The pulleys arrived tonight, so I grabbed the motor to see how they fit. I'm actually very happy with how they fit. I will be modifying them a little, but not much which is great news.

http://ecorenovator.org/pictures/ecorider104.JPG



The top pulley here doesn't fully go on, its only about halfway on the shaft. I'll have to modify them to get it to slide on farther. The general rule we use in the industry I work in (industrial conveying equipment) is you need 1X diameter engagement on couplings and pulleys. So, that is what I will be aiming for.

http://ecorenovator.org/pictures/ecorider105.JPG

Can you cut the setscrew flange off of one pulley and weld that pulley to the other pulley?

Woohoo!

Will there be any more grass cutting to do when these are on? Seems like the grass growing season is rapidly drawing to a close.

1*D, as in 114°?

The pulleys are cast iron, and I'm not sure what type of iron at that. Welding would be tricky.


Thankfully yeah, its pretty much done. However, it'll be a good task for the new motor having to cut through the very tall grass.

Speaking of which, I still have to run this motor in to seat the brushes completely.


Not sure what you mean by that. I mean I have a 7/8" diameter shaft, I should have 7/8" of linear engagement into the pulley. I emailed my friend who works in motor testing to verify this. I'm pretty sure I'll add a capscrew at the end of the shaft with a washer or two (or hardened washer) to hold everything on and secure in addition to having the setscrews holding the pulleys on. The fit on these pulleys is much looser than what I had on the other motor.

I threw the motor on to seat the brushes today. Being so new, the brushes need to be worn down so they fully contact the commutator or you can have problems when you try putting a lot of power through it. To do this, all I did was hook it up to a 12V battery and let it spin for a while. I'll stop it after a while and check each brush to make sure that they are fully contacting.

http://ecorenovator.org/pictures/ecorider106.JPG



As you can see here, none of the brushes are close to being broken in as none of them have even touched the duller band on the right side of commutator.
http://ecorenovator.org/pictures/ecorider107.JPG

Are you sure the brushes are that wide? Normally you are looking for an arc in the brushes that matches the arc of the commutator segments. Once the two arcs are the same you have full contact and are good to go. You really need a view from the end of the shaft or a small mirror to view this. You can also pull the brushes out periodically during your break-in and see if any of the original flat area across the bottom (where the brushes touch the commutator) is left. If it's all gone your motor is ready.

Yup, I'm sure. I've already had the brushes out when I replaced the springs on it.

I just talked with an engineer at work. We did some quick calculations on key stress and found that even with only the 5/8" or so engagement I'm getting on the second pulley I'll be more than fine transmitting the torque that the motor puts out. So, I'll just add the bolt on the end to make sure everything is held together nice and tight.

You could cut the boss off one pulley, and drill and tap the set screw into the v of the pulley, so that the belt clears the top of the set screw.