partner 3 kneemill hi/lo spindle gears

[bestrada11]

anyone know anything about the hi lo gears without me having to tear this thing apart to visually see what im dealing with. i hear a little bit of kinda rattle from the head and narrowed it down to what ever gears are changed when i move the hi lo leaver it machines smoothly enough at 500 to 750 rpm. but when i set it to creep very very slow it kinda almost skips or misses. and another thing there is a switch that is avtivated when its on low gear...... this switch has a light that turns red..... well when this switch is off meaning that the lever is on hi gear setting i am unable to program the machine to have a spindle speed above 500 rpm and when the gear is set to lo and the light on the switch is on the machine will M04 S1500 but the thing is in lo gear so its creepin.... so what do i do about the rattle and the mismatch (at least it seems to be a mis match ) on the input into the machine...

[ZZZZ]

It sounds like the input for the back gear switch is backwards. Look at the input screens to see which input is changing when you flip the switch back-and-forth. A zero is off and a 1 is on.

Is this machine a Partner 3 or a Partner O3, they made both. The P3 is a heavier casting with a fixed head and a quill, the O3 has the mill-slide with a regular knee-mill head. I can get you the drawings of the O3 head if you can use them.

[bestrada11]

Please I could definitely use them. I looked at a grizzly head w a high low gear and a frquency drive and the drawing was pretty much confusing. I don't understanbd the concept of how the high lo gear works. What happens inside.

[bestrada11]

Can anyone explain basicaly how the high low lever and gears work together?

[Brian L]

Basically the main motor drives a belt to the spindle. Below that spindle there is another small pulley that uses a belt and drives a much larger pulley to the rear of the main spindle. On the same shaft as that gear, below it, is another gear set, smaller on this shaft, bigger around the spindle. When you are in "open belt" or high gear, you go direct from the motor to the spindle.

In back gear, usually engaged by lifting the lower gear set into engagement with the upper set, you transfer power through the upper portion of the spindle, through the two sets of gears, resulting in a reduction ratio. These gears are usually behind the spindle, hence the term, "back gear".

The actual mechanism and power transfer vary from machine type to machine type, some run cog belts, some run gear drive, some a combo.... Some machines, like a Bridgeport, require you to not only flip the gear lever, but also rotate a ring that lifts/drops the gears into alignment to go into/out of back gear.