Conrad Hoffman
Diamond
- Joined
- May 10, 2009
- Location
- Canandaigua, NY, USA
Years ago I did a lot of very close tolerance honing and had been hoping to find a machine for myself for a good few years. Strictly an advanced hobbyist here, so it had to be the right machine at the right price. It finally happened and after 5 rolls of paper towels, 1/2 gallon of V&PM Napatha, a spray can of carb cleaner, a good razor scraper and about 18 hours of elbow grease, the MBB-1660 looks near to new.
My guess is, as long as the belts go around, people do near zero maintenance on these. This is just a brief note to describe what I did. The trick is to remove the motor from the top of the head, along with the side panel. At that point you can stuff a rag or paper towels in the bottom and spray all the internal parts with carb cleaner- bearings, bushings, lever points and sliding springs, until everything is cleaned up and moving freely.
The manual specifies 20W oil for most everything but IMO one can do better and maybe extend the maintenance interval. I used two things- Superlube Synthetic Low Viscosity Oil (no PTFE) and their Synthetic High Viscosity Oil (with PTFE). All sliding and rotating bushings get the low viscosity. The sliding springs, screw threads of the tension adjustments and anything else with looser tolerances or higher forces gets the heavier oil. Similar cleaning and oiling was applied to the rear (accessible) parts as well. Carb cleaner is effective at brightening up the big aluminum pulleys. Seems to work well now, though it wouldn't surprise me if a bearing or two would benefit from replacement or relubing. Also oiled the motor and replaced the plastic hoses.
The oil reservoir is designed for 15 gallons of honing oil, about $300 worth of stinky MB-30. As an experiment, I'm going to try reducing this to a gallon or two- I'm not doing high volume production work, nor removing a lot of material. I'm thinking a heavy plastic dishpan under the pump, and redirecting the pan drain back to same. The drain is 3/4" NPT, with an elbow and down pipe. One can unscrew the down pipe, then remove the elbow. My plan is to replace it with a hose barb and hose for the redirect. This loses the benefits of the sediment tray, but I'm hoping that won't bother much at my usage level. I'll post more when I see how this works.
My guess is, as long as the belts go around, people do near zero maintenance on these. This is just a brief note to describe what I did. The trick is to remove the motor from the top of the head, along with the side panel. At that point you can stuff a rag or paper towels in the bottom and spray all the internal parts with carb cleaner- bearings, bushings, lever points and sliding springs, until everything is cleaned up and moving freely.
The manual specifies 20W oil for most everything but IMO one can do better and maybe extend the maintenance interval. I used two things- Superlube Synthetic Low Viscosity Oil (no PTFE) and their Synthetic High Viscosity Oil (with PTFE). All sliding and rotating bushings get the low viscosity. The sliding springs, screw threads of the tension adjustments and anything else with looser tolerances or higher forces gets the heavier oil. Similar cleaning and oiling was applied to the rear (accessible) parts as well. Carb cleaner is effective at brightening up the big aluminum pulleys. Seems to work well now, though it wouldn't surprise me if a bearing or two would benefit from replacement or relubing. Also oiled the motor and replaced the plastic hoses.
The oil reservoir is designed for 15 gallons of honing oil, about $300 worth of stinky MB-30. As an experiment, I'm going to try reducing this to a gallon or two- I'm not doing high volume production work, nor removing a lot of material. I'm thinking a heavy plastic dishpan under the pump, and redirecting the pan drain back to same. The drain is 3/4" NPT, with an elbow and down pipe. One can unscrew the down pipe, then remove the elbow. My plan is to replace it with a hose barb and hose for the redirect. This loses the benefits of the sediment tray, but I'm hoping that won't bother much at my usage level. I'll post more when I see how this works.