MM16 will not start

[Gary Cioni]

Just took delivery of a MM16. I spent a few hours getting it cleaned and set up in my shop today. I went out picked up some wire and a plug and wired it up. Turned on the power and nothing. Double checked the wiring and everything checked out fine as far as power to the saw.
I checked the lower micro switch on the foot brake and reset it still nothing. I do not know how to check the switches to see if they are working properly(electric wise). I cleaned them well and they sound fine. Anyone have any ideas?

[Mike Weaver]

In my case, I had the wiring wrong...

Do you have a multi-meter? If so, you might be able to test connectivity of the micro switches.

In any case, I'm sure a call to MM is in order to let them know about your troubles.

-Mike

[Howie French]

just a thought..

make sure Red Off button is not pressed in, need to turn to release.
Good Luck !

Howie

[Joe Jensen]

Just took delivery of a MM16. I spent a few hours getting it cleaned and set up in my shop today. I went out picked up some wire and a plug and wired it up. Turned on the power and nothing. Double checked the wiring and everything checked out fine as far as power to the saw.
I checked the lower micro switch on the foot brake and reset it still nothing. I do not know how to check the switches to see if they are working properly(electric wise). I cleaned them well and they sound fine. Anyone have any ideas?

Do you have a blade installed? I know on mine if the ceramic guides are too tight, the saw won't start....joe

[Mike Heidrick]

Just took delivery of a MM16. I spent a few hours getting it cleaned and set up in my shop today. I went out picked up some wire and a plug and wired it up. Turned on the power and nothing. Double checked the wiring and everything checked out fine as far as power to the saw.
I checked the lower micro switch on the foot brake and reset it still nothing. I do not know how to check the switches to see if they are working properly(electric wise). I cleaned them well and they sound fine. Anyone have any ideas?

Tell us about the wiring.

[Greg Ladd]

Gary,

Check out the Minimax USA website video. There are various videos on their that reference bandsaw setup. My guess is one of the microswitches is out of alignment.

Good luck. You will love that bandsaw once you get it running.

Greg

[Aaron Montgomery]

I had (have) an issue with mine where it would not start depending on how the switch cover was attached. I never determined what was the cause of the problem, but I was able to adjust it such that it starts reliably. One of these days when I'm back in the shop, I'll investigate more fully, but for now it works on the rare occasion that I ask it to.

[Jim Flynn]

Gary, I also just took delivery on a new MM16. The switch on this is a little different and more sensitive than the ones on my CU300Smart. You need to ensure that when you twist the red button to release it that it comes all the way out then I have to give it a second twist before the on switch will activate the saw. Hard to explain but give it a shot.

[Dan Siedschlag]

Also make sure you are pushing the "on" switch fully in. When I first connected my saw I heard what sounded like a relay when I hit the switch but the motor wouldn't start. After talking with MM it turned out I wasn't fully hitting the switch. When I pushed it fully on, it started right up. The switch had a much longer throw than I had imagined.

[Doug Shepard]

Have you tried dialing up the setting on the little dial underneath the switch cover? I had a somewhat similar problem right after getting mine and it turned out to be a combination of a bad switch and dial setting too low. Here's the thread with the history. There might be something in there that you haven't tried yet.
http://www.sawmillcreek.org/showthread.php?t=30647

[Greg Billus]

This happened to me a while back when I received my MM16. Here's
what I did after talking with MM.

First unplug the machine, get your ear close to the switch as
you plug the machine back in. You should hear a soft click,
this is the coil in the switch receiving power. If you hear the
click it's probably either a bad main switch or micro switch. To make
sure it's not the micro switches try shimming between the switch
and the covers to make sure the switches close. You can do this with
the covers open, and just close the switches manually, just don't
have a blade installed and keep your fingers clear especially on the
lower micro switches.

In my case I didn't get the soft click, so on to the next step.

In this case you can either have a bad main switch or it's mis-wired,
as in my case. Now unscrew the switch from the machine,
with it unplugged, of course. With the wiring diagram included
with the machine you'll see there is the incoming 220v power
and two loops, one for the upper micro switch and one for the two
lower micro switches. In my case the wires were all crossed up. The
lower switches were wired in parallel not series and the upper loop
was miswired so the coil wasn't receiving power. I rewired the switch
as descibed in the wiring diagram, and viloa a soft click when plugged
in and the saw started just fine.

Good luck.

[Gary Cioni]

Thanks to everyone for your input. I will give your suggestions a try.

["Gary Brewer"]

Hi Gary: Just curious if you got a solution to your mm16 problem?
Gary