Davis-Wells Bandsaw Wheels Removal ?

I have been restoring the Davis Wells bandsaw i have written about and have run into a problem. I need to remove the wheels from the machine and i dont have a gear puller to remove the wheels. I have tried the rental yards and have no luck there either..........it is 10" from the center to the outside of the wheels.
Anybody know how to get these big wheels off ? or know where i can buy a puller big enough to remove them ?

Thanks Dan

You don't want to pull by the outside of the wheel. To much risk there of breaking or bending a wheel.

Does it have either two or three threaded holes in circle on the hub? If so you can use one of these.



Your thread the bolts into the holes through the puller and pull on those thread holes.

Just noticed AutoZone has a 'loan a tool' program and this is one of the tools they will apparently loan.



If there are not threaded holes you may have to pull the shaft out and have it pressed out, but there is probably another way.

Dan,
if i remember correctly, your wheels are spoked, not solid disks. I had this same issue when working on my old Crescent band saw - it had probably been 50 years since the wheels were last pulled and they didn't want to move.
What i did was to use a gear puller. I happened to have some scraps of 3/8" steel bar stock. I slid them behind the spokes and taped them in place near the hub, but making sure that they spanned 3 or 4 spokes. I put two of them on so that the hooks from the gear puller would grab them at roughly 3 o'clock and 9 o'clock positions. If you have a gear puller with 3 claws, you're better off, but mine worked just fine with only 2. Then, i cranked the gear puller until it budged and slowly slid off.
My wheels are aluminum, and i was concerned that they might bend, but everything worked just fine. I believe your wheels are cast iron. They'll be stiffer, but you may have some rust issues where the hub slides on the shaft. That would make it a bit more difficult to pop loose. If you have a heat gun or a propane torch, you may need to resort to warming the wheel hub so that it expands just a bit. When doing so, be mindful that bearings have grease in them and that you might need to repaint the wheels.
After you get the wheels off, make sure to check the spindle for smoothness, especially where a set screw might lock tight against it to hold the wheels on. Often, the set screws will indent the spindle, raising a portion of steel that you'll need to file back down flush with the rest of the spindle.
Good luck with it. It'll be completely worth it when you're done.
Paul Hubbman