band saw belts

Only belts I've seen fall apart were on cars.

I imagine light duty belts in an industrial environment might fail more often than in a home workshop.

In shops that get really hot the lube/tar tends to break

I don't know what my belts are made of. Whatever it is, it definitely last a long long time. They look like standard, everyday fan belts.

I can't imagine a belt causing a metal lathe to vibrate? The metal lathes I've seen don't vibrate if you load non-concentric turnings in them. Hard to see how a lowly belt would cause severe vibration in a

1000lb+ tool. Now that I think about it, I've used fly cutters in my drill press and even then don't recall "severe" vibration at slow speeds.

-- Jack

The older I get the meaner I get. I'm pretty sure soon I'll be biting people...

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Reply to
Jack
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True but these belts typically log thousands of hours in very hot and often wet and dirty conditions. I suspect the industrial belts found on home woodworking equipment see a few hours of continuous duty each week if that much.

Absolutely!

Typically rubber with inner belts. It is hard to say how long they have actually lasted with out an hour meter. In a protected environment they will last for many many years depending on how much use they actually get used. If they were being used every day for the past 60 years you certainly would have replaced them at least a few times.

Reply to
Leon

AKA "cog belt"

Reply to
dadiOH

Cog belts are typically timing belts that engage a gear type pulley. The notched I am talking look similar but are v-shaped and do not engage teeth on a pulley.

Reply to
Leon

here is a real one

one machine that is not used often has belts and the belts tend to get a memory of the pulley

when that rare occasion comes up that i use the machine the belts are insisting on retaining their memory of the pulley

seems that link belts do well to eliminate this exact problem

the link belt design may not adapt to use as a bandsaw tire but then again it might

but apparently no one has tried

Reply to
Electric Comet

Good luck with that, but before you try I can guarantee it won't.

Reply to
Markem

I was replacing belts that were attached in the 40's and 50's. These are not only old, but old design. In one lathe the 'bearings' were in open races. e.g. not in holders but loose. Just better than babbets.

So these are not modern by any means. Both lathes - metal tool grade and wood lathe (oldest) run smooth. It takes a little time to run in the belt and it forms to the V's in your wheels. One then takes out a link to take out the added slack.

Martin

Reply to
Martin Eastburn

This is news to me. Generally "industrial" means high quality, expensive, long lasting. I actually thought automotive fan belts were cheap. I don't have a lot of experience buying belts for my tools, so I'm certainly no expert. I bought a fan belt for my jointer once, because I replaced the cabinet it sat on and needed a different length belt. Had I known link belts were cheaper or even the same price, I would have gone with that mainly because the length is adjustable. It's a bit of a pain determining the correct length of a belt, and I'd assume link belts would be the ticket.

Perhaps old belts run smoother than new belts? If my belts are anything, they are old. On the other hand, I don't get how a belt weighing a few ounces would make a 300-1000lb machine vibrate severely?

I've seen those type of belts, but don't have any. Belt wise, I've been happy with what has been working forever. If I ever need to replace one, I just might go with a link belt. I see Harbor Freight has a 5' one for $26. I guess I could get two 2 1/2' belts out of that. I'm still thinking an automotive fan belt would be cheaper, but not sure.

Reply to
Jack

How do you know this, do you give them a quiz? Do you take the belt off and see if it has the wrong shape memorized? What is the problem, is your 4 oz belt making your 400lb machine severely vibrate?

A band saw tire is not a drive belt.

You could be the first. Let me know how that goes. I'm betting your link belt "tire" will vibrate your socks off...

Reply to
Jack

Absolutely. In an industrial environment a TS might run continuously

8-24 hours a day. Just guessing, but my table saw probably has less than a few days actual use. Even a large project like a set of kitchen cabinets the TS run time measures in minutes, not hours,days etc. Rather than wear out, I guess the issue would be how long the material would last with or without usage. I've seen rubber tires on bearings completely disintegrate just setting in a drawer.
Reply to
Jack

Do you mean "may not adapt *for use on* a band saw tire"?

I can't imagine that you plan to use a link belt *as* a band saw tire.

Reply to
DerbyDad03

It isn't that the belt is CAUSING the vibration but that it is transferring vibration from somewhere else.

Reply to
dadiOH

There is a good reason they haven't; namely, it won't work. HTF would you expect to run a bandsaw blade on a narrow, thick, rough belt?

Reply to
dadiOH

when i find a bandsaw tire created using the same technique as a link belt will let you know

no one has done it yet far as i know

Reply to
Electric Comet

Yeah I can see that. I retired from the automotive world and sold thousands of belts. With dealerships we only carried top quality automotive style belts. When I was very young I worked for an auto supply store that carried automotive and industrial belts. A customer brought a belt in that he wanted to match in size. It just so happened the only fit was an industrial belt and I later learned that he put it on a vehicle, the belt lasted about 3 weeks. Had he told me what it was going on I would not have sold him a belt at all, we did not have an automotive quality belt in stock.

I actually thought automotive fan belts were

Pricing is relative. With the dealerships back in the 80's Dayco belts cost the dealer $14~$20. I suspect if you buy an industrial belt at a industrial supply or like company the belt will also be expensive. Industrial at the auto supply were about half the price of the automotive. One of my vendors sold automotive lamps for cars and he owned an airplane. When he bought air plane lamps from an aviation supply the cost was 3~4 times the cost of what he sold the same lamp to automobile dealerships.

Think about how a 1 oz. wheel weight in the wrong place on a wheel makes the whole car shake. Industrial belts are not as precision made and or come in a variety of qualities, as automotive, they often have high spots and wide spots. Automotive belts are pretty uniform in shape

That is where I got my link belt and at the time it was a name brand belt. That was surprising, you could buy the same brand at a number of other places which is not the norm for Harbor Freight. Any way the single belt was long enough to replace the two belts on my DP.

Keep in mind that link belts do stretch quite a bit after a bit of use, I ended up having to remove a link after some use.

Reply to
Leon

Yeah, that really seems off base, not totally unlike considering the use of a link belt in place of a car tire or a funnel in place of a wrench.

Reply to
Leon

;~) Some people make comments about things they have no clue about. Like how using a peach to tune a guitar may be a better way. I wonder if anyone has doe that? LOL

Reply to
Leon

Silly you, I have it on good authority that apples are always used.

Reply to
dadiOH

REO Speedwagon may have tried it. They've apparently tried weirder things.

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Reply to
DerbyDad03

Well that is common knowledge to many but not all. LOL

Reply to
Leon

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