ST6 Roller problem

[Gary Prentice]

We've had a bit of an issue.

 

The welded plate to which the side anvil is bolted sheared its weld and came adrift. Plate, anvil and bolts disappeared apart from a piece of the anvil that jammed the bottom roller.

 

Freed that, pulled the bottom roller plate out to make sure nothing else was in there and thought that was that. Redwoods have found a spare plate for us to weld back and posted everything to us this afternoon.

 

In the meantime we've test started it, only to find that the roller will only run in reverse. Swopped the electric feed wires to the hydraulic block and it will then only run forward and won't reverse.

 

Had a look in the electrical box, all the fuses are good. Swopped the three relays - no change.

 

Until I can speak to Redwoods in the morning, has anyone any suggestions/had similar problems?

 

I've a horrible suspicion that the anvil piece jammed the roller and something electrical/electronic (and expensive) has burnt out under excessive load:sneaky2: Or could the forward/reverse buttons have gone south?

[JaySmith]

We had a similar problem with an st6 if I remember right. Ours would only reverse and not let the rollers go forward. From what I remember they sent us a new wire that links the control box to the roller, I think that's correct. It was a bit fiddly but did the trick

 

 

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[Gary Prentice]

I know the wire you mean. We've swapped them over but which ever configuration they go on we only get feed one way. Seems there's no live feed on one of the two electric box outlets.

[JaySmith]

Again this was maybe two years ago so can't remember it that clearly but I think the wire goes in both ways round and we had to swap the ends over to make it work, I.e spin the loom around. If not then maybe it could be the box?

 

 

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[Gary Prentice]

Just checked with mechanic cos I had to leave him for a bit. Definitely no power from one of the box outlets:sneaky2:

[JaySmith]

New box then?

 

 

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[T14EES T14UNK]

Isn't this covered by the warranty? A piece shearing off doesn't normally happen through bad wear and tear, never mind normal use!

I'm curious because I've recently been hearing great things about the after sales service but would be pretty upset if that happened to a newish chipper. (Newish??- Jensen...5yr old - no problems!!!) 8-9 yrs later, a few wear and tear issues but not something that could have almost written off the machine.

Hope it's just a wiring issue and it all gets sorted but hope you can stop it from happening again in a more catastrophic way!!

[Gary Prentice]

Bought it as a used machine and it's now out of warrenty. I think it's got around 900 hrs on it.

 

We were looking at last night and it's a bit of an oddity from a design/manufacturing point of view. The flat bar looks as it sits in a little recess at the bottom, then has a short run of weld <10mm , it's then welded across the width at the top.

 

I'd imagine that it's a high stress area and receives a lot of shock loads as timber meets the blades - so maybe it could have been designed or built stronger. I think we'll be adding a tad more weld when we replace it.

 

 

I'm not too hopeful with the wiring, think when the roller jammed it's overloaded a circuit but would have thought a hydraulic pressure release valve would have prevented that

[Gary Prentice]

Redwoods have been great today. Parts arrived at 9AM. Phoned the service department and spoke to simon re. the rollers. First thing he said to look at was the air gap on the speed sensor. With the flywheel/pulley assembly moving forward when the anvil went through the gap was excessive and the screen was showing 0RPM

 

Re-set that - still not reading. Swapped the speed sensor with the hood one and the engine starts - so the sensor works. Swapped the wiring tails over to check them, they were ok.

 

Spoke to simon several times to check that wires were correct etc, really patient, helpful fellow, but by mid afternoon it was looking like the electronic module was faulty. Simon still had a gut-feeling that it wasn't that but I think was running out of ideas.

 

Decided to take the machine into O Plant at Liverpool next week after we sort the mechanical problems, Simon said it would be cheaper for us than arranging for someone to come to us.

 

This evening our auto-electrician neighbour said he'd have a look. So we put all the sensors back to their original positions, started it and then pressed the P3 button to demonstrate the 0-RPM reading - which now read 450RPM. Turned the revs up, pressed the feed button and the rollers are running both ways. RESULT:thumbup:

 

Not definite yet, but looks like a faulty connection on the inside of the box that got tweaked moving wires about, remaking the connection. So hopefully we can resolve that, put new blades in on monday to set the flywheel in the right position and all's sorted.

 

Big thanks to all at Redwood, everyone I've spoke to has been really helpful, explaining how things operate or should operate, finding parts that they don't supply to the public and getting them out to us, and most importantly returning calls.

[john p]

Ive read a number of threads about forst and the main thing I can glean from them is that redwoods customer service is excellent! Nice one