cosmetic restoration.

I bought new "tires" and installed them onto the wheels.  The new thing is urethane over rubber - they supposedly wear better and work smoother.  The only thing I don't like about them is the pumpkin orange color.  They went on a bit tight, but it was easier than advertised.

I modified the hub from the original roller chain sprocket to fit a large diameter V-belt pulley.  It's nice to be able to use the tools at work for this.  I used the newly acquired CNC mill to drill in a bolt hole pattern.

Then I tapped 1/4-28 fine threads.  I like fine threads because it's easier to tap - - the threads are not as deep.  And the bolt is a slightly larger diameter for more strength.

That hub attaches to the driven spindle shaft, and then I attached my modified V-belt pulley.  The sticker on it shows it's an Allis Chalmers pulley, and it's a bit out true.  While it is concentric, I had no power to straighten the wobble from side to side.  My awesome new Starrett indicator came in handy to show my variance is 0.062 inches.  That might as well be a mile in my world.  I marked the run-out in thousandths of an inch every 15 degrees or so around the perimeter of the pulley.

Here's a close up of that Starrett 196A indicator with it's cantilever rod option in play.  What a great tool.

Regardless of insane pulley wobble, I did install a brand new blade.  It tracks and runs smooth and true on the two wheels.  It should, for new bearings and new tires should make it smooth as silk.

Here's a couple of overall shots of how things stand.

Things to do:
1.  Fix the wobbly pulley, or rather just buy new.
2.  Figure out a better motor mount
3.  Make a center cutout for the table.
4.  Paint the last 2 covers.