Quick Fix

[Magicman]

Thanks Paul. I was hoping that there was something maybe better, but I guess that 17 years is OK.  I'll get WM to send me one with my next order. 

[Magicman]

Wondering about shipping the conduit took care of itself today.


 
I had to replace the brush assembly in my blade guide motor, so now the conduit will be shipped with the replacement brush assembly.  Yup, I always carry one.

[Brucer]

I installed my Autoclutch between jobs. My regular timberframing customer was in a quite period and one of his workers had a bunch of trees for me to saw (outside town).

I got the clutch installed, pulled the mill to his place, and got to work. A couple of hours into the job the debarker in-out motor quit working. I checked the breaker (inside the control panel :() and it had tripped. Reset it and things went fine for a while, then it quit. Reset, breaker and back to work. Repeat as needed.

After a while I figured out that the only time the breaker tripped was when I had the autoclutch engaged (motor at full power) and was trying to move the debarker out. Once I figured this out I could change my work pattern a little and not trip the breaker (until I forgot about the pattern >:().

I gave it some thought that evening and figured out that one of the debarker wires must be shorting to ground, but only when the autoclutch was engaged. Hmmm ... what changed when I put the Autoclutch in? Nothing that had anything to do with the debarker.

Then I remembered that I'd also shredded an alternator belt the last day sawing before I installed the clutch; and I'd had trouble getting the alternator belt tight, and the belt cover was hard to get on and off, and there was a cable harness interfering with the belt cover. So that's where I looked for the short.

Sure enough, the debarker wires ran under the alternator belt guard and one of them had been rubbing and the insulation was worn through. Every time I engaged the Autoclutch the harness would tighten up a bit and the exposed debarker wire would make contact with the belt cover. This particular wire was only positive when I was moving the debarker out and that was why the breaker only tripped under a particular combination of events.

The fix was simple -- tape up the wire and push the cover up a little higher. After the job I filed the cover smooth and put some extra protection around the whole harness.

I was so focused at first on the combination of debarker and Autoclutch, plus the recent install of the autoclutch, that I completely overlooked the shredded belt (and the problems I had getting the belt cover on and off.

[4x4American]

Thanks for sharing

[Magicman]

Yup, I did some looking and found where the insulation was worn through on my autoclutch wire, but I am not going to do anything to it until I replace that large flexible conduit.  For now I am up and running.   ;D