Poly "V" belt slips

[CPeter James]

I bought one of the Sears Drill presses last fall on the "special" sale. For $179, it was a good buy, but not worth $529 or even $329. One problem is that the poly "V" belt slips on the pulleys. The pulleys have some sort of coating on them. It appears to be harder than paint and I suspect it is anodized. Any ideas on how to stop the slipping. I have the belts as tight as I dare.

CPeter

[Hank Knight]

Have you used belt dressing? It's purpose is to reduce belt slippage. You can probably find it at your automotive supply store.

[Justin McCurdy]

Some will probably disagree, but try using some coarse sandpaper on the pulleys to rough up the surface.

[glenn bradley]

Before using a belt dressing (nothing wrong with it) I would clean pulleys and belts thoroughly with DNA, Naptha or the like. This will pretty much remove any foreign 'stuff' that may not be visible.

[Frank Drew]

Try a link belt.

Would a link belt work on pulleys designed for poly-v belts (are there link belts designed to substitute for poly-v belts)?

[Howard Acheson]

There is no reason to expect link belts to work better. Like others, I would suggest that you clean the existing belts and be sure the grooves in the pulleys are clean. There is no reason why the belt(s) supplied with the drill should not work fine.

[John Gornall]

A V-belt or a poly V-belt grips because the sides of the V bulge out when it is bent around a pulley. The bulging grips the sides of the pulley Vees. The belt should not be very tight. The grip is lost if the belt bottoms out, if the belt is worn, or if the pulley and belt don't fit together correctly.

Over many years in an industrial situation I have seen many belt problems which were solved by installing a quality brand name belt. Many of the no name import belts just aren't made right. I remember a case where we were breaking belts weekly and buying the belts from the machine supplier, same no name belt that came on the machine. I bought a case of name brand belts from a local supplier and over the next 10 years we never broke a belt.

[glenn bradley]

Would a link belt work on pulleys designed for poly-v belts (are there link belts designed to substitute for poly-v belts)?

Link belts will not work on poly-v pulleys.

[Frank Drew]

Thanks, Glenn; I wondered if there was something new on the market that I didn't know about.