Harbor Freight 4x6 Tracking Adjsutment

royesses

royesses

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Rest In Peace
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Aug 23, 2014
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When adjusting blade tracking many new owners can't get the blade to fully seat on the drive wheel while it is almost against the flange on the idler wheel. The manual says the blade should be not quite against the flange on both wheels. But the manual does a poor job of explaining how to do this. The blade should be fully on the wheels with without rubbing on the flange. The teeth of the blade should not contact the wheel.

Bolt 24 moves the idler in and out. Bolt 25 Adjusts the tilt of the idler. If you have lets say 1/4" clearance between the blade and flange on the drive wheel but there is the correct clearance on the idler wheel the idler wheel needs to move inward about 1/4". You do this by first loosening the blade tension just enough so you are not fighting against extra pressure on the adjustment bolts. Next you loosen the bolt 25 (angle adjustment) since it presses against the bottom of the idler wheel mount block about a turn or two. Then tighten the bolt 24 which pulls the idler wheel mount in, about the amount you need to get the proper blade clearance on the drive wheel. Then just tighten the bolt 25 just to snug it against the idler wheel mount. Set the tension you want on the blade and check tracking. If the blade still sticks out too much on the drive wheel move the idler wheel in that amount and use the bolt 25 to get the blade clearance the same on both wheels. Bolt 25 counteracts the effect of blade tension. It only takes a couple of minutes to do this. This is how I set my 4x6.

I've seen in other forums all kinds of cures including turn the wheels, making shims to move the wheels and other cures. It is frustrating for someone who purchases his first 4x6 band saw and then can't get it set up according to the procedures in the manual. Since I point users on other forums to The Hobby Machinist I thought this might help them out. I realize the guys on this forum don't need this help but many new guys might.

Roy
 
I think after I rebuilt my 70s Taiwan-made saw one of the first things I did was lay a straight edge from wheel to wheel to check that they were in the same plane- I made a couple adjustments to get them aligned including adding a thin washer under the drive wheel spindle to bring the wheel out slightly from stock. I think it was a clearance issue with the saw body- I forget exactly, but it tracks great now

-Mark
 
It very commendable to put things like this here because it seems to be a very visible site and also if they have another problem or question somebody won't take their head off :) it was trying to find info on the start cap on my old shaper and nowhere else could I find what the cap was supposed to be that brought me here. :encourage:
 
Trying to improve this somehow, we are one of small saw maker, hope we can get a better design in the future!
 
Where I used to work we had a 4x6 Jet. It was being used on a daily basis by in between 40 and 100+ because the crews would expand and contract with jobs and how many temps they'd hire. So that saw was being used all day everyday but by very sketchy guys. Besides putting a new blade on it periodically there was no maintenance. The blade started popping off and it got to where it wouldn't stay at all. In this case the drive wheel was very sloppy and it was the bearings in the gearbox. I replaced them and tracked it and it was good as new. Then the field crew found out and took it and was never seen again. I set the tracking on mine when I got it 40yrs ago and not touched it since. I don't ever remember seeing a mod of the stock tracking mechanism on the 4x6, anybody else?
 
royesses said:
I've seen in other forums all kinds of cures including turn the wheels, making shims to move the wheels and other cures. It is frustrating for someone who purchases his first 4x6 band saw and then can't get it set up according to the procedures in the manual. Since I point users on other forums to The Hobby Machinist I thought this might help them out. I realize the guys on this forum don't need this help but many new guys might.
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Who knows all you've helped with your post Royesses. This like so many other forums I've been on has this huge mass of surfing watchers and who knows what they get because there's never any feedback. I just checked and there are 128 members and 545 guests! It dawns on me it might just be needed instruction not a design problem. Granted some machines can come from the factory with major defects. But I would be willing to bet there is a ton of user error involved.

I've talked to other manufacturers and manuals are a major problem. One guy told me don't bother. He looked me straight in the eye and said have you ever referred to the manual? I had to admit I mostly only look at the parts breakdown if there's a problem. Mainly because a lifetime of dealing with manuals has left me very skeptical of their use. I have a neighbor who that was her job writing and editing manuals and she has no clue about tools or fixing things.

More and more all of us are turning to YouTube if we have a problem. A good 10min video by a guy who knows what he's talking about is better than any manual. Case in point. I decided my 5x6 is a poor and dangerous substitute for a vertical bandsaw. I found an old HF 14" all cast iron on CL for $50. I was going to overhaul and mod it to cut steel as it was a wood cutting bandsaw. I figured the saw had problems and was right. The present owner had never been able to use it because he couldn't keep the blade on it, neither had the original owner before him. The guy was shocked I still wanted it. Upon inspection the tracking block was so mangled I had to buy a new one. There were other problems but all easily fixed. When I went to track it I went with what I thought I knew from years of using, tracking and replacing blades on other vertical saw's I'd used. It worked but it didn't seem right and it wasn't cutting straight. So I went to YouTube and found this. Mr Snodgrass in 35min addressed every single thing I thought I knew about tracking a bandsaw and realized I don't have any clue where I got all those "truths" and every single one of them was dead wrong. Used what I learned in that vid and the saw works and cuts perfectly.
 
C-Bag said:
Who knows all you've helped with your post Royesses. This like so many other forums I've been on has this huge mass of surfing watchers and who knows what they get because there's never any feedback. I just checked and there are 128 members and 545 guests! It dawns on me it might just be needed instruction not a design problem. Granted some machines can come from the factory with major defects. But I would be willing to bet there is a ton of user error involved.

I've talked to other manufacturers and manuals are a major problem. One guy told me don't bother. He looked me straight in the eye and said have you ever referred to the manual? I had to admit I mostly only look at the parts breakdown if there's a problem. Mainly because a lifetime of dealing with manuals has left me very skeptical of their use. I have a neighbor who that was her job writing and editing manuals and she has no clue about tools or fixing things.

More and more all of us are turning to YouTube if we have a problem. A good 10min video by a guy who knows what he's talking about is better than any manual. Case in point. I decided my 5x6 is a poor and dangerous substitute for a vertical bandsaw. I found an old HF 14" all cast iron on CL for $50. I was going to overhaul and mod it to cut steel as it was a wood cutting bandsaw. I figured the saw had problems and was right. The present owner had never been able to use it because he couldn't keep the blade on it, neither had the original owner before him. The guy was shocked I still wanted it. Upon inspection the tracking block was so mangled I had to buy a new one. There were other problems but all easily fixed. When I went to track it I went with what I thought I knew from years of using, tracking and replacing blades on other vertical saw's I'd used. It worked but it didn't seem right and it wasn't cutting straight. So I went to YouTube and found this. Mr Snodgrass in 35min addressed every single thing I thought I knew about tracking a bandsaw and realized I don't have any clue where I got all those "truths" and every single one of them was dead wrong. Used what I learned in that vid and the saw works and cuts perfectly.
Click to expand...
Great video!

I'm guessing that you had to do some fashion of speed reduction on the 14" bandsaw?
 
Yup, big time. From 3k' per min down to 110' per min. I ended up making a double belt reduction mostly out of stuff in the "engineer to stock" pile. I look at it now 5yrs later and wonder how I came up with that.
 
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