My first treadmill salvage

[middle.road]

(con't from Great Deals posting...)

This isn't good -- I'm going to start harvesting this things... bunch of good donor stuff in here.
- The motor (of course) the reason I grabbed it...
- The plank. Looks to be 3/4" MDF with a special coating on one side. I going to use this to make a new cross-cut sled for my table saw.
- The rollers. I'm going to redo my out feed riggers on my miter saw. Since we are doing so much re-habbing to this house I wore out the temporary ones I put on it back in January of '13.
- The tubing. I cut out some decent pieces for shop stock. Finally put my HF portable bandsaw through a workout. performed well.
- Hardware. There were even some Grade 8 bolts on this one.
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A linear pot or potentiometer is a variable resistor, like a volume control. I specify a linear, meaning a linear or even change in resistance as the knob is turnes, as opposed to an audio taper which is different. That is so you can tell the geek at Radio Shack what you need, and you get the right one. An audio taper pot might work, but would not provide a smooth change in speed. You would wire it to the controller board in place of the treadmill's speed control. The treadmill power cord should have a resetable curcuit breaker type of on/off switch. That can be reused as the power switch. The bayonet type connectors can be connected directly to the controller board.
Have you determined what model controller was in the treadmill?
If you need more info on repurposing the motor/controller, let me know. It's really not difficult.

Chuck

So I swap out the OE speed control with a linear pot? (I finally googled imaged it so at least now I'm on the same page.)

Which one is the controller board?
(hehe)

silk screen says MC-60 REV. C in the upper left, so that's good, right?



So I took all the motor and related pieces and tucked them into a milk crate which is going up into the attic.
Need to weary of getting sidetracked with another 'Want to do' project instead of taking care of all the 'Need to Dos' that I have to do.

_Dan

 

[Rbeckett]

The MC-60controller is the best way to go. If you ever blow yours up you can easily obtain one from Ebay cheap too. Once you get the recycling bug you will find all kinds of useful materials in some of the mmost unlikely places. Congrats on the treadmill now just keep it up to help rid America of all the junk just laying around and gathering rust.

Bob

 

[middle.road]

I figure I'm going to need three more motors.
My acquaintance down at habitat said they get them in frequently. People don't want to haul them to the dump.

As I was drifting off last night I was thinking:
- Slo-Mo Grinder. I've got an old style head, 1/2" shaft, cast housing, two ball bearings, 2" pulley.
- The 1" belt / 6" disc sander combo - Craftsman. maybe.
- The Bandsaw perhaps?
- The 6" belt sander.

I may take the tubing today and make a lathe chuck holder for under the lathe.

Then again I really really want to make something on the Birmingham today.

And there's also the house, I'd like to finish up the den/office before my better half get back from KC.

_Dan

 

[Chucketn]

You got it Dan. In the top pic the controller is on the bottom. The 'linear pot' connects to the red/white and black wires at the bottom of the pic. I have pictures of my setup if you need. The center tab of the pot goes to the terminal labled W. The other two to H and L. I used a Double Pole Double Throw center off toggle switch in the leads to the motor for FWD/Rev control. Some folks add a simple on/off toggle switch in the connection to the center tab of the pot. Supposed to stop and start the motor at the last speed. I haven't tried that.
As my set up is connected, it works like the SEIG lathes and mill, you have to rotate the speed pot to minimum and back up to desired speed. A safety feature I'm used to on the lathe.

Chuck

 

[gramps1951]

The first one I salvaged was a high end machine that had a huge board made of what appears to be 1" black nylon or some type of plastic tough material. I can think of lots of uses for that!!

 

[Kernbigo]

That is true break the center wire (wiper) on the pot and install the motor start and stop switch, than you can start where you left the pot instead of lowering it and resetting