Help with Jet 15 HH planer belts

[Bob Grier]

The first time I used the planer I noticed belt dust outside the belt cover. Hours later I removing the belts, cleaned the dust up and adjusting the motor mount to align the motor and head pulleys, I reinstalled the belts and tried again. Same thing but this time I noticed the pulleys were hot to the touch. (They could have been hot after the first time I ran the machine, I don't know.) I checked the pulley alignment and they were not coplanar due to the belt tension deflecting the motor mount. I called Jet to discuss belt tension, heat, pulley alignment, and belt dust. They said belt dust will disappear soon and said they haven't had problems with the belts or alignment. They said I should adjust the pulleys to be coplanar and everything should be good. I tried again and this time I used shims under the motor mount and tightened the belts enough so they would not slap the belt shroud at start up and at the same time be coplanar. I talked to the people where I bought the planer and they thought a motor mount attachment might be broken. It isn't. It just flexes.

The planer has only about an hour on it and both the motor and head pulleys get up to 175 degrees, plus or minus a few degrees after five minutes planing. It does smell of hot rubber. Not much dust anymore but there is still some. This does not seem right to me but I do not know what to do. It is hard to describe how tight the belts are but they are tighter than I would like them to be. I also took flash pictures of the belts while running to see if they were slipping. They did slip while running as well as at start up when tension was at the original factory? setting. They continued to slip as I tightened the belts but now for some reason I am unable to get good pictures so don't know if they slip at the current higher tension.

The machine does a really nice job of surfacing even difficult wood and it is relatively quiet. I do enjoy using it but am concerned about the high temperatures.

I will probably try talking to Jet again but am wondering if anyone has similar experience or suggestions?

Thank you,

Bob

[Mike Cutler]

Bob

I've owned the same basic machine, minus the helical head, for ~ 10 years. The belt dust is messy on mine also, and I too thought it was going to shred one of those belts, but it never did.
I drove myself crazy the first year or so about it, and then just got over it. I took one down to NAPA to find a replacement belt for it incase they ever did smoke themselves, but the OEM's are still on there. Although I did take the cover off last week and know that they are starting to look "thinner",a nd I'm going to replace them with a higher quality belt.
My personal take is that they are crappy belts to start with, and I think slightly the wrong size. My own opinion though.
I would hesitate to keep tightening up on the belts. There are three of them and they should provide sufficient tension as a group. I'd rather have the belts slip, than transfer that energy to the head mechanism given a choice.

BTW. It's a great planer. Mine is a little beast, and I've run some nasty stuff through it.

[Rod Sheridan]

I had a friend with an import 15" planer with the same issue, premature belt wear.

I replaced the 3 belts with aftermarket belts and the wear and the burning smell stopped...........Regards, Rod.

[Bruce Wrenn]

I had a friend with an import 15" planer with the same issue, premature belt wear.

I replaced the 3 belts with aftermarket belts and the wear and the burning smell stopped...........Regards, Rod.

The reason Jet and others use five dollar belts is nobody will sell them four dollar belts. Meaning most OEM belts are the very cheapest they can buy and still get the job done. Most likely a set of quality grip notch belts will do a lot better.

[Matt Day]

I'm keeping my eye on this thread, as I noticed the belt smell and warm belt cover when I did my first real planing in my new to me 15HO the other day. Thanks for posting.

[Bob Grier]

Thanks Rod, Mike, Bruce and others for responding.

I have decided to not worry about the alignment, heat and dust of the belts for now. In the past I spent considerable effort shimming the motor mount, realigning the pulleys and then tensioning the belts to the point that the pulleys became coplanar (tension flexes the motor mount which of course changes the angle of the motor pulley). I tried different tensions and I don't think the heat and dust is significantly different than when I bought the machine and the belts were looser and pulleys not coplanar. I do not know why the pulleys get so hot. 170+ degrees seems too much. I am sure the interface surface between the pulley and belt is hotter. I wonder what temperature is required to produce burning rubber smell. I will do what Bruce did and change the belts when I feel like going through the process of aligning the pulleys again. It won't be soon though. I won't go for link belts because of the expense. If when I change the belts, there is a significant change in temperature or dust, I will append the results to this post.

Bob