Lathe motors

"Todd Price" wrote: Anyone try putting the 1 h.p. Jet motor on the Grizzly 1067Z (clip) ^^^^^^^^^^^^ My Jet 1236 had a 3/4 HP motor. The Reeves drive always slipped before the motor stalled, so you may find that adding HP does not gain you anything. (If the drive on your lathe is similar to the Jet.)

Yea, I did it and it was a bit of a pain, but worth it. I upgraded the motor on my Grizzly G5979 lathe. It had 1/2 HP and I put on a 3/4 hp reversible motor. I had to buy a shaft coupling and a piece of keyed shafting to extend the motor shaft. I also had to devise a new mounting arrangement since the off the shelf motor was no way going to mount the same way as the POS motor that was on there. I also had to use rubber footing to dampen vibration. It turned out to be a lot of messing around, but it works quite well. The new motor has all the power I need and it runs nice and quiet.

Ms Leslie Gossett

Can't be easily done. The 1067Z uses a custom motor mount and a motor with a custom shaft; it can't be replaced without major welding to the cast iron bed. I've asked Grizzly about this before ;-)

To tweak the 1067's speed:

Remove the cover.

Run the motor, and crank the handle down past the slowest stop, until the belt is riding right up at the top of the spindle pulley. This is the slowest speed the lathe can do.

Hold the handle in place and shut off the motor.

Remove the screws for the handle.

Remove the handle.

Turn the handle until it locks into the slowest stop.

Replace the handle and screws.

Replace the cover.

The slowest stop is now the slowest speed (and thus highest torque) the lathe supports.

If you still need more torque, sharpen your tools better ;-)

Never say "can't". I've slowed the lathe down already. What I need is more power. I can very easily stall the motor while turning bowls with an Ellsworth grind gouge. And believe me, it's sharp enough. I thought of taking the route Ms. Gossett suggested, but I thought it would be too much to have the pulley hanging out that far from the motor.

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I thought it would hang out too far as well. But with the motor well supported, it doesn't seem to be a problem. Mind you this project took me a lot of time, persistence and ingenuity. The whole thing was one problem after another.

The 1/2 hp motor looks more like a 1/3 hp motor in size. When you put a real

3/4 hp motor up against it, your going to think, " this is never going to work". The 3/4 hp is huge in comparison. You have to set it well off of the headstock using spacers so that you don't lose any swing. I mounted it using a piece of heavy unistrut and spaced it about 2" off of the headstock. That brought the motor about 4" away from where the old motor was mounted.

Another issue I had to deal with is the keyway on the motor. Aparently the old motor keyway is metric, so is the keyway on the pulley. I had to grind a long key to fit the pulley (metric) and the motor which is english.

You will have 2 motor feet sticking up in the air. I fashioned a Z bracket to attach one of the feet to the headstock. There is still one foot unattached. It doesnt seem to make any difference. It is mounted very solid now.

A better way would be to use a motor and a VS drive and eliminate the goofy VS pulley arrangement. That way you wont need the long shaft and the motor wont have to hang out so far from the headstock.

I also used a 3/8" power-twist v-belt to make the transition easier. That way you can be more flexible with the motor mounting and not have to keep buying belts. You will need to consider the extra vibration the new motor will have. Using rubber mounts made a huge difference.

Good luck!

Ms Leslie

Thanks for the info Ms.Leslie. Jet tells me that their 1 hp motor is $114. If the shaft length and diameter were the same as the Grizzly it would save alot of engineering. Anybody know about this? P.S. Don't know if I'm doing this posting exactly right, but I guess you can read it anyway.

Todd Price

That was going to be my next option, to just buy a motor from Jet. I have compared my Grizzly to the Jet and they are identical except for the motor size. The reason I shied away from that is the fact that I know I can reverse my motor, but probably not the Jet motor. If running in reverse is not important to you, I say go with the Jet motor.

As a side bar on reversing the motor:

I have turned several bowls with the new motor without a problem. Last night, I was sanding the interior of a bowl. I was nearly finished. I had the lathe switch in reverse. I turned on the lathe and reached over for my sander and just then the Oneway chuck unwound from the spindle and crashed to the floor. The nearly finished bowl was shattered. I have turned maybe 15 bowls so far and this is my first unsalvageable incident. I have had bowls come off the chuck and was able to recover. But not this one. The velocity and weight of the chuck just crushed it. At least it wasn't a real expensive piece of wood, a 6" x 6" x 3" paduak turning blank.

Well I have learned my lesson, I am getting setscrews today to lock the chuck on the spindle. Oh well, live and learn.

For those here that told me that they never had a chuck unscrew: It can happen to you too!!

Ms Leslie Gossett

Hi Leslie,

If you are going to use a set screw with the one way chuck on your Grizzly, drop a lead shot in the set screw hole. This will protect the threads on the spindle. Snug the set screw down pretty good and add another to the top. Snug the second one down a lttle tighter. This will prevent the first one from vibrating loose. Don't forget to take both set screws out before trying to remove the chuck.

The thread protector is a good idea. Traditionally, a small disc of brass is used. It will last longer than the sacrificial lead shot. Also, to me, a second set screw is a 'belt and suspenders' approach. One set screw is sufficient. After all, there are millions of pulleys stuck to shafts with one screw and they are doing fine.

Thanks for the suggestions. I was worried about marring the threads. I will get some brass to keep handy when I need to lock down the chuck.

You can buy brass tipped or nylon tipped set screws. This way you don't have to hunt for that little piece of brass amongst the shavings. Martin

I just realized that Grizzly's G1495 has a 3/4 hp motor. Anyone know if this motor will match up with the pulley system on the 1067Z?

Thanks, Todd Price