Link belts stretching?

why don't you bend down by your saw and take a look at the belt??

dave

John Graser wrote:

John Graser asks:

That stretchiness is what makes them so smooth. I''d pull a link or 2 to see if that helps, if you've checked your blade for suitability and sharpness.

Charlie Self "Health food makes me sick." Calvin Trillin

They do stretch for the first few hours of use. BTW, so do regular v- belts, at least the good ones. After twenty to twenty-five hours of use under load, they should be re-tensioned (and possibly have a link removed). At hobby-duty levels it can take awhile to put 25 hours on a machine.

Jim

Dave, you missed the point.

Jim

Why don't you just put on a good quality V-belt. I don't quite understand this fascination of using an product that was originally designed to be used as an emergency fan belt with limited life expectancy to operate machinery. As an aside, quality belts do not stretch measurably. Sorry John. If the automotive and most other serious machine industries can rely on them I think the would be the best choice for your contrator saw.

Dave

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VS. belts hold shape when not used often enough or the belt is cold. Hence, vibration in the blade\machine. A Link-Belt ends that vibration.

Auto spell changed my "V" to a "VS"

measurably.

You are correct, I have the bad habit of thinking everyone live here in So.Cal. Would not just running your machine for a few minutes to warm-up the belt serve the same purpose? Dave

measurably.

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good point. My Powermatic band saw uses a serpentine style belt like cars made in the past decade and a half. Beats a link belt or a V-belt! Quiet, smooth power transfer and doesn't stretch as much as V or link.

dave

TeamCasa wrote:

I can run may table saw 20 minutes before the belt even starts to warm up. True, it does lessen after a few minutes. It's still very convenient to be able to start and cut.

Send me your Powermatic, I'll send you my Craftsman.

measurably.

Well, thank you Dave! I thought it was just me, but I took a serpentine belt off my saw to put a link belt on. Had to, obviously, change pulleys too. I think it, the link belt, made the saw run louder and rougher. I'm going to pull it off tomorrow and put my old belt back on.

Try it and find out. Life expectancy isn't really a critical issue when it's so easy to put a new one on, and they really *do* dampen vibration significantly.

Most of my tools have direct drive universal motors still, but one exception to the rule is my horizontal bandsaw. It used to have so much vibration that the belt cover would flop around like a fish out of water. After installing a link belt, it barely flutters. It didn't eliminate all of the vibration, but it definitely made a marked difference.

Michael, If your belt flaps, fix that!

I don't really want to start a circular debate on this. If you and others are happy - that's fine with me. I'll stick with quality parts.

Dave

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can I get back to you on that, Bill??

Hey, I picked up some Craftsman chisels and they seem fine. Took forever to get the backs flat and shiny but they seem to hold an edge much better than the Marples I had purchased at HD last month (and returned).

dave

Bill wrote:

Jerry, my serp belt-run band saw is incredibly smooth running. I wish that Powermatic had outfitted the 54a planer with the same style belt.

dave

Jerry Gilreath wrote:

My only complaint about the craftsman is a weak splitter\guard. It was bought for me last year so I can't complain much. It cuts wood. So it does it's job.

having spent 40 some odd years busting my knuckles on mainly europeon, plus a few jap & domestic autos for a living, plus having to endure the fiasco of dealer/port installed airconditioning, plus the fiasco York 2 cylinder a/c compressors installed on Piper aircraft has taught me a few things beltwise. One of the main issues with V belts is the lack of control of the placement of the plies in the cross section of the belt. Look at a premium automotive belt & you can see as the belt passes through the pulley, the reinforcing ply (s) wander all over the place. The rubber body wears at a different rate than the ply material & lo & behold the width start to vary & things start to shake. The serp belts are a huge improvement & a a plus it doesen't have to ride up & down in the groove as does a V belt. The link belt links are all ply material (fabric) & allows for easy replication (each link) in the manufacturing process so chance of defect, uneven wear is reduced. Also the link assembly flexes much better especially around a small pulley.

clue me in. I thought the op was asking us if his belt is loose. Harder to tell from San Jose, than for the operator to make the small amount of effort to LOOK at the silly thing himself!

dave

Jim Wils> Bay Area Dave wrote...