R2E3 grease in head and pulley setup

[ccoleman]

Hi all,
I've pulled the head partially apart on my R2E3 and I'm wondering why there is so much grease in the section under the brake pulley and above the gearbox? Should that be full of grease? It seems to me that the toothed timing belt that drives the back gear should be dry and one would only need a little white lithium on the mating area of that upper portion of the drive shaft to the gearbox section of the drive shaft?

Also, ran across this video in which this gentleman replaced the variable pulley with a fixed 1:1 using his vfd for speed control.
YouTube - ‪BRIDGEPORT CNC PROGRESS 2 - CONVERSION TO VFD & POLYV BELT DRIVE‬‏What do you all think of this setup? I was curious about a loss of power at lower rpms, but I suppose it's being geared down through the gearbox so maybe not a problem. Thoughts?

Thanks for the help.
Chris

[machintek]

The back gear housing may have been overfilled with grease. There is no seal there so the grease may have worked its way out to the tooth area of the mating of the splined gear hub and the spindle pulley shaft.

George