Trouble with my Grizzly 1023 table saw

[Nicholas Bukky]

Any one else have there bearings go out on their arbor?

I was ripping maple yesterday and the bearing closest to the motor went out and made me PUCKER!!:eek: I spent last night tearing it apart and half the morning putting it back together. Luckly there is a bearing supplier close by and they had a match in stock.

I've had the saw for just about two years and have used it heavily in my little one man shop. I really did not expect that type of failure so soon.
It's been a great saw and now I hope to get another two out of it.


Nick

[Andrew Schlosser]

I suspected that I had bearing issues in the bearing closer to the blade. Started up and sounded ok during normal operation, but when the blade was spinning down, the blade wobbled. I could not detect a wobble otherwise with a dial indicator and hand spinning the motor/blade. Perhaps if I could have uncoupled the blade from the motor and gotten a higher spin rate, I would have aggravated the issue.

Never got around to fixing it, as I just sold my saw 2 weeks ago.

[glenn bradley]

There are plenty of people on here with that saw who have not had the problem. Obviously there are many variables; duration and intensity of use, environment and so forth. A failure at two years does seem premature. Taking things apart is no fun but when I replace bearings I go for the best I can get. As an example, I upgrade from the factory bearings to double-shielded on a recent bandsaw service. This will vary with speed requirements and all that. Any good bearing place can steer you right.

[Nicholas Bukky]

I think the new ones I got will last, they are high quality. If it makes as much money these next two years as it did the last I will gladly put in another set:D It has been well used daily and it was well used today!

Thanks,
Nick

[Rich Aldrich]

I had issues with the bearings and arbor on my G1023. Vibration was the symptom, especially a certain speed the saw would go through when the blade would coast down - it had to be a resonance. Anyway, I found the bearings spun on the arbor. It was getting bad enough the blade would shift when the saw was started up, so it was difficult to rip accurately.

I replaced the bearings with SKF, my favorite bearing. I bought a new arbor from Griz. It runs nice and smooth now.

[Steve Clardy]

My 1023 is 13-14 years old now. Original bearings.
Used almost daily

[eugene thomas]

just replaced arbor bearings in my saw last year. well bought in 1994 so can't complain.

[scott vroom]

Bearings should not have worn out in 2 years. I would have asked Grizzly to provide new bearings. I know, it's a 1 year warranty....but never hurts to ask. I think Shiraz would agree bearings should last well beyond 2 years.

[Ken Fitzgerald]

Scott,

I'll disagree, I don't think anyone can take the liberty of speaking for Shiraz but Shiraz.

2ndly, the OP said they'd been heavily used. If he's like me, heavily used means HEAVILY USED and in that case 2 years might be a reasonable expectation.

It's just like buying a car. If a 2 year old car has 40,000 miles on it or 130,000 miles on it which would you want to buy and which would you expect to have more problems?

Like wise that same 2 year old car might have been used for 40,000 miles but all of it at 120 mph so which would you want to buy?

I have a CT scanner that does 10 patients a day and one that does 35 patients a day. I have had to install 3 times as many x-ray tubes on one as the other. Care to guess which one has had the most tubes installed on it?

The type of use a machine experiences has a whole lot to do with the life of certain parts! I deal with that everyday.

[Paul Ryan]

I completely agree with Ken, it all depends on use. I once put a complete rebuilt 7.3 diesel in a Ford F-350. The truck only had 4,500 miles on it. But it had a little over 9000 hours on the motor. I was used in by a railroad company. 9000 hours comes out to be about 400k miles of basically idle time. So it all depends on use.

One word of advise if your belts are overly tight that can take out arbor bearings prematurly.

[Nicholas Bukky]

It's fine now with the new bearings installed and I don't blame the quality of the saw for the failure. That's why I didn't bother calling grizzly. It would have taken them longer to ship me parts than for me to run to town and get them myself. I can't afford that much down time with a main tool.
I didn't realize how much I use it till it didn't work:eek:

If I use it as much these next two years as I have the last two it will still be paying the bills!!
That saw helped me move out of my three car garage and into a 2400sqft shop I built this spring. I hope to keep growing

Thanks for your replies,
Nick

Paul how do you know if your belts are to tight?

[Paul Ryan]

It is hard for me to say it is just a feeling thing. I have replaced belts on cars and machinery for years. If you have never replaced the belts then I wouldn't attribute it to that. But if they are so tight the barley deflect when pulled on then they are too tight. On a table saw they should be snug, I know that doesn't tell you much. But those that are in the "never to tight" crowd will tighten belts until they sing like a band saw blade. That is too tight and will wear out bearings. If they have some deflection say about 1/2" in they should be good. But that is a 1/2 with a resonable amount of tension. If you have to lean back and get your back into it to get 1/2" then it is too tight. Sorry I cannot shed more light. Just understand they can be to tight.

[Gary McKown]

When I got my 1023SL used, it had that wobble on shutdown. I first suspected the arbor bearings, but there seemed to be no play in them whatsoever. Watching the motor "hop" a tiny bit during the shutdown braking led me to believe the belts were too loose. Making them REALLY tight eliminated the wobble, but I thought they probably were too tight. Inspecting the belts, I found that they looked fine but seemed to be overly stiff. Replaced them with the Grizzly link belt set, and no more wobble (or bang on startup) even through a fair range of tightness.

I had read that one should not use link belts in a multiple-belt setup, because they would naturally be a bit different in length. Either I lucked out, or an exact match is not necessary with links, because they have been working fine now for almost three years.

[Stephen Edwards]

Scott,

I'll disagree, I don't think anyone can take the liberty of speaking for Shiraz but Shiraz.

+1, ditto, etc. Grizzly has such great CS, in my experience, that I accept the 1 year warranty for what it is. One year. I'll give you an example.

In 2008 I bought one of their HSS brad point drill bit sets. Last week I had occasion to use the 1/8" bit for the first time. Unfortunately, it was badly out of round, quite the wobble to it. I couldn't remember what month I bought the set. I called Grizzly CS, gave them my customer number and asked what month I bought it. Turns out it was in July 2008, thus beyond the warranty period.

I didn't expect nor ask for a replacement bit. The few minor issues that I've had with machine parts or tools that were under warranty and have called for replacements, their CS department has never questioned my integrity or my honesty. They've just sent out a new part, without asking that I return the defective part.

Lesson learned for me: The next time that I buy a set of bits (and I will buy more), I'll chuck all of 'em up in the DP to check 'em for true as soon as I get them. I did that last week on the set that I bought last year. As luck would have it, the two bits that I hadn't used (1/8 and 7/16) were the only two out of round!

As for the bearing issue on the OP's saw, I would hope that I'd get more than two years service from them. On the other hand, it sounds like you've had good service and worked the machine hard for the two years that you've had it.

I was having problems with the blade guide bearings on my G0555X. Grizzly sent free replacements, no questions asked. I still had the same problem. I upgraded to a better, more expensive bearing. The upgraded bearings weren't super expensive, either. Problem solved.

In regards to my Grizzly BS, that one bearing issue is the only problem that I've had with a part. I suppose I could have spent several hundred dollars more for another brand of saw and perhaps not have had that minor bearing problem. But, 4 top of the line blade guide bearings ain't worth a few extra hundred bucks to me!