Leaking Oil Help

Anyone ever used a hydraulic oil dye or similar to help find oil leaks?
 
tjb said:
I know of an excellent equipment repair guy in the Atlanta area. I hesitate to list him on HM or sharing contact info without his permission. So if you're interested, send me a PM, and I'll pursue it for you.

Regards
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If i can't figure it out by this weekend I will definitely ask for that info.
 
Pevehouse said:
Hi, first of all good luck on finding the leak you have there. I have been down this road with my mill and my lathe. Just wanted to pop in and say hi, since you’re the closest member I have found on HM. I’m not in Atlanta but about a hundred miles away in Auburn Alabama. If I weee a little closer I wouldn’t hesitate to come help
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Awesome. I'll be in Auburn this weekend for my son's soccer tournament.
 
Mr Mike said:
@wnchstrtnfldvlle

I see oil in the Kerf the length of the feed rod - Horizontal green arrow.
what amounts to a drop growing - Vertical green arrow.
Have you checked the front and rear of the feed rod collar for leaks - red arrow.

Maybe dry this area up and place a small catch pan or card board under the feed rod collet to see if its leaking here. an oil leak from a single area can find its way to other areas.

Just pointing out this area just in case.

View attachment 500426
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Well,
I was able to get the shaft pulled away from the clutch, but I wasn't confident enough to break open the casing to see about removing it entirely. I cleaned up the area, the retightened everything down. I refilled the gearbox this morning and will check it when I get home to see if there's a new leak.

Does anyone know if I can safely remove the front panel of the gearbox with the knobs without anything falling out or getting messed up?
 
wnchstrtnfldvlle said:
I had about ten minutes to work on this before I had to leave to drop my son off at practice so I forgot to take some pictures. But

View attachment 500399

The section numbered 1, is the cover for the switch assembly that’s activated by the lever. There’s no oil behind there, just a cavity with the wired switch. So the gap circled in yellow isn’t leaking anything.
After a closer inspection, I believe the oil may be coming from the circled green section. I drained the oil before removing the cover plate (wasn’t sure what was back there and didn’t want to spill oil), so after cleaning the green area I couldn’t verify the leak.
When I get a chance I will see if I can verify the leak is there. It’s the highest point where I’ve seen oil but haven’t confirmed that’s not it. It would also explain why the leak slows down at a certain point.

Thanks for your help so far.
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Where you have that number one in the pic, That is just a switch cover. You can take it apart by sliding the shaft assembly to the right without taking apart anything on the apron. The whole shaft will move to the right and just stick out of the bushing block on the far right side at the end of the lathe bed. There are a couple of micro switches in there with a cam assembly. Pretty simple actually. The leak is just going to be coming from somewhere else. You should still take the switches out and clean them off. There is an insulating wrap around them.
 
I did figure that out a couple days ago. I appreciate your help though. Currently I'm waiting to get home tonight to see if cleaning and tightening everything on the shaft above it helped.
 
Well here is where I'm at now.
IMG_5286.jpg


Yesterday morning I cleaned up everything, tightened the plate the middle shaft runs through then refilled the gearbox with oil. When I got home around 2:30, the puddle was back, and in the picture below there was a large buildup of oil right where the yellow arrow is pointing. Not enough to drop, but a lot bigger than it has been so far. There was also the same amount of oil that had run down the machine to the floor as well.
IMG_5285.jpg


So I started trying to see if I could remove the clutch piece in order to remove the seal, plate, and gasket. No dice. So then I removed the front access plate of the gearbox to look at the other side of it. Pic below.
IMG_5284.jpg


Does anyone know if there's a way to remove the portion of the shaft that enters the right side without pulling the entire shaft with the gears. The left hand red arrow points to what looks like a circlip. Any ideas? I've already got an email in to QMT tech support but wanted to ask here as well. I think if I can get that plate section removed I can replace the oil seal and get a better gasket on there and get this leak fixed.
 
wnchstrtnfldvlle said:
Well here is where I'm at now.
View attachment 500667

Yesterday morning I cleaned up everything, tightened the plate the middle shaft runs through then refilled the gearbox with oil. When I got home around 2:30, the puddle was back, and in the picture below there was a large buildup of oil right where the yellow arrow is pointing. Not enough to drop, but a lot bigger than it has been so far. There was also the same amount of oil that had run down the machine to the floor as well.
View attachment 500669

So I started trying to see if I could remove the clutch piece in order to remove the seal, plate, and gasket. No dice. So then I removed the front access plate of the gearbox to look at the other side of it. Pic below.
View attachment 500670

Does anyone know if there's a way to remove the portion of the shaft that enters the right side without pulling the entire shaft with the gears. The left hand red arrow points to what looks like a circlip. Any ideas? I've already got an email in to QMT tech support but wanted to ask here as well. I think if I can get that plate section removed I can replace the oil seal and get a better gasket on there and get this leak fixed.
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I have only messed with the Norton style gearboxes, But I wouldn't imagine this style to be too hard. On the Norton style box, Each shaft has a small snap ring which keeps the shaft in place. It shouldn't be that hard. I have done most of it without removing the box from the lathe. But removing it really isn't that hard either.

Have you determined where the leak is?

It looks like maybe you could try to coax the flange off of that clutch and it looks like there may be a lip seal there.
 
I’m as sure as I can be that the leak is from the flange. Just not sure if it is the gasket or the seal.
If I can get the flange off I can clean it up and try another gasket from the factory. They’re going to ship me all the parts I’ll need for that assembly.
 
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