Question about Craftsman 3hp cast iron table saw

Hi!
Welcome to Lumberjocks!
I just recentely completely rebuilt my 298762. It too was stiff. I had to remove the snap ring, pull the rod, remove the two rubber o rings, polish the rod up, and replace after cleaning everything real good. I used dry graphite in a squirt can for lube on all parts.

Hope this helps. :O) E mail me if I can help further. It is a good saw.

Luck,
Smokey

Smokey,

Many thanks for the reply and the kind welcome.

I presume you are talking about the rod that carries the wheel for the elevation, right? The one the wrench is attached to in the photo.

Did you find it necessary to remove (and polish up) the other pivot point (that the pawl(?) is on)?

Thanks for the tip about the dry graphite.

Cheers

Octavis,
Glad to help.
Yes, because I was rebuilding my tablesaw, I stripped everything down. I didn’t want to do it but one time and figured I would just do everything before I fine tuned it.
This link is by an Ed Bennett describing the steps he went through in rebuilding his and was a real good guideline for me.

tablesawalignment.com
http://www.tablesawalignment.com/blog

Smokey

OK, now I’m stuck.

Here is the assembly, stripped down a bit more. I’ve removed the 2 e-clips on the elevator rod and the e-clip on the pawl component.

Can’t see how to separate them.

Cheers

Octavis,
Sorry I’m late getting back to you, I’ve been out of town all day.
Squirt some WD40 on the shaft at both ends where you removed the clips from and continue turning the shaft until it comes off of the threads.
Then work it back and forth until you are able to pull it completely out of the housing.
It is the two o rings inside on the shaft that is causing the binding.
Smokey

Smokey,
Many thanks. I went ahead as you suggested and success!

Now for the arbor housing – it won’t budge.
I have a hard plastic mallet, pulley puller, crowbar,2×4 and big hammer at the ready.
However, I want to procede with caution – don’t want to crack that nice cast iron.
How did you get yours off?

Meantimes I’ve been de-rusting the table top and extensions with citric acid and paint remover- its coming along nicely and I’m very pleased with the progress.

I measured the radial(?) runout with a dial indicator on the pulley shaft and it is zero! No in-and-out motion either.
The runout on the flange(?) – (where the saw blade meets) is exactly 1 thou. Might be better if I could get the rust off, ha!
Cheers

The arbor pulls out of the housing. Remove the snap pully and key, remove the stop ring. I then used a softwood 2×4 and hammer to hit it on the pully side to knock the arbor and bearing out of the housing. I then used a 3 hooked puller to pull the next bearing off the end that did have the pully and housing on it. I bought new bearings at my local bearing store (be sure to take an old bearing with you as the size are on the side of the rase, and watch they don’t sell you a metric as the opposite diameter will be wrong). I replaced the bearings using a cutoff piece of PVC that had the same size od as the inside rase of the bearing. By being gentle I had no problem with r&r. Theonly place that gave me a problem was the outer bearing (the one next to the pully did not fit tight enought into the housing allowing a few thousandths of movement of the arbor. I ordered some wave washers but when I received them they were too thick so I peened the casting with a center punch and hammer. The result was no play and it works great so far.
Smokey

Smokey,

Thanks again for helping out.
I may have to replace the bearing down the road but for now I’ll leave it alone as it does not seem to have any play.

I am trying to separate part A from B (please see modified photo above). Sorry, I should have been more clear. It seems that A should pull off from B but they are really stuck together and I can’t even twist A around on the post. There doesn’t appear to be anywhere to put the legs of a bearing puller.

Cheers

On mine there is a retaining ring on the end of the shaft on B that I removed and then was able to pull A off. Mine was not froze up thought, but I did soak it good with penetrating oil and worked it back and forth. It them came off real smooth.

Thanks Smokey.
I’ll just keep on soaking it and working it back and forth then.
Cheers

OK, an update.

I’ve successfully freed up part A from part B. It is now as loose as a goose and swings freely. That’s the good news.

The potentially bad news that in doing so, the post (that A swings on and that is fixed in B) came out about 3/8”. I’ve banged it back in again so that it is flush again on the back of the main casting.

I’m concerned that when the saw is in operation the post may come out and somehow be a safety concern.

Hope I’m explaining this OK.

Any thoughts?

Hmmm, the docs on a similar saw (here) seem to imply that post is just a press-fit into the casting; i.e. no setscrew or pin that would hold it in the casting. I think you’ve found the major reason for binding on the blade height mechanism – corrosion on the post and friction with part “A” in your photo above. I think it was frozen up so much that working the pivot back and forth moved the post enough to work it out of the casting slightly. As long as those parts move freely now, there should be no forces acting on the post to pull it out again.

Make sure there is no play on that post with the swing arm now. Any play there will allow the blade to move slightly in relation to the table, making it impossible to keep the blade aligned with the miter slot.

Others here have mentioned dry graphite for lube; I’ve also had good luck with spray on lithium lube. After drying, it doesn’t seem to attract any sawdust.

-- "Find out what you cannot do and then go do it!"

EEngineer,

Thanks for the clarification on the post corrosion – I can now put that out of my mind and move on.

Yeah, I was not thinking of it on re-assembly but any play back and forth would be bad – I pretty sure I’m good to go, though.

Thanks for the spray lithium lube suggestion – I’ll look out for it on my next visit to the hardware store. I went ahead with the dry graphite – only because I had some to hand – not the easiest stuff to apply – if it does go where you want it, it then just falls off. Ha!

Cheers