Need advise on my sawmill project

[jpassardi]

You really should have a spring: air bag, coil or rubber. The problem with not running one is that as the band expands with temperature it grows in length and tension is lost. The spring maintains band tension. The wheel belts provide a minimal amount of "cushion".

[ladylake]

 Yes put a spring tensioner on your mill.  Steve

[Ken Malone]

I picked up a 1/4 hp gear motor that is rated at 18 rpm ratio 95:1 does this mean the shaft turns 1710 rpm? It is rated at 750 in lbs torque I'm hoping to raise and lower mill with it.Any thoughts?

[Ken Malone]

I have a 18 rpm dc gear motor.when I power it up with a car battery I get about 3 rpm.Any thoughts? It also says 90 v on the tag . What does this mean?

[Hilltop366]

I would think v=volts which would explain the low rpm at 12v.

[Ken Malone]

Do you mean it would take 90 v to get the 18 rpm?

[Hilltop366]

I think so.

It was likely made to run with a controller that converted 120 AC to 90 DC. 

[Ken Malone]

Yup your right.came off a treadmill.

[Ken Malone]

I'm now on to building blade guides. I've seen many different configurations  just wondering what is the best.Any ideas or pictures would be great. Thanks Ken

[Ljohnsaw]

Ken, Do yourself a HUGE favor and just buy the Cook's roller guides. That's what I finally did after having regular bearings lockup at least once a year.

I made my own drilled mounting bolts with a zerk fittings to grease them. That was mounted on a rod that fits in a square 2"X1/4" wall tube. Two bolts per side allow for full adjustability.

In retrospect, I should have just used a piece of solid square stock instead of the round, it would have been easier to fab.

This was after rusting all winter.


This also shows the supports for the adjustable arm.


The whole boring build thread

[jpassardi]

I agree with John, you can get the assemblies from them with adjusters and save some fab time.
I also suggest their felt/diesel dripper if you plan to mill pine. I retrofitted one to my Woodmizer. Buying the parts separately is nearly the same cost.

[Mooseherder]

I have a 18 rpm dc gear motor.when I power it up with a car battery I get about 3 rpm.Any thoughts? It also says 90 v on the tag . What does this mean?

This is the Dayton Gear motor on my mill for forward and back.

[fluidpowerpro]

I would say the 90v is the intended operating voltage.

[Ken Malone]

Just installed a new centrifugal clutch but it doesn't disengage . It turns at idle speed. Any thoughts? Thanks Ken

[fluidpowerpro]

When I first got my saw the idle speed was set too high so the clutch didnt disengage. Whats your idle speed set at? Try bumping it down a bit?

[Ken Malone]

My idle speed is 1700 rpm. The clutch is not supposed to engage until 2000 rpm.

[Ljohnsaw]

That's a pretty high idle. I like it down below 1,000. I think mine is around 7 or 800.

[Ken Malone]

What do you have for an engine? I don't think mine will run that slow without quitting. Thanks Ken

[fluidpowerpro]

1700 sounds high to me also. Mine is at about 1000. It's a Briggs 16 HP Vanguard.

[fluidpowerpro]

Was just thinking...
If it engages at 2000 it might need to drop below 1700 to disengage. Everything has a dead band and for a mechanical device like a clutch 300 might be too close. On mine I noticed that when getting close to engaging or disengaging, it makes sort of a clanking noise.

[Ken Malone]

Ran it full throttle for about 2 min. Now it's working fine😁

[Ken Malone]

Just wondering what the blade tension should be and how to gauge it .Thanks

[barbender]

There was a thread on here about a poor man's strain guage a long time ago. Two clamps and a dial caliper. Open the caliper up an inch or two, clamp the jaws to your blade. Zero the caliper out. Now tension your blade, and watch the reading on your caliper as you tighten. The problem is first- I never did this, just read about it; and second, I don't remember how to convert the measurements into psi of strain. Obviously this would be onerous to do every time you put a blade on, so you would figure out a method to correlate the adjustment on your tensioning device with the corresponding correct strain. Clear as mud?😊

[Ben Cut-wright]

The dial caliper method of strain measurement works quite well. I've used it on many (same size blades) and compared the measurement with a dedicated strain gauge.  They are close and often identical.  Conversion charts are available online.  It's not necessary to measure every blade, IMO.  Note the position of the tension mechanism for the representative blades and adjust to that set point when replacing same-blades.