Levin Drill Press Help?

[Mel in WA]

Just purchased this little Levin drill press. The spindle turns somewhat hard & lumpy, so I figure the bearings need to be replaced.

Anybody on here had one of these apart?

Thanks

 

[rustytool]

Mel, I have one of those and replaced the bearings in it. As I recall you just unscrew the collar on the bottom with a hook spanner wrench. I think the bearings are then held in with a screwed in collar. It's quite simple.
The bearings are a standard size and available. I just bought some off of eBay. Works great. Greg.

 

[SouthBendModel34]

For the sake of safety, treat yourself to a new round belt. If that tatty belt breaks, you could be struck in the face. That's a 1/4 HP motor, isn't it? There's enough power there to do some damage.

Troy Belting, McMaster-Carr, or MSC ought to be able to set you up with a nice new belt for a reasonable price.

 

[rustytool]

I use this stuff.1 8" Round Urethane Drive Belt Roll 1 Feet Long USA Free Shipping | eBay

 

[L Vanice]

I use this stuff.1 8" Round Urethane Drive Belt Roll 1 Feet Long USA Free Shipping | eBay

I use 3/16" round urethane, which perfectly fits the Levin and other watch lathe pulley grooves. I have electric welders designed for welding urethane belts. Urethane stretches, but watch lathes usually have the pulley in the center of the spindle and are a lot simpler to re-belt if you do not use endless belts. The Levin drill press can easily use an endless belt because the pulley is on the end of the spindle.

If you look at the Levin drill presses on eBay now, you will see one for $595 that has a brand new endless belt purchased from Levin. It looks like braided aramid, which does not stretch. He did not say what he paid for the belt. I was tempted to buy the drill until I saw that the column has a big notch cut out of it.

My Green engraving machines have endless belts made of braided white cotton thread. They look a bit dirty and ratty after many years of use, but still work fine.

Larry

 

[JST]

Interesting.

I tried dentist drill belts on a small drill press and a watch lathe. Same deal, braided cotton I found that they slipped and did not work effectively. Replaced with similar diameter green urethane from Small Parts Inc (no longer available) and both work fine with that.

 

[L Vanice]

I have bought an assortment of sizes of urethane round belting from this eBay seller in China. The quality is excellent. 12 Feet Transmission Round Belt for Watchmaker Lathe | eBay

I have also bought USA urethane belting on eBay when the price was low. So far, all has been satisfactory. I have noted that some Rounthane (USA) brand belting I bought new from a local dealer back in the 1980's has gone brittle and useless. I don't know what the shelf life is supposed to be.

My dental engines do use thin braided belts, which are OK for the 3/32" shank dental burs they are designed to drive. Those belts are much too small to fit the V-grooves of my watch lathe pulleys, which are designed for 3/16" or 5 mm round belts. The urethane belts do not slip like a cotton belt, so, size for size, urethane will drive better than cotton. But it is still a good idea to use the belt size for which the machine was designed. If you do overload a urethane belt, it will slip in the pulley groove and destroy itself as the surface melts and shreds. Remember, it is a thermoplastic, meaning it will melt.

Larry

 

[JST]

The belts were a decent fit, since the pulley is basically a "V" pulley, not really formed for a particular diameter. (Boley)

The urethane does seem to be "harder" than other materials, although perfectly flexible, and easily melted for joining. So the hardness is likely not from getting brittle, it's not at all brittle.

 

[partsproduction]

Yes those Chinese urethane belts also have a pebble finish, a texture that I assumed immediately would tend to add friction. I used some Tuesday night, easy as can be. I put a chunk of 1/16" iron sheet in the vise and heated it with propane torches for two minutes, then, looking down the knife edge of the sheet metal brought the two ends together against the hot sheet, and quickly slide them off the edge of the hot sheet so they ended up together. After cutting the "Flash" off with a pocket knife the pulleys don't seem to know the splice is going over them.

 

[L Vanice]

It is possible to cut the weld flash with a razor blade, sharp knife or fingernail clippers. I have come to prefer flush-cutting wire snips meant for soft copper wire. This one for $1.85 with free shipping from China is quite a bargain.
Durable Electrical Wire Cable Cutter Cutting Plier Side Snips Flush Pliers Tool | eBay

This type of cutter is included in some of the commercial belt welding kits, so I think they are considered the best tool for the job. Those kits cost from a few hundred to a few thousand dollars. Most use a heated thin metal blade to melt the belt ends-no magic there. The tricky bit is the device that guides the melted ends together so that they line up and have a controlled amount of length change from the cut length.

Larry

 

[partsproduction]

I have some of those, I think,made for the aircraft industry to cut aluminum rivet buck tails off. The one's I bought were made in the USA and feature a built in microscopic misalignment that is supposed to make them work better.

 

[kjwillia]

I use this stuff.1 8" Round Urethane Drive Belt Roll 1 Feet Long USA Free Shipping | eBay

Hello Rusty,
I live in Spokane, WA just up the road from you. I picked up a Levin mini drill press on Monday at an auction in Seattle. It appears to be in great shape except it also need a new belt. I checked out your ebay link (thanks) and it looks like you need to purchase 10 feet and I am not sure what is the best way to join it. Any chance you would be interested in making a belt for me (for a price of course) and sending it to Spokane? Kevin

 

[L Vanice]

Hello Rusty,
I live in Spokane, WA just up the road from you. I picked up a Levin mini drill press on Monday at an auction in Seattle. It appears to be in great shape except it also need a new belt. I checked out your ebay link (thanks) and it looks like you need to purchase 10 feet and I am not sure what is the best way to join it. Any chance you would be interested in making a belt for me (for a price of course) and sending it to Spokane? Kevin

I have Levin lathes that probably use the same pulley groove size as the drill. I use 5 mm (3/16") round urethane belting. I have an expensive Swiss-made electric belt welder that is made for this purpose. But it is possible, with practice, to weld this belting with a heated piece of sheet metal to melt the two ends, then press together so the joint is not offset and let cool. A nail clipper is a suitable tool to cut off the flash around the weld.

This stuff is cheap, so buying 10 feet should not be an issue.

10ft 5mm PU Transmission Round Belt High-Performance Urethane Belting Green 784958650837 | eBay

Find many great new & used options and get the best deals for 10ft 5mm PU Transmission Round Belt High-Performance Urethane Belting Green at the best online prices at eBay! Free shipping for many products!

www.ebay.com

Larry

 

[JST]

Heating that way likely works better than what I do, which is to heat both ends with a lighter, then jam together (I use a little jig) and trim off the squeezed out material. Yes it is a crude way to do it, but it works.

Those drill presses work very well. I have one that I rescued. I cleaned the bearings and re-used them, but replacing is probably better.

So far, I have drilled holes down to about 0.2 mm with it. Worked very well.

 

[rustytool]

Hello Rusty,
I live in Spokane, WA just up the road from you. I picked up a Levin mini drill press on Monday at an auction in Seattle. It appears to be in great shape except it also need a new belt. I checked out your ebay link (thanks) and it looks like you need to purchase 10 feet and I am not sure what is the best way to join it. Any chance you would be interested in making a belt for me (for a price of course) and sending it to Spokane? Kevin

Kevin, I just put a flat piece of metal, A piece of metal strapping like they secure things to a pallet with in a vise then heat it with a propane torch. Touch both ends of the belt to the hot metal and when it melts slide the belt up and off the metal holding the ends together until the belt cools. There will be a lot of goopy belt around the joint. You can trim it with a razor blade or use a bench grinder and rotate it will touching it lightly to the wheel. It will look like something the cat drug in but it works. It's almost impossible for both ends to be exactly opposite each other but when it's trimmed or ground it will work. If it doesn't work on the first try just cut it and try again. The belt is stretchy and with the adjustment of the drill press you have a lot of leeway in the length of there belt. I sold my Levin drill press to a guy in Rathdrum and I don't have anymore belting.

 

[MrStretch]

There is also hollow belting that uses double ended barb bits to hold it together. Used one for years with my Geneva pattern Lorch & handwheel. Don't know the source, my tutor gave it me when I was in college in the uk.

 

[L Vanice]

There is also hollow belting that uses double ended barb bits to hold it together. Used one for years with my Geneva pattern Lorch & handwheel. Don't know the source, my tutor gave it me when I was in college in the uk.

Product name is Hollow Rounthane urethane belting from Shingle Belting (made in USA). I bought it in 200 foot boxes and sold several hundred feet of 3/16" diameter in yellow and clear with aluminum connectors at NAWCC regionals years ago. That is the product that eventually turned brittle in the box and on my lathes. I switched to the solid green urethane belting from China and have had no trouble with it.

Larry