tri-power poor quality

[digitalmdj]

I just bought a Shoptask Tri-power. It has a oil leak. The spindle bearings are dry and make noise. Thr mill manual feed is totally out of adjustment. The gears have so much backlash that it skips a tooth. Also percision bearings are practiclly non existent. It will take 5 to 6 months lead time to get the bearings. Shoptask could not tell me where to get the bearings either. They don't have a clue and they are so out of touch I won't even call. This machine will need all the bolts replaced with grade 8 bolts. This thing was just slapped together. They could have done a better job with quality. The headstock was full of casting sand. The gears in the headstock were binding so I had to tear into it and found burrs on all the bushings causing the gearbox to bind. I will have to tear the whole machine apart and start over. The second and third shafts in the main shaft gear box are not even on bearings. They are very sloppy steel bushings with burrs all over them.I will need to redesign them later and add nedle bearings with hardened shafts. This thing is cheap cheap, cheap. No wonder their is so much run out everywhere.

[norvil1]

i have been trying to tell people that since i bought one a year and a half ago. you are lucky you didnt get the cnc model, then you would have wasted 9,875 dollars
like i did. john promised a positional accuracy of .001 and i got .008-.012.
i personally feel like i got ripped off, as i have said before. hsm doesn't even run his ads anymore. why people continue to do business with john taylor is
beyond me. for more information feel free to call at 601-584-8450 8-5 cst

[digitalmdj]

You cannot get accuracy with wheel bearings installed. You need precision bearings and they are almost impossible to get. Timkin does not make a precision bearing in these sizes. John has been lying to everyone. The precision bearing numbers are 32006 p5, 32007 p5, and 32008 p5. The p5 represents Precision grade 5. Timkins are grade 2 at best which is a bearing you would use on your front wheels of your car. They take six months to get and thats if your lucky. I will get this sorted out but I have the resources to do so. If you are a regular joe you won't have a clue where to look or what to do to fix the problems. I will take a total rebuild to fix this thing right.

[digitalmdj]

I removed the guards from my shoptask and found a 2" crack in the casting. It looks like a casting crack from cooling to fast. This one they are going to have to replace.

[plungerhead]

First post. I must say that this forum has my eyes wide open to the Shoptasks shortcommings. None the less, I elected to go ahead with the purchase but now plan to learn the trade from the machine up. Looks like I chose the right machine after all!
When we all are done rebuilding our Shoptasks to perfection we'll have the satisfaction of knowing it has been done right and the pride of doing it ourselves. 30 years in the plumbing business has shown me there is no substitute for grimy, dirty, hands on experience to build skill level and I see no difference here. So keep those tips, part numbers, mods and tricks comin' cause I'm gonna need 'em!

plumber

[digitalmdj]

JT replaced the bad spindle gearbox with another cracked gearbox casting. This one all the shaft bores are machined to spec but it was cracked . Check your shaft bores on the second and third shafts to see if they are not to spec. The original was machined so bad it is just a paper weight now. Also the new casting is junk they tried to cover the crack with paint. They are so stupid I worked with cracked deisel heads for six years. You can't hide one from me.

[plungerhead]

So, if I am going to blueprint my Shoptask I'll need some specs. Does the manual have anything? I guess the first step after complete disassembly and inspection would be to get everything straight and true. Tell me about tramming and scraping; a good reference would work so I don't burn everybody's time.

Machine is due in 2-3 weeks and I have to finish preping the shop. Moved the water heater (went tankless,) beer fridge gets a downsizing, the floor is next. Anybody know of a good epoxy floor coating for concrete? All I have is a Benjamin Moore waterborne polyamide epoxy in platinum gray.

plumber

[digitalmdj]

First you need to check for casting flaws. So you need to remove the paint they like to paint over cracks. Then when you pull the second and third shafts see if the bushings fit snugly into the gearbox housing. If you have more than a thousands play then you have machining problems. The gears are most likely binding and they made the holes bigger to cover up a machining screwup. They didn't machine the hole in the correct place and they were off a few thousands

[MrWild]

With so many negative posts about poor quaity and disfunction covering years, why did you guys buy this machine? If you got the machine and it was junk, why wasn't it returned? Got to get your hands dirty to learn? Heck yes! But wouldn't getting them dirty doing real work be bettr than the trials of rebuilding a "new" machine?

ANYONE who is thinking of a all in one machine, read these posts and LEARN! Buy a real mill or real lathe, but don't buy a REAL headache

[digitalmdj]

I got into this thing to deep now. I am going to return everthing piece by piece . Jonn taylor will go broke replaceing defective junk. And I will have the machine they promised in the end. All the screws and locknuts on the whole machine are total junk. The mill head lifting screw nut is so loose it will strip out in a few months. The mill gearbox need to be shimed badly. It goes on and on and on.

[digitalmdj]

John taylor just tried to accuse me of damaging the castings. I knew this was going to happen. He wants me to send the machine back at my expence so he can send me another screwed up machine or give me my money back. If he does not replace the castings I will get a price to fix what I have and take him to small claims court here in california. I will get estimates and make sure he pays to fix everthing. I can play his game I am better at it than he is. If I send the machine back he will recover his money by acusing me of damaging the machine . If he replaces the parts it's at his costs and he doesn't want that. Neither do the Chinese they don't want to pay either. So I will finish the machine and make him pay through the court system. It may take time but he will have to drive 8 hours for court. He will not like that. I will make sure he understands the process.

[norvil1]

shoptask is a Nevada corporation. good luck.