Ben Brantley
02-29-2008, 2:33 AM
Hi all!
I just purchased a new PM2000 this morning. Due to some unexpected snafus with the unloading process (I'll spare you the details for now), I decided to disassemble the saw at home, still on the truck and the pallet, to make it easier to move the thing into my garage.
I removed the top (easy) but did not know to capture the location of the three copper shims. Oopsee. I guess I will have four possible shim configurations to test. :) Fortunately, the top is easy to put on and take off later.
Next, I removed the linkage arm that supports the riving knife. I thought I needed to do this, because I thought I needed to remove the dust shroud and tubing, because I thought I would need to remove the trunnion to make the thing light enough to move. (That last assumption was incorrect, as it happens; see below.)
Third, I removed the dust shroud and its tube. One convenient and one inconvenient hex bolt and it was off.
Finally, I removed the motor. Doing this required that I remove the belt as well as the wiring. The wiring was locked into the motor's wiring box with some kind of permanent (?) locking device. After ten minutes of fooling with it (prying, stabbing, pinching, etc.), I gave up and just cut the wire so I could get the thing out.
At this point, the saw was light enough for my father and I to ramp it down into the garage, obviating the original plan to remove the trunnion. (Thank goodness; it looked way more complicated than the other parts and like it would be much harder to get replaced and realigned correctly!)
After we got the saw in the (warm) garage, we set about reversing our steps. We re-mounted the motor (using a ceiling-mounted winch, by the way, which made it feasible instead of a pipe dream) and set the belt in place with an arbitrary amount of tension. That prompts question 1: how much tension should we have on this belt? The manual is useless for this kind of thing, and I can't find a technical or service manual online. (And what's up with that?)
Next, I rewired the motor. I had to break off the dumb, permanent plastic doohickey that rigidly held the old cord in place at the motor wiring box. Now I have a cord that is not completely sealed into that box... there's an air gap and it can wiggle. Should I worry about this? I imagine dust will settle into that wiring area if I don't seal it up somehow. I was thinking maybe I would just slap some duct tape on there. Since the other end of the wire is secured where it exits the cabinet, I don't think there's risk of too much tension on the wire at the motor, but you could convince me otherwise.
Continuing our backwards procession, we reinserted and installed the dust shroud and tubing. Unfortunately, we immediately discovered that now the shroud/tubing interface runs into the sidewall of the cabinet when the blade is set to 45 degrees and we attempt full retraction. We did not notice this before we took it apart, but then, we weren't playing with the blade movements at that time either... so, is this standard? Should we just not crank the saw to the stops like that? I feel like we precisely replaced the shroud on its two mounting holes (it would be hard to mess it up since there're no other options even close), but now I wonder who's got the issue here -- us reassemblers, or the saw?
The last piece to go back in was the riving knife linkage assembly. (I have no idea if that's what it's called, but it's one bar in what looks like a regular old four-bar linkage to me, so there you have it.) This thing was a total bear given the way it has a special, third hex bolt that has to go through two pieces with a washer in between. It was trivial to unscrew it, but getting it all back in place was a big to-do! I would be intrigued to hear if anyone else has replaced this bar and found an easier way to get it screwed back together.
I'm pretty new to table saws (and woodworking in general; just starting, really), but I guess I consider myself reasonably competent when it comes to working with machines and putting things together. I'm asking these questions because it was far from a perfect experience so far.
I'll certainly be speaking with Powermatic about these things tomorrow, and they may just answer all my questions to my satisfaction and get me on my way. (If so, I'll post whatever responses I get back to this thread.) But I appreciate your time spent reading about my shenanigans anyway. :)
Ben
I just purchased a new PM2000 this morning. Due to some unexpected snafus with the unloading process (I'll spare you the details for now), I decided to disassemble the saw at home, still on the truck and the pallet, to make it easier to move the thing into my garage.
I removed the top (easy) but did not know to capture the location of the three copper shims. Oopsee. I guess I will have four possible shim configurations to test. :) Fortunately, the top is easy to put on and take off later.
Next, I removed the linkage arm that supports the riving knife. I thought I needed to do this, because I thought I needed to remove the dust shroud and tubing, because I thought I would need to remove the trunnion to make the thing light enough to move. (That last assumption was incorrect, as it happens; see below.)
Third, I removed the dust shroud and its tube. One convenient and one inconvenient hex bolt and it was off.
Finally, I removed the motor. Doing this required that I remove the belt as well as the wiring. The wiring was locked into the motor's wiring box with some kind of permanent (?) locking device. After ten minutes of fooling with it (prying, stabbing, pinching, etc.), I gave up and just cut the wire so I could get the thing out.
At this point, the saw was light enough for my father and I to ramp it down into the garage, obviating the original plan to remove the trunnion. (Thank goodness; it looked way more complicated than the other parts and like it would be much harder to get replaced and realigned correctly!)
After we got the saw in the (warm) garage, we set about reversing our steps. We re-mounted the motor (using a ceiling-mounted winch, by the way, which made it feasible instead of a pipe dream) and set the belt in place with an arbitrary amount of tension. That prompts question 1: how much tension should we have on this belt? The manual is useless for this kind of thing, and I can't find a technical or service manual online. (And what's up with that?)
Next, I rewired the motor. I had to break off the dumb, permanent plastic doohickey that rigidly held the old cord in place at the motor wiring box. Now I have a cord that is not completely sealed into that box... there's an air gap and it can wiggle. Should I worry about this? I imagine dust will settle into that wiring area if I don't seal it up somehow. I was thinking maybe I would just slap some duct tape on there. Since the other end of the wire is secured where it exits the cabinet, I don't think there's risk of too much tension on the wire at the motor, but you could convince me otherwise.
Continuing our backwards procession, we reinserted and installed the dust shroud and tubing. Unfortunately, we immediately discovered that now the shroud/tubing interface runs into the sidewall of the cabinet when the blade is set to 45 degrees and we attempt full retraction. We did not notice this before we took it apart, but then, we weren't playing with the blade movements at that time either... so, is this standard? Should we just not crank the saw to the stops like that? I feel like we precisely replaced the shroud on its two mounting holes (it would be hard to mess it up since there're no other options even close), but now I wonder who's got the issue here -- us reassemblers, or the saw?
The last piece to go back in was the riving knife linkage assembly. (I have no idea if that's what it's called, but it's one bar in what looks like a regular old four-bar linkage to me, so there you have it.) This thing was a total bear given the way it has a special, third hex bolt that has to go through two pieces with a washer in between. It was trivial to unscrew it, but getting it all back in place was a big to-do! I would be intrigued to hear if anyone else has replaced this bar and found an easier way to get it screwed back together.
I'm pretty new to table saws (and woodworking in general; just starting, really), but I guess I consider myself reasonably competent when it comes to working with machines and putting things together. I'm asking these questions because it was far from a perfect experience so far.
I'll certainly be speaking with Powermatic about these things tomorrow, and they may just answer all my questions to my satisfaction and get me on my way. (If so, I'll post whatever responses I get back to this thread.) But I appreciate your time spent reading about my shenanigans anyway. :)
Ben