Bearing replacement and clean up of electric motors

[Jerry Bruette]

Matt, any suggestions on how to clean up the shaft? I pulled the pulleys off the other day and the shafts look a little rough. I figure that I could just take some degreaser and white vinegar/baking soda to it with a Scotch Bright pad and give it a good cleaning, just want to get sone more opinions.

I used to use steel wool and citrus cleaner/degreaser. That's all you should need unless there's galling where the sheave was, then carefully clean that up with a file/abrasive paper. You don't want to change the dimensions of the shaft where the bearings or sheave mount.

[Rod Sheridan]

Use C3 clearance bearings for electric motors and after cleaning the debris from the windings gently with a soft paint brush and low pressure air, perform an insulation resistance test…….Regards, Rod.

[Frank Pratt]

You still feel stupid until you figure out what you did wrong.

A feeling I'm very familiar with

[Marc Fenneuff]

Matt, any suggestions on how to clean up the shaft? I pulled the pulleys off the other day and the shafts look a little rough. I figure that I could just take some degreaser and white vinegar/baking soda to it with a Scotch Bright pad and give it a good cleaning, just want to get sone more opinions.

Try the blue scotchbrite pads on shafts first, not the green. The green ones will leave visible scratches on the shaft surfaces (of course you could then polish that out too). Too much abrading and too much polishing will start to mess with the tolerances as well.

3-phase motors are a dream to work on and run, provided you can power them. On some smaller 1-phase motors I have had to desolder a single lead to get the end bell off.

20210407_iphone_0651.jpg

[Bobby Robbinett]

Thank you guys so much. I plan to start disassembling the motors next week. Will do one at a time. There are a total of 4 motors but I only plan on breaking down 3. These go on a shape and sand machine. I have the entire machine pulled apart and am doing a full rebuild/restore on the whole thing. It has 1 shaper spindle and 2 sanding spindles.

I am taking the base and all of the parts of the shaping and sanding heads to get sand blasted and powder coated next week too. Only thing is that my powder coating guy is a month out to to my job.

With that said, I have toyed around with the idea of either sanding then prime and painting myself or buy a Harbor Freight sand blasting kit and priming and painting afterwards. That is a whole other topic though.

I have all of the worm gears, shafts, guide tubes, gears, sprockets and chains to disassemble and derust before I start sanding. I am also replacing all bearings, pulleys, belts, conveyer pads, rollers and gold downs. Should have a pretty nice machine when done.

[Jerry Bruette]

You could save a few dollars by not replacing the pulleys. I would check them for wear before spending unneeded dollars.

[Marc Fenneuff]

With that said, I have toyed around with the idea of either sanding then prime and painting myself or buy a Harbor Freight sand blasting kit and priming and painting afterwards. That is a whole other topic though.

If you sandblast at home, be sure to use the proper PPE, regardless of the media you use.

[Bobby Robbinett]

You could save a few dollars by not replacing the pulleys. I would check them for wear before spending unneeded dollars.

The stock pulleys are in horrible shape. I am not the original owner so I don’t know for sure but the pulleys look like they have been beaten to death. New ones for just the two sanding heads are $700 aftermarket that includes two motor pulleys and two spindle pulleys because there are 2 sanding stations. Haven’t priced the shaper head pulleys yet.

[Bobby Robbinett]

If you sandblast at home, be sure to use the proper PPE, regardless of the media you use.

Absolutely! I have to get a few more ppe items to even consider it.

[Charles Coolidge]

Seems like there was a motor shop here in town that did this work, including soaking/baking the windings. It was NOT cheap but the place did an excellent job.

[Bobby Robbinett]

Seems like there was a motor shop here in town that did this work, including soaking/baking the windings. It was NOT cheap but the place did an excellent job.

Yes I spoke with my local electric motor shop and for just the bearing replacements and no clean up or any additional services they quoted me $360 minimum for the big motor and $260 for the 3 smaller motors. I just figured that I could easily replace the bearings my self and do a good cleaning and inspection for far less. Like I stated above the pulleys for just the sanding heads are like $700 so I need to save money where ever I can.