Pics and possible problem...

Roger Tulk

Member
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3,018
Location
St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada
Here are pics of my lathe and the Reeves drive:

Here it is under wraps:

glathe01.jpg

Here is the Reeves drive set to low:
glathe02.jpg

This is the belt tension at low and medium:
glathe03.jpgglathe04.jpg

This is the belt looseness at high, and the belt tension:
glathe05.jpgglathe06.jpg

This it the Reeves drive set to high:
glathe07.jpg

Now, I'm guessing this doesn't look right. I would say that the driving spools are not coming together as they should. The width of the driving spool at high is 23/32" measured to the outside of the spool, and the width of the driven spool at low is 20/32". Am I right, and is there a simple fix for this?

All help and suggestions appreciated!
 
Have a look on the driven pulley...are the two sheaves coming together and touching each other at the highest speed setting? If they are touching, that's the top speed and nothing is wrong. If they are not touching, anf it it looks like they are meant to, you might try a bit of lube on the shaft the outer pulley sheave slides on. Most folks recommend a dry lube like graphite for the shaft. That's what I used to use. Frank Fusco had good results with WD-40, as I recall.
 
Looks like either the belt has stretched, or you have the wrong belt. From the pics, the pulleys seem to be opening and closing okay.

Is the belt slipping, or just flopping around? If it's not slipping, then you don't have a problem.
 
My guess is that you have the wrong belt for the drive, In my experience reeves drives use a wider belt. When one set of sheaves are completely together, the belt should fill the space in between at the top of the sheave, I'm just guessing, since the reeves drives that I have had experience with always used a wider, flat belt about 1/4" in thickness.
 
Have a look on the driven pulley...are the two sheaves coming together and touching each other at the highest speed setting? If they are touching, that's the top speed and nothing is wrong. If they are not touching, anf it it looks like they are meant to, you might try a bit of lube on the shaft the outer pulley sheave slides on. Most folks recommend a dry lube like graphite for the shaft. That's what I used to use. Frank Fusco had good results with WD-40, as I recall.

If you look at the last picture, Vaughn, it's the driving pulley where the sheaves don't come together at high speed. The driven pulley comes together perfectly when it should, at low speed (second picture.) I have put some WD-40 on it, and tomorrow I'll see if it worked itself in overnight. If this is just a lubrication issue, it should be easy to solve.

The lathe manual suggests applying grease to the shafts. I suppose they mean white lithium grease. Does anyone use grease?
 
If you look at the last picture, Vaughn, it's the driving pulley where the sheaves don't come together at high speed. The driven pulley comes together perfectly when it should, at low speed (second picture.) I have put some WD-40 on it, and tomorrow I'll see if it worked itself in overnight. If this is just a lubrication issue, it should be easy to solve.

The lathe manual suggests applying grease to the shafts. I suppose they mean white lithium grease. Does anyone use grease?

Ah, I was crossed up on which of the two pulleys had the moving sheave. I do indeed see that the pulley is fully closing, and it also appears to be fully opening.

As Jim said, if the belt's just floppy and not slipping, there's nothing to worry about. The floppy belt is the nature of the beast. And Chas, my Reeves drive lathe did indeed have a wider belt like you described, but I've seen others (specifically Grizzlys) that had the narrower belt like this one.
 
Are you sure there really is a problem?:huh: Does it work? Been too long for me to remember perzactly how that belt is supposed to look at different speeds. Two things to try. Take belt off. Easy done with adjustable pulley at widest. Then crank them together to see if the come together. If not try some cleaning and lubing. However, if it works, get in house and start turning.
 
Are you sure there really is a problem?:huh: Does it work? Been too long for me to remember perzactly how that belt is supposed to look at different speeds. Two things to try. Take belt off. Easy done with adjustable pulley at widest. Then crank them together to see if the come together. If not try some cleaning and lubing. However, if it works, get in house and start turning.

That's my next step. I had belt slippage occasionally with my old lathe, which used four stepped pulleys that had to be manually changes, and were always fairly tight. I am certain I will get belt slippage above half speed. I will put some wood in int and try, soon.

Thanks again!
 
Thucktheth!!!!

After I had done the Memsahib's bidding this morning, power washed the patio, whipper snipped the edges of the lawn, dug a deep hole, dug another hole to contain the dirt from the first hole, loaded the truck with a metric tonne of yard waste and concrete scraps and took it to he dump, etc., etc., I got to take a look at the Reeves drive again. It turns out the copious amounts of WD-40 that I sprayed on the spindles last night must have done the job. Today it works perfectly from lo to hi, and very, very smoothly. All she needed was a bit of TLC.

Oh, I exaggerated the chores a bit. I only did the first two things, and aslo power washed the bed of the truck, and the front wheels.
 
Spic and span and Bristol fashion...

I now you are probably getting tired of this by now, but here it is with the ways all cleaned up and waxed, and most of the wood dust wiped off, and ready to go:

glathe09.jpgglathe10.jpgglathe11.jpgglathe12.jpg

Now to make something....
 
Yeah, she does. I just went out to put a piece of wood in it, and it immediately started to rain. I have a piece of cherry just waiting to be turned. The forecast was for occasional showers, but it has started to rain most of the times I have started to do something with this lathe. I'm ready now, weathergods, OK?? :mad:
 
Yeah, she does. I just went out to put a piece of wood in it, and it immediately started to rain. I have a piece of cherry just waiting to be turned. The forecast was for occasional showers, but it has started to rain most of the times I have started to do something with this lathe. I'm ready now, weathergods, OK?? :mad:


Roger,

Nice lathe! I have the lathe with perhaps the worst Reeves drive of all, the Craftsman. I find that if I run it regularly and lube the shafts lightly it works pretty well. I did get the time freeing it down to under an hour before I learned to turn the lathe on and run the speed up and down every week or so even if I didn't have anything to turn. I started with white grease but have went to colloidal graphite, LockEase, might be spelled LockEaze. Either way Ace is the place for a palm sized squeeze bottle or NAPA auto parts. Either may have to order the squeeze bottle but it is my favorite form of delivery. Other places to buy too I'm sure but those are the first two that come to mind.

Congratulations on the new toy! Wife management is a very tricky thing, can be hard to tell who is managing who. :D

Hu
 
Roger,
There's one other problem you may run into with the reeves unit... on the motor shaft of my lathe, there is a 4x4x80 mm keyway that holds the pulleys to the shaft in such a way as to make them turn.... on the moving pulley - the one outside next to the spring - I've had trouble with the keyway slot wallowing out so that the outside pulley will actually turn slightly and the teeth of the pulleys don't mesh... the points will lock and not slide in or out to move the belt.... I usually have to run the speed lever up to where I want it, shut off the lathe, then jiggle the pulleys until the teeth mesh and then slide together.... I've discovered that my keyway has actually broken and I'm missing a length of it.... I just ordered and received a new set of pulleys and a new keyway to fix this problem...... and if your belt slips on the pulleys any, you'll get rubber dust in the space between the pulleys that can play havoc with the movement....
 
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