# Replacement handwheel for Husky mill



## larry2c (Mar 16, 2020)

I have a Husky knee mill (clone of Grizzly 8X30) and only one of the cheezy plastic handwheels is not broken. I bought a 6" chrome plated cast iron handwheel and it came with a 1/4" hole in the center of the hub. I have bored the hub out to 1.305 and the old steel hub that I pulled out of the OEM plastic HW is 1.312 OD and it is a knurled OD. I plan on pressing the old hub into the new HW and I think with the hub being knurled the .007 press fit will be OK. However, I was thinking of also putting some Loctite or maybe some other type of adhesive on the knurled surface before assembly.

Just curious if others have done this repair and if so, did you use anything besides just a press fit. Attached pics show the HW and the OEM hub.


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## extropic (Mar 16, 2020)

A .007" press sounds scary to me. It would be a shame to split the hub (now fairly thin walled) on your nice new hand wheel.
Why not turn down the old hub to a .001 press fit? Add loctite or epoxy just because?


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## larry2c (Mar 16, 2020)

"Why not turn down the old hub to a .001 press fit? " I'd love to, but no lathe - yet . Normally I would go with about .001 to .0015 on the press but since the hub I'm going to be pressing is knurled, I think I need more - anticipating the knurl points to actually cut into the softer cast iron.


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## benmychree (Mar 16, 2020)

extropic said:


> A .007" press sounds scary to me. It would be a shame to split the hub (now fairly thin walled) on your nice new hand wheel.
> Why not turn down the old hub to a .001 press fit? Add loctite or epoxy just because?


I quite agree on the fit being way too tight; I see that the tops of the knurls are truncated, so the fit with 1 or 1.5 thou would be plenty.  It's not like there is a lot of torque being transmitted with that handwheel.


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## larry2c (Mar 16, 2020)

OK, I can bore out the HW to get the .0015 press. What Loctite or other adhesive would you recommend?


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## benmychree (Mar 16, 2020)

I would not use loctite, I'd use a anti seize (white lead is my favorite), assemble it, and if you are concerned with movement or slippage, I'd drill and tap it axially at the interface of the two parts and screw in a long setscrew.


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## pontiac428 (Mar 16, 2020)

John, I've used zinc (silver) and copper (bronze) anti-seize paste, but I've never seen white lead- where do you get it, and what application is it found in?


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## benmychree (Mar 16, 2020)

White lead is no longer on the market, but I have had success finding it on e bay.  It is the very best anti seize for press fits and interference fit threads.  If you get some, pour off the oil that is floating on top and replace it with machine oil, the original oil is linseed and it hardens if exposed to air.  White lead was formerly used in paints, and supposedly caused intelligence problems with inner city kids who ate paint chips or chewed on window sills.
If you can't find any and want some, I could help out, got lots of it.


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## pontiac428 (Mar 16, 2020)

Lead seems like the ideal anti-seize.  Looks like lead carbonate was mixed with linseed oil and was good at doing a number of things.  I like shopping for old cans of pesticides and poisons on eBay for office art, looks like I can add this one to my search!


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## benmychree (Mar 16, 2020)

pontiac428 said:


> Lead seems like the ideal anti-seize.  Looks like lead carbonate was mixed with linseed oil and was good at doing a number of things.  I like shopping for old cans of pesticides and poisons on eBay for office art, looks like I can add this one to my search!


I LIKE your attitude!


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## larry2c (Mar 18, 2020)

OK, the new handwheel is bored out and assembled onto the old hub and now back on the machine. I ended up going with a .002" press and in reality, I could have made it a bit tighter. I think the knurl sort of broached it's way during the pressing. I did put a setscrew into the new HW and with it tightened down, nothing is moving. Good enough for now! I may order a couple more HW's and replace all the plastic ones - they were all cracked and repaired with glue at some point.

Thanks to all for the help!


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