Epoxy and unknow plastic

[stephenc]

I was using my shaper a bit this afternoon and the Reeves drive started slipping a little . Thinking that one of the questionable belts I put on it needed adjusting I opened up the machine and found that the center pulley section had come apart .
And that the two ball tabs that hold it together have pulled out and the sockets are now to loose to hold the pulley section together .

So before I just go glueing back together I'd like to hear what others have used with success on plastic .
I have no idea what type of plastic it is ... the shaper I salvaged the drive from was from the late 60's to early 70' s at a guess .

I've used both jb weld and devcon two ton epoxy with satisfactory results before ... but if there's something that might work better I'm all ears .

[Harold_V]

Pictures? Could help with a solution.

There may be a better way to fix the problem.

Harold

[liveaboard]

If the plastic is 40 years old, it's likely degraded and brittle. I'm not envisioning your situation at all from your description, but I don't think epoxy will solve this.
I was a Devcon fan but now use marine epoxy from a Dutch specialty shop; I have 3 types, thin, normal, and paste. 2 hardeners, normal and chemical resist. I love the stuff, but sticking a failed pulley together seems unlikely to me.

[jcfx]

I'm with Harold_V, pictures would help.
I'm guessing this is a metal shaper ?

[stephenc]

Hope this works ... sorry about the poor quality. But laying on my back trying to take a decent picture inside the shaper isn't the best way to take pictures .

But I think you should be able to make out the ball and socket that snap together to hold the two center sections together .

[Glenn Brooks]

I don't think any epoxy is going to work for you in this case. The mating surfaces you will need to glue back together look way to thin for the epoxy to hold. Maybe it would work if the little balls were solid - in which case they probably wouldn't have broken to begin with.

Is it possible to drill and thread both edges of the two pulleys, where the broken pieces are, and put everything back together with spacers and pins, or maybe all thread, or machine screws?

Or make a solid spacer to fit between the the pully haves, and reassembly with fastenings or some sort? Maybe epoxy would work if you had sufficient bearing surface with a spacer...

Glenn

[stephenc]

glenn

my plan is to simply give the ball's and sockets a good cleaning and maybe rough them up a bit with some sand paper and then simply put a good size dab of epoxy in the sockets and clamp the halves together .

boths pieces are intact , and after some closer inspection i am pretty sure that what has failed is what ever glue the factory used to hold it together .
at least thats how it looks to me with my head stuck up in there .
and i did manage to scrape off what seemed like dried up and brittle glue from inside the two sockets .

i am giving your idea of a spacer and screwing it together some thought ... but it looks like if i go that route it will quickly snowball into a bit of a more extensive project . ie .. if i use a half inch spacer i will have to make the shaft it rides on that much longer along with the sliding bushing and then moving the motor to line things up again .

at that point i would give a long hard think on just ditching the reeves drive and saving up for a vfd

[ctwo]

JB PlasticWeld

[jcfx]

No glue will work in my opinion, if the ball experiences any motion the glue will fail.

I'm not sure what the third picture shows, is it the socket the ball goes in ?

I'll guess that the what you thought was glue is was a nylon or delrin cap of some sort that held the ball in place
and was press fit into socket. My Craftsman metal bandsaw drive pinion gear is made of nylon and it dates from the 50 - 60's.
Make a new cap to press fit into the socket out of the same plastic (nylon or delrin).
Hopefully the ball stud screws out so that you can get the machined cap on.

[stephenc]

Yes the last picture is the socket the ball fits in .
And it was most definitely glued together . I just spent an hour cleaning out the old glue
Or epoxy what ever the case may be .
There is no room inside the socket for any kind of cap or retainer .

The center section of the drive doesn't really have much stress on it as far as pulling it back apart .. all it does is slide back and forth when the drive is raised or lowered to change speed

After cleaning the glue out I just snapped it back together and spent 10 or 15 minutes running the speed up and down and both halves stayed together .

Tomarow I'll stop at a parts store or two and see what they have in epoxy . ... even if it does fail in the future there isn't much to lose all that can happen is it spreads apart again

[jcfx]

Old petrified grease could pass for old glue believe or not, if you have a parts manual for your shaper it may be worth
looking at it or hunting one down to see if there is a cap whether it fit outside around the socket or in.

[stephenc]

I went with the jb plastic weld . Glued it up last night and gave it till noon today to cure .
I think it's problem solved ... I let the shaper run for two and a half hours and it's still together .