Horizontal mill spindle is stuck

[ecdez]

Well, almost. I can still turn it a little, but it's fighting me.

It's a B&S 1 1/2 and has been working fine until a few hours ago. I have narrowed it down to the spindle bearings but when I check them they are full of oil so no obvious cause for a problem. Spindle looks to be difficult to remove so I'd like to avoid that if possible. I was thinking of draining the oil from the spindle bearings, soaking it down with carb cleaner or diesel or something, dry it out and fill it back up. Any glaring problems with this plan?

Hard as it may be to believe, this machine is the workhorse of my shop so I need it back up and running as soon as possible.

Pictures of machine below.



front of spindle


rear of spindle
you can see oil drain plug and large spanner nuts on spindle


oil input (front and back are same)
you can also see front spanner nuts

 

[Terrywerm]

Being full of oil does not guarantee that one of the bearings has not failed for some reason.

Case in point: Semi truck. '85 Peterbilt to be exact (this happened in early 1986). Drive axles use roller bearings throughout. Oil levels are fine. Still under factory warranty, less than one year old, less than 100,000 miles on it. Big bearing on the pinion of the rear drive axle locks up at about 65 MPH. That pinion not only stopped turning, it stripped the teeth off of the ring gear, broke the axle housing, and dropped the intermediate drive shaft between the two drive axles, turning it into a steel pretzel.

Needless to say I needed a change of underwear after that. They were able to pinpoint the bearing as the culprit, but were not able to determine why that bearing failed.

If it is the workhorse of your shop, and you depend on it almost daily, you might just want to tear it apart and find out for sure just what went wrong so that proper repairs can be performed. Downtime costs you money too, but doing a makeshift repair just to have it go down on you again later is an even bigger loss of time and money.

 

[4GSR]

First thing I would do is pull the drain plugs from each oil reservoir on both the front and rear bearings. Then refill with a ISO 46 R & O type oil. I think this would be a Mobile Veocite oil. I don't use Mobile oil, so I don't know. See if this helps.

Also, does either bearing get warm or hot?

Last, its been many years since I messed with one of these mills, I believe there are felts or cotton duck material used as capillaries to get oil to the bearings. These felts may be harden from old oils and need tp be replaced. Last, the front bearing rides on a taper on to OD of the spindle. The bearing adjustment maybe out of wack causing the bearing to get tight from the lubrication being starved from the bearing.

Ken

 

[ecdez]

If it is the workhorse of your shop, and you depend on it almost daily, you might just want to tear it apart and find out for sure just what went wrong so that proper repairs can be performed. Downtime costs you money too, but doing a makeshift repair just to have it go down on you again later is an even bigger loss of time and money.

That's the truth right there. I guess my biggest concern in tearing it apart is either screwing something up in the process or not being able to even get it apart. Best I can figure from the catalogues this machine is pre WW1. It's probably never been apart before and has 0 runout at the spindle. After I'm done, who knows. On the other hand, it does me no good at all with a stuck spindle.

First thing I would do is pull the drain plugs from each oil reservoir on both the front and rear bearings. Then refill with a ISO 46 R & O type oil. I think this would be a Mobile Veocite oil. I don't use Mobile oil, so I don't know. See if this helps.

Also, does either bearing get warm or hot?

Last, its been many years since I messed with one of these mills, I believe there are felts or cotton duck material used as capillaries to get oil to the bearings. These felts may be harden from old oils and need tp be replaced. Last, the front bearing rides on a taper on to OD of the spindle. The bearing adjustment maybe out of wack causing the bearing to get tight from the lubrication being starved from the bearing.

Ken

Since I have to drain the oil anyway, I might as well take a peek down the fill hole to see what I can see. It's a generous size hole. Wermie is right though, if I'm in the shop this machine is running. I can't afford to have it down. I was just thinking earlier this week about how I need to have another large horizontal. There's always a pile of stuff waiting to be run through it. It would be good to split that pile between two machines and in this case have a backup.

Of course there's no info that I could find regarding procedure for pulling this thing out. I guess I'll document it for future reference.

Sigh.

 

[ecdez]

I got out there a little before work this morning and got the rear chain drive cover off. There's a sprocket that doesn't seem to want to budge. I couldn't find any set screws or pins. Before I crank down on the gear puller I figured I better double check to see if anyone had experience with this. I sure don't want to break it since it's probably the only one on the planet.

As a side note, the spanner nut came off freely. If the rest are just as nice it may not be so bad. I also drained the oil and there does appear to be some felt like material in there. The rear bearing is not stuck as it has about 1/16" of play. It's just wobbling around in there and moves freely. I guess this may be for the best after all.

 

[yendor]

When you drain the oil STRAIN it thru a cheap but fine mesh Kitchen Sieve, and look for metal bits.

I rebuild vintage motorcycles and every one when I start a project each gets its oil strained just to see if there will be any surprises.

 

[ecdez]

I will do that for future drains, but these two have already been drained. For as full as they looked from the top, surprisingly little oil came out of the bottom. Something tells me there is probably a gooey mess in there.

 

[Smithdoor]

I have filed the draw bar hole with grease and put very close fitting dowel in the draw bar and use a 10lb hammer
FYI use rags around dowel or you will were some of grease

Good luck
Dave

I got out there a little before work this morning and got the rear chain drive cover off. There's a sprocket that doesn't seem to want to budge. I couldn't find any set screws or pins. Before I crank down on the gear puller I figured I better double check to see if anyone had experience with this. I sure don't want to break it since it's probably the only one on the planet.

As a side note, the spanner nut came off freely. If the rest are just as nice it may not be so bad. I also drained the oil and there does appear to be some felt like material in there. The rear bearing is not stuck as it has about 1/16" of play. It's just wobbling around in there and moves freely. I guess this may be for the best after all.


View attachment 91059

 

[rafe]

I would clean the shaft and gear a lot more and inspect it to see if there is something holding it in place,I don't think it would just sit there. It could be a ridge from wear!? Or a pin or set screw . If you find nothing tighten up your puller and give it a sharp smack straight in on the tighening bolt and see if it loosens ....HTH

 

[ecdez]

Took a wire brush to it at lunch and still can't see anything. The shaft is keyed but the sprocket is not. There are two holes on the end that appear to be for roll pins or something like that. Might be just a press fit .





I backed off the spanner nut and I think I might see the answer or at least a clue. Looks like the hub of the sprocket assembly is recessed into this brass piece about 1/16". Perhaps squeezing this gap closed is what keeps it in place. Doesn't seem likely though as I know the sprocket turns but I don't ever recall seeing this nut rotating.

I'll fool around with it some more tonight. I sprayed it down with WD so I'll try that first. If it still won't move, maybe put a little heat on it and see if it helps.