[TheForge] maneuvering motor to get Little Giant belt to track correctly

Sat Jul 5 23:24:01 2003

> Now I'm finding it's trickier than I expected, to bolt the motor
> into place so the belt tracks well.

Flat belts tend to run "uphill".  It's desirable to mount one of a
pair of pulleys so that you can cock its shaft one way or the other.
That allows you to create "uphillness" on the side opposite the one
the belt of slipping off of.  Just making the belt tighter probably
won't help a lot.

You didn't say (did I miss an earlier post?) if you have the motor
mounted right on the hammer with a very short belt.  I think it may be
easier to get flat belts to track if the pulleys are a yard or more
apart.

Another trial-and-error type trick is to put a half twist in the belt,
(making it a Moebius strip) either left to right.  I just did this
with my 25# Jardine and it improved both slipping and tracking.  The
reason this helps is, um, ummmmm....ummmmmmm.  Right.  The explanation
of why this helps is left as an exercise for the reader. :-)

- Mike

-- 
Michael Spencer                  Nova Scotia, Canada 

[email protected]            
http://home.tallships.ca/mspencer/