I was threading a brass rod when all of a sudden my Lathe seized up. One of the belts started squealing and the chuck quit turning. I hit the emergency stop button and and ran for the circuit breaker and opened it too. I'm thinking to myself, HTF can a belt drive Lathe head with Timken taper bearing in an oil bath seize up? After a moment or two to allow my nerves to settle down I opened the lid and had a look. I released the belt lever and disengaged the back gears. Immediately the Spindle loosened up. The jack shaft gears were free as well. That's when I noticed the pulley between the spindle back gears is what had seized up. I removed the chuck and went ahead and started the process of removing the spindle. When I removed the set screw holding the pulley locking ring and started tap it off I accidentally hit the pulley with my plastic face hammer which magically loosened it up. The back gears are helical cut so they put pressure on the pulley back gear and that set screw. After almost 30 years of use the slight clearance required between the spindle back gear and the pulley and it's back gear became zero, and so the friction became so high it seized. No damage was done at all. I went ahead and changed the oil for the bearings and set the clearances between the spindle components. While I was at it I pulled the jack gear out, cleaned and lubed it too. I also fine tuned the belt adjustments. From now on I'm going to do this once a year. This scared the crap out of me!
Oh crap, my Lathe seized up!
- Thread starter n4zou
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