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Bandsaw noise help

717 views 3 replies 3 participants last post by  Thorbjorn88 
#1 · (Edited by Moderator)
I recently bought a Dayton 3z981 bandsaw off craigslist for $80. It's a generic Taiwanese 4-speed wood/metal cutting bandsaw. The seller had it set up to run at the slowest speed to cut metal and it ran reasonably quiet when I looked at it. I brought it home tore it down and cleaned it up and ordered a lot of new parts to spruce it up since I got it so cheap. I just test ran it with just the bottom wheel at wood cutting speed and there is a pretty loud clunking sound coming from the axle area. Here are two videos one with the wheel attached and one without. What do you think this noise is and what can I do to fix it?



 
#2 ·
I had a similar problem with my Atlas band saw. I had replaced all the bearings and tried to get woodruff key out with no luck. I ended up taking it to a machinist who couldn't get it out either. He tried cutting it out and that didn't work, so he trimmed it off and cut another slot for the key.

When I got back home I put it all back together and it worked fine for a while. Then I started getting the same clattering noise as you. I found that for some reason the set screw on the lower pulley had come loose just a tiny bit. Every time I tightened it down it would work fine for a while and than start clattering again. Very Irritating !!

My neighbor and I fiddled with it for a half hour or so and decided to try some low temp Loctite. Once I tightened it down with that it's worked fine ever since.

That sound you have on YouTube is exactly like what I had on my saw. You might try taking off every pulley. It looks like you've got three. Put the each back on, test it and if it clatters hit it with the Loctite. That is of course if your saw has set screws like mine. I haven't had any clattering on mine since we used the Loctite.

Best of luck.
 
#3 ·
+1 Check pulley set screws, wood-ruff keys/slots, and pulleys.

Video sounds like metal on metal 'rubbing' during one spot on rotation.

Additional thought to that posted above:
- If the saw was run hard with loose set screw, or too much belt tension; might also have elongated the pulley arbor(s) or damaged the shaft bearing.
Both are easy to check while you have pulleys off for inspection.
 
#4 ·
Thanks guys! I went out to look at it quick before heading to work this morning and tightened a set screw on the pulleys and it fixed the noise. I'll inspect it more later to see if there's other issues like CaptainKlutz suggested but that fixed the noise. Hopefully that's all that's wrong otherwise this bandsaw might be becoming a boondoggle.
 
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