Smithy Bearings -- The Saga Continues

Got my hook spanner made today -- had to go to Home Despot for a hole saw & I forgot to check at the car store if they had one! Oh well, its functional in a cro-magnon sort of way.

The spindle bearings are tapered roller bearings, similar to front wheel bearings on a car. I had visualized a process where the bearings are a light press fit, and the nut (for which I made the hook wrench) is used to adjust the tension.

If I want to use than nut to adjust those bearings I'm gonna have to REEF on it -- something is wrong here! No way is that going to provide an adjustment, and I have trouble believing that anything so high torque would be designed with such a nut.

So, am I wrong? Is this normal-sounding? If things _are_ too tight, do y'all have any suggestions?

Thanks.

Reply to
Tim Wescott
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Update:

It occurs to me that I didn't check the bearing or the spindle for dings. If I see anything obvious I can stone it off (well, if it's on the inside of the bearing I may order another bearing instead of a round stone). I'm going to check for this.

I suspect that the real problem is that the spindle was just made a bit too big for the bearing. I can see those happy guys in their Worker's Paradise making a tradeoff between just bashed it together, making their quota and keeping their jobs, versus trying to make it right, not making their quota, going back too their village and starving.

I really don't like the idea of turning the spindle down, mostly because I don't know if I can maintain decent accuracy, but also because I don't have a toolpost grinder and it would be most inconvenient to make one without the mill that I'm trying to fix. None the less if it comes to that I may see if I can dummy something up with blocks of wood and a Dremel tool (ick).

Alternately I could call Smithy and see what they say -- I suspect that since they've allowed this to happen in the first place they're not going to be good for much, but it may be worth a try. Anyone know how responsive they are?

Reply to
Tim Wescott

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