Back at the homemade sawmill video added

Georgia088 · February 19, 2018, 09:07:03 PM

Quote from: Kbeitz on February 19, 2018, 06:16:58 PM
Isn't you'r centrifugal clutch one that closes up on the belt as the engine speed increases? If it is you might be able to lock in in the smallest belt size so it wont close up to the larger size.

The centrifugal clutch closes until the lowest point of the clutch contacts itself. Then the clutch is tapered from that point to the top. Depending on the width of the belt, it may ride anywhere from the lowest point (about 2" in diameter) to the outward most (top) point (about 6" in diameter). My golf cart belt (1-1/4") rides at the outer most part of clutch so 6" diameter drive. However, if you put a smaller width belt. It rides down in the taper or v at a lower diameter. This makes it a much smaller diameter
Is there any reason using a 1/2" belt running down in the clutch some won't work?

Kbeitz · February 20, 2018, 12:44:11 AM

I bet the taper wont fit a V=belt.

coach08 · February 20, 2018, 07:08:17 AM

we connected a 3/8 v belt to the clutch by way of make shifting another pulley for the belt to turn and it seemed to do ok. Not sure what it will do under a real load as we were just holding the shaft and applying presure by hand to the driven pulley. We are asking on golf cart forum, to see if anyone has had any experience with different size belts on these clutches. Will keep everyone informed on what their response is. Thanks for all the help and advise

coach08 · February 20, 2018, 05:35:47 PM

responce from golf cart forum.. " I don't think it will hurt anything in the short term, but may wear grooves in the pullies over time. Don't know if that would ever cause you problems. I say "go for it". oh well, Im a gambler what the heck. Will probably give it a shot.

Kbeitz · February 20, 2018, 06:01:10 PM

Quote from: coach08 on February 20, 2018, 05:35:47 PM
responce from golf cart forum.. " I don't think it will hurt anything in the short term, but may wear grooves in the pullies over time. Don't know if that would ever cause you problems. I say "go for it". oh well, Im a gambler what the heck. Will probably give it a shot.

To keep the belt from slipping the sides of the belts taper needs to match the taper of the pulley.
If it does then your good to go.

Gearbox · February 21, 2018, 10:20:14 AM

If you don't put a stop to keep it from closing up it will apply to much pressure on the belt and break it .

Georgia088 · February 21, 2018, 01:05:03 PM

Quote from: Gearbox on February 21, 2018, 10:20:14 AM
If you don't put a stop to keep it from closing up it will apply to much pressure on the belt and break it .

It stops when the bottom most part of the clutch contacts itself. It then is tapered all the way to the outward most part of the clutch (so when the clutch is completely engaged the taper touches itself at the bottom and is about 1-1/2" wide at the top). Also, the golf cart belt has a taper very similar to the "v" taper on a v belt. I don't know if you consider the golf cart belt a "v" belt or not, but the shape of them is very similar.

Georgia088 · March 03, 2018, 10:08:52 PM

Well, shipment came in yesterday with pulleys, axle, and bearings. Worked on changing the golf cart tire sawmill into a regular steel wheel (pulley) sawmill. Got a little bit done but a long ways to go. Got a question:
The collars on the pillow block bearings keep the shaft from moving in both forward and backward directions or just one direction? Anyone see problems with my setup?

Thanks!

Kwill · March 03, 2018, 10:19:35 PM

Looks good. What kinda guides are you using?

Georgia088 · March 03, 2018, 10:32:14 PM

Cooks. I got them a while back before I decided to change from golf cart tires.

Kbeitz · March 04, 2018, 01:56:53 AM

Pillow block bearings come with two different kind of collars. Eccentric locking collar (cam lock) and just plane set screw collars. Both will lock the shaft. The cam lock collar needs to be turn in the same direction as the rotation of your shaft when locking. Bot all types have set screws.

Georgia088 · March 04, 2018, 03:29:41 AM

Quote from: Kbeitz on March 04, 2018, 01:56:53 AM
Pillow block bearings come with two different kind of collars. Eccentric locking collar (cam lock) and just plane set screw collars. Both will lock the shaft. The cam lock collar needs to be turn in the same direction as the rotation of your shaft when locking. Bot types have set screws.

I have cam locking. As you can see, I have one pillow block on each side of band wheel. So, all I need is a collar on one bearing (as long as it's turning in the direction of motor) and it will keep the shaft from moving forward or back. Correct?
Also, thinking of putting a jack in to tension the blade instead of a bolt like I had originally planned. Any reason that won't work? You can actually see the jack in the floor in bottom pic.
Thanks!

Kbeitz · March 04, 2018, 08:04:07 AM

You need some kind of adjustment for toe.

DbltreeBelgians · March 04, 2018, 10:42:46 AM

Quote from: Kbeitz on March 04, 2018, 01:56:53 AM
Pillow block bearings come with two different kind of collars. Eccentric locking collar (cam lock) and just plane set screw collars. Both will lock the shaft. The cam lock collar needs to be turn in the same direction as the rotation of your shaft when locking. Bot types have set screws.

Pillow block bearings also come in a concentric locking collar such as Sealmaster "Skwezloc" or Dodge "D-loc". I use these on a daily basis at my day job as a maintenance mechanic and find them far better than set screw locking devices as you don't get near the fretting on the shaft and you don't have the marring on the shaft you get from set screws making disassembly much easier if and when the time comes for R&R of components.
Brent

Georgia088 · March 04, 2018, 11:35:02 AM

Quote from: Kbeitz on March 04, 2018, 08:04:07 AM
You need some kind of adjustment for toe.

My toe adjustment will be moving the front or back pillow block bearings either in or out. They pillow blocks have slots so they can slide. If this isn't enough adjustment then I will cut slotted holes in what they go through. I can't work on it today, but I got to the point of starting to tinker with the adjustments yesterday. My blade when barely tight seemed to almost track by hand after adjusting bearings, but was slightly running off the back of one wheel and the front of the other. I'm going to have to play with the adjustments a little more.

Georgia088 · March 04, 2018, 07:47:34 PM

Well, I had about thirty min today to look at the mill. I adjusted the pillow block bearings and got it so that the 1-1/4 blades would track (turning it by hand) with the back of the blade pretty much flush with the back of the wheel.... is this where it should track? It looks like I have a lot of toe in on one wheel, but it seems to be tracking... if I put a straight edge across both wheels it will touch in 3 places and there is about a 1/4 inch gap on the outside of one wheel... not sure what it should look like, but...

gww · March 05, 2018, 10:13:24 AM

Georgia
My opinion is you start with four places touching on your wheels and after adjusting you end up with about what you did. The test will be when you put full tension on and if it will still track.
You mill is looking solid and I can't wait for your first cut and would like it if you give a report. I think you are going to do well.
gww

Georgia088 · March 10, 2018, 10:27:24 PM

Well, I had a chance to fool with it some today. I got it to track with quite a bit of tension (no idea how much; guess I need to make me a gauge). I welded some adjustments to push against the pillow block bearings to keep the tension from pulling the outer pillow blocks from moving inwards when the blade was tightened down.
I think my biggest problem was my surplus pulley (bandmill wheel) would move on the shaft. One of them kept moving. Even when the H bushing inside the pulley was tightened down. I couldn't keep it from moving. I ended up putting a small "tack" on the pulley to the shaft. This seemed to keep the pulley from moving and it tracked fine under tension. I don't think I should have had to do this, but it worked. I cut a straight cut with out the blade guides contacting the blade.
The next chance I get, I will adjust my blade guides with down pressure.
Any idea why my pulley wouldn't stay in place?

Kbeitz · March 11, 2018, 06:41:32 AM

Sounds like the hub is bottoming out like the bore is to big.

Georgia088 · March 11, 2018, 11:31:39 PM

It has about 1/8 to 3/16 of a gap between the flange of the h bushing and the pulley. So, I don't think it's bottomed out but I put so much torque on the small little bolts that I am afraid I'm going to break them. The heads of the bolts are starting to "round" as well. One pulley has held fine. The other didn't. But the tack seemed to hold it. Just hope I don't have to move or change it soon or often.

Kbeitz · March 12, 2018, 01:16:41 AM

If you have room you could buy a split collar.

Georgia088 · March 18, 2018, 05:28:33 AM

well, I finally made a short video, but idk how to post it lol.
The video sucks btw, but it was the best I could do at the time.
I got to cut some yesterday, and it was an ok day. I didn't realize it but I was down to my last sharp blade of about 8 that I have. And Stupid me hit the very top edge of my log dog. I wanted to cut so bad I kept using it. It cut pretty well still. There was some knot wave in SYP that I noticed (not too bad) but I'm wondering if My feed speed was too fast. Or not adjusting my blade guide in closer to cant didn't hurt?
When I noticed wave I tightened the tension a little and moved guide closer to cant. This seemed to fix it. I cut probably a solid hour to hour and a half and it did pretty good. Then I started noticing the teeth marks in the wood getting more visable... and pow. The blade broke. I am assuming it was getting dull...
Couple of questions:
Are you supposed to let head up over cant to send the mill back home or is it ok to go straight back (after removing board) and letting the blade pull the saw dust off the cant?

I have two 1-1/2" blades. The rest are 1-1/4". Can I use them with 1-1/4 guides? I tried one but it ran further back on wheel and was running hard against guide. So I took it back off. Do they run in a different place on the band wheel?

How in the world can the adjustable blade guide keep the correct down pressure when you slide it in and out to get closer to the cant? I have always left mine in one place, but since I rebuilt, it is much easier to slide it. I would like to use it if it helps, but I just believe my down pressure has to be changing when I slide it.
I still have more questions than answers, but other than not having any sharp blades other than 1-1/2", I was overall fairly happy with it today.
Maybe this will link will work:
https://youtu.be/UanmXJ5yW-A

Thanks.

gww · March 18, 2018, 12:12:51 PM

Georgia
Here is my shot at answering a few questions. Can you move your guides back a tiny bit with out any other movement? Your 1.5 inch blade is still going to want to ride on top of the percieved hump on your pullys. So the blade being wider will ride the same on the pully (center of blade) but will be just a little wider as far as your guides are concerned. You could probly not hurt yourself by leaving just a bit more gap from the back of your 1.25 blades and still get enough support to switch between the two sizes with out changing, cause it would probly not take very much but I could be wrong and you would have to try it.

I don't think your feed speed was too fast but when I get wave, I usually slow down but have heard many advise on here that going too slow will make it follow the wood more and you need to go even faster. My view is that your blade was probly just getting dull. You could tell by how hot it is getting. One other thing. with small pullys for your blade to turn on, the heavier 1.5 inch blades will be flexing even more and it may make them break even faster.

On sliding your guides in and out (narrow or wider) If you have the bar it slides on level, it should change nothing as far as down presure goes. Mine is close but not perfect. What I find is that when cutting after a flip and after moving my guides, I may get one sacrafice board that is not perfect, but every board after that first one should come out uniform and so it is something that I can live with and if I am going to plane the board before using it, I can just compansate enough on the first cut to get close enough to perfect for me. My guide are off so that when I widen them, it actually puts a little extra down presure on the blade and I am sure there is a point that is too much but my mill works fine with just a small extra down presure when I have to do wide cuts. I usually have mine some where around (guess) 18 inches and never move it in and only move it out when I am making my first can't out of a log. So If I have a 26 inch log, I might have to move it out for the squaring of the log but can move it back after I have a cant.

If you are running your blades to failure, you would do good to get a drimmel and learn to sharpen the blade while it is on the saw like Kbeitz does. It takes 5 or ten minutes to do but is worth it in my opinion just because it is not so much work pushing the mill though the cut. I sometimes do it on every log after the first few logs. You don't want to grind but just barily touch them and it does not last as long as a new blade does at first but is very helpful and I believe as long as I don't grind too much, I get much more board foot per blade then I used to since I don't send my blades to a resharp service.

I hope some of the above is helpful in some way.
Good luck
gww