What happened?
Yesterday, @ross reported that the lift on the thicknesser wasn’t moving. Not going up more specifically.
What did i do?
Today I came and check what’s going on with the machine. This machine moves the bed up and down thanks to an ACME screw that’s drive by the wheel in the front of the machine that moves two bevel gears.
This bevel gears are made out of plastic. The small bevel gear, that’s attach to the shaft with the handle, has wear and the flat features have round up.
The machine got stuck around 200mm or so, so im guessing at this point the mechanism needs more torque and the gear snaps and gets stuck.
I drive the acme thread by hand, until the mechanism was able to move the bed up and down again.
Once i got enough clearance i was able to disassemble the mechanism to inspect the parts confirming my suspicions.
Now I have assemble the thing again and place two metal shims so the gear is holding better now.
What are we going to do?
I already sent an email to felder to order a new part. Once this comes, we replace the part and move on.
What happens in the meantime
The machine is working just fine. I’d recommend the following:
- Try not to lower the bed below 170mm. (this is the minimum to park the hood on jointer mode).
- Pay attention when using the bed lock (eg. Don’t crank the bed with the lock on).
