No torque - belt adjustment or motor?

[Dan Forman]

I know nothing about Reeve's drives, but from the sound of things, this is the best excuse short of a complete meltdown that you are likely to get for a nice lathe upgrade. Given the new coring set, and the strain it will place on the Gray Lady, might be time to give her a break and get something with EVS and a little more horsepower. If the finances aren't there yet, hope you can get the old gal back in working order soon.

Dan

[Josh Bowman]

Kathy,
I was thinking, a little while back you had a no start problem. You found the 'slow start' relay to be the cause. You don't think bypassing it caused a problem do you?

[Jeff Nicol]

Kathy, I agree with curt on this one, the pulleys are most likely not moving freely to allow the speed to change smoothly and to change at all. The belts or belt can wear out but you would still have some speed changes and at certain points when the pulleys are at their smallest is where you would possibly see slipping but not real loose or sloppy belts. So if you are going to go through and clean everything you may as well put new belts on too. The shined up pulley surfaces really have little to do with things and the smooth surface makes better contact with the belts so scuffing them up will just wear on the belts and potentially wear the pulley out sooner.

Dry graphite powder works well for a lubricant and does not attract dust like oils and grease. Just keep it blown out with air every few days and you should be OK.

New lathe is best fix, good luck,

Jeff

[Kathy Marshall]

Thanks for all the suggestions!
It looks like it is a belt issue (what a relief! I looked up a replacement motor and Delta gets $650 for one!). The belts weren't just loose, they weren't even just sloppy, they were barely making contact with the pulleys. In fact I was able to remove the belt on the motor side without even loosening the tension.
Made a trip to Napa Auto and was able to get the motor belt, the spindle belt will be in tomorrow. I almost went with a link belt, but they wanted $19 a foot and I'd neet 6 feet ! Needless to say I went with the standard V belt.
I installed the belt on the motor side when I got home and it was enough of an improvement that I was able to finish turning the largest ash bowl . When I finished with that, I tore apart the headstock so it will be ready to install the new belt as soon as I get home, and still have time to test it out! The disassembly went very well, everything unscrewed or came off fairly easy and no pieces were lost in the shavings!
The probem with the belts wasn't so much due to stretching, it was more that the sides of the belts wore down making them narrower so they sat deeper in the v of the pulley. The old belts measured 7/16" for the spindle belt and 1/2" for the motor belt, I didn't measure the new belt but it was a little wider than the motor belt, so I suspect the spindle belt has lost over a 1/6" in width.
Hopefully this will help other turners that may run into this problem.

[Curt Fuller]

Glad you got it up and going again. Just out of curiosity, does your Delta have two belts, one from the motor to one side of the Reeves setup and another between the two Reeves pulleys? On my Oliver there is only one belt, the spring loaded sliding pulley is on the end of the motor shaft. That's why there is no belt adjustment.

[Bernie Weishapl]

Glad to see ya got it figured out Kathy.

[Kathy Marshall]

Glad you got it up and going again. Just out of curiosity, does your Delta have two belts, one from the motor to one side of the Reeves setup and another between the two Reeves pulleys? On my Oliver there is only one belt, the spring loaded sliding pulley is on the end of the motor shaft. That's why there is no belt adjustment.

Thanks Curt!
Yes, there are 2 belts from the motor to the reeves drive and from the spindle to the reeves drive. The reeves pulley has a floating center, as one belt is tightened and pulled deeper into the V, it forces the floating center towards the other belt forcing it to run higher in the V. The explanation may not be technically correct, but that's how I see it.
When both belts are worn, everything just kinda flops around !

[Sid Matheny]

After looking at the parts lists I see why you were having problems. Don't think I have ever seen a reeves drive that used 2 belts.
http://www.ereplacementparts.com/del...659_14238.html

Sid

[Dale Coons]

Have the same lathe. If its not a gummed up tensioner or belt (the most likely culprits) it may really be time for a new lathe. My SIL tried to change the speed on mine a couple of years ago while the motor was off and manage to bust one side of the pulleys. Delta doesn't sell the pulleys separately anymore--the 'kit' was a couple hundred dollars and about a 6 month wait while it was on 'back order'. Good luck, you do beautiful work!

[Paul Williams]

Kathy, I am glad you got that fixed. An open question for the people familiar with that lathe. Wouldn't this be a natural for a veritable speed motor conversion?

[Don Alexander]

not only a skilled turner but a lathe mechanic as well