Jack Petropoulos
03-29-2022, 9:29 AM
I picked up a Rockwell RC33 in nice condition but found that the head would creep up as I ran stock through. As an example, my finished stock might be 2" thick at one end and 2 3/16" at the other. When I would release the head lock to adjust the height the head would drop noticeably. No amount of tightening of the head locks would prevent this. I spent hours on this and other forums trying to figure it out. After finding the great video by Steven Woodward (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zFdcSKi47ZU) as a reference, I decided to do a complete rebuild.
I found that the head locking mechanism was pretty fouled up and I wouldn’t be surprised if it failed to clamp down on the posts adequately. The blades were also pretty dull.
After finally getting it all back together this afternoon it is cutting perfectly….. end to end, side to side and with less snipe. I can’t say for sure what the problem was but I will bet it was either the locks or the blades or both.
Though the project was intimidating at first…... like most things, once you commit you find a way to get it done. I encourage anyone to take this on. You will learn a lot about your machine and get a finely tuned asset at the end.
Jack
I found that the head locking mechanism was pretty fouled up and I wouldn’t be surprised if it failed to clamp down on the posts adequately. The blades were also pretty dull.
After finally getting it all back together this afternoon it is cutting perfectly….. end to end, side to side and with less snipe. I can’t say for sure what the problem was but I will bet it was either the locks or the blades or both.
Though the project was intimidating at first…... like most things, once you commit you find a way to get it done. I encourage anyone to take this on. You will learn a lot about your machine and get a finely tuned asset at the end.
Jack