Another band sharpener question..

[Bodger]

Greetings, I've been reading and watching for a while and this is a good site for serious sawing questions.  I just rebuilt my WM band sharpener after over 12 years of constant use.  All I really did was replace the brushes in the motor that drives the stone.  After putting it back together I checked the tracking of the stone and found  almost a 64th of run out to the outside of the stone.  I put on a new rock and had the same reading.  Now, I never checked it before and don't know if I has always been that way or if this is something new.  I did try and shim the stone but without much success.  I hate the idea of having to purchase a new sharpener but dislike having to send them out to sharpen.  Have any of you checked yours for this?

[LeeB]

I never checked mine per say, but I'm pretty sure it was there. I could rotate the stone by hand and it wouldn't touch the blade, turn on the motor and it would touch lightly. I don't think it would really make a whole lot of difference unless it was really bad.

[pineywoods]

I'm with LeeB, I don't think that little runoutwill make any difference. It's not really a precision piece of machinery. But if it bugs you, pull the motor apart and take the armature to a machine shop. 15 minute job on a lathe.

[gmmills]

    If your grinding wheel motor has good bearings in it the runout is caused by the grinding wheel . Remove the grinding wheel and check for runout on the face of the arbor. If the wheels are out really bad the water in the coolant tray will have small waves in the surface as the motor is running.  I buy my grinding wheels 6 at a time from WM. Some will run very smooth.  Over the past 2 years the quality control of the wheels has been improved considerably.

    I have found that the hook angle can be altered with a fair amount of runout. Set your grinder for a 10 deg hook angle and the sharpened blade may only have a 9 deg hook angle.  You may even gain a deg from 10 to 11.