My Power Pro Story
Posted: Wed Jan 16, 2013 1:06 am
Chapter1: My first PowerPro was one of the first 10 DIY upgrades shipped out by Shopsmith. I preordered in June 2010, I think. It took me forever to get around to doing the upgrade. I knew from work experience to take my time in doing an upgrade until others had & all the bugs were worked out. Unfortunately, my upgrade experience had both good & bad. The good was the instructions & templates were the best I had ever followed. The DVD was something I wish other upgrades I had completed included or even wrote myself. There only some minor issues- no show stoppers with the upgrade.
A lot of time and testing must of gone into putting the PowerPro together. However my upgrade had a number of severe vibration issues which required the headstock be shipped back. I had worked with tech support. We changed the settings and the vibration issue remained. They were gonna ship me a new idler assy, but instead realized something else was wrong. The fix was returning the headstock where all the Shopsmith upgrade parts were first replaced. The ultimate fix was replacing the DVR motor, control, & touchpad/display( I think they go as a set). Tech support was proud to announce it was running with no more vibrations and shipped it back to me via FedEx Ground (yikes!).
Unfortunately the idler shaft somehow got knocked into headstock on the shipment back. I've read this has happened to at least one other person. I wonder if this is something that could be prevented? The old water pump bearing shaft was held in place, I believe. I know there is a new water pump bearing idler shaft for sale on Ebay, but I have no idea of the bearing specs. The old idler shaft revolved at 8,320 RPM max; the new one is 16,000 RPM. I'm not sure if even one of the new old-style idler shafts would work. I know I'm not going to take a perfectly operating PowerPro apart to test and risk compromising my warranty. It ain't broke!
Chapter 2: That was an experience. In my excitement I didn't notice the idler shaft was knocked in when I put the headstock back on the propped up way tubes. Everything went well. I was expecting to see a vibration-free PowerPro. I finished putting the Shopsmith back together along with a double-tilt upgrade. When I brought it up to speed, the Shopsmith acted possessed and started vibrating across the wood subfloor with the casters up! As it vibrated across the floor, anything loose fell off.
I turned it off, pulled the belt cover off, and saw the inner bearing almost completely out of the eccentric bushing. I got on the phone. So back to Shopsmith it went. It seemed to be shipping damage, but after shipping the headstock back, I could find no evidence on their container to me that showed any evidence of damage. A result of the new double-bearing idler shaft and split eccentric? About 4 years earlier a FedEx Ground driver kicked the large box containing my Ebay-won power station out the side door of his truck onto my cement driveway and took off. He didn't see me standing in the garage. This was like the 3rd delivery attempt & I guess he got tired dealing with the heavy box. I got a check from FedEx for the damage caused by the motor bouncing around.
Chapter 3: This time the headstock shafts were protected in the shipping process by a $3.99 shaft protector (521889) that was simply taped to the belt cover. Rather than buy a new belt cover, I simply drilled a couple of holes in the old belt cover and simply glued a couple nuts in place to secure the shaft protector.
Oh, if you have a double-tilt upgrade, make sure the Locktite securing the thread stock to the knurled knob hasn't failed. I didn't notice a couple of threads sticking out of the top of the knurled knob securing the end of the way tube assy. The result? <think for a sec> There should be no threads sticking out or…the far side of the way tubes will pop out when the weight of the headstock is placed on the propped up way tubes. Fortunately I was not by myself as there's no way I could of kept the headstock on the way tubes from falling over on the concrete floor. That would of sucked.
Epilog: This time the PowerPro purred like a kitten! No more vibrations. Life was finally great! Each and every problem issue was address and my headstock was covered by their warranty which is much than print. I was also expedited a new knurled knob. Life is good as are the people working on Poe Avenue. I can only keep my figures crossed that something will spark people's interest. I like the new Jacob's chuck & the table lift.
The PowerPro is powerful and it is even better now than when it first came out in August 2010. I could not resist the urge to get a second DIY upgrade last Memorial day after a Lowe's demo. Shopsmith really improved the upgrade by including a new power switch and improving any issues(big or small) with the original DIY kit. Any issues I had doing the first upgrade had been eliminated to the point I think it only took me a couple hours to complete the second upgrade. I noticed the firmware was upgrade on the second DVR.
I'm surprised I haven't seen the DVR motor in other woodworking tools other than the Teknatool Nova lathe. The is a DVR motor in the Dyson vacuum that spins supposedly at 100,000 RPM. That is fast.
A lot of time and testing must of gone into putting the PowerPro together. However my upgrade had a number of severe vibration issues which required the headstock be shipped back. I had worked with tech support. We changed the settings and the vibration issue remained. They were gonna ship me a new idler assy, but instead realized something else was wrong. The fix was returning the headstock where all the Shopsmith upgrade parts were first replaced. The ultimate fix was replacing the DVR motor, control, & touchpad/display( I think they go as a set). Tech support was proud to announce it was running with no more vibrations and shipped it back to me via FedEx Ground (yikes!).
Unfortunately the idler shaft somehow got knocked into headstock on the shipment back. I've read this has happened to at least one other person. I wonder if this is something that could be prevented? The old water pump bearing shaft was held in place, I believe. I know there is a new water pump bearing idler shaft for sale on Ebay, but I have no idea of the bearing specs. The old idler shaft revolved at 8,320 RPM max; the new one is 16,000 RPM. I'm not sure if even one of the new old-style idler shafts would work. I know I'm not going to take a perfectly operating PowerPro apart to test and risk compromising my warranty. It ain't broke!
Chapter 2: That was an experience. In my excitement I didn't notice the idler shaft was knocked in when I put the headstock back on the propped up way tubes. Everything went well. I was expecting to see a vibration-free PowerPro. I finished putting the Shopsmith back together along with a double-tilt upgrade. When I brought it up to speed, the Shopsmith acted possessed and started vibrating across the wood subfloor with the casters up! As it vibrated across the floor, anything loose fell off.
I turned it off, pulled the belt cover off, and saw the inner bearing almost completely out of the eccentric bushing. I got on the phone. So back to Shopsmith it went. It seemed to be shipping damage, but after shipping the headstock back, I could find no evidence on their container to me that showed any evidence of damage. A result of the new double-bearing idler shaft and split eccentric? About 4 years earlier a FedEx Ground driver kicked the large box containing my Ebay-won power station out the side door of his truck onto my cement driveway and took off. He didn't see me standing in the garage. This was like the 3rd delivery attempt & I guess he got tired dealing with the heavy box. I got a check from FedEx for the damage caused by the motor bouncing around.
Chapter 3: This time the headstock shafts were protected in the shipping process by a $3.99 shaft protector (521889) that was simply taped to the belt cover. Rather than buy a new belt cover, I simply drilled a couple of holes in the old belt cover and simply glued a couple nuts in place to secure the shaft protector.
Oh, if you have a double-tilt upgrade, make sure the Locktite securing the thread stock to the knurled knob hasn't failed. I didn't notice a couple of threads sticking out of the top of the knurled knob securing the end of the way tube assy. The result? <think for a sec> There should be no threads sticking out or…the far side of the way tubes will pop out when the weight of the headstock is placed on the propped up way tubes. Fortunately I was not by myself as there's no way I could of kept the headstock on the way tubes from falling over on the concrete floor. That would of sucked.
Epilog: This time the PowerPro purred like a kitten! No more vibrations. Life was finally great! Each and every problem issue was address and my headstock was covered by their warranty which is much than print. I was also expedited a new knurled knob. Life is good as are the people working on Poe Avenue. I can only keep my figures crossed that something will spark people's interest. I like the new Jacob's chuck & the table lift.
The PowerPro is powerful and it is even better now than when it first came out in August 2010. I could not resist the urge to get a second DIY upgrade last Memorial day after a Lowe's demo. Shopsmith really improved the upgrade by including a new power switch and improving any issues(big or small) with the original DIY kit. Any issues I had doing the first upgrade had been eliminated to the point I think it only took me a couple hours to complete the second upgrade. I noticed the firmware was upgrade on the second DVR.
I'm surprised I haven't seen the DVR motor in other woodworking tools other than the Teknatool Nova lathe. The is a DVR motor in the Dyson vacuum that spins supposedly at 100,000 RPM. That is fast.