Preventing an extractor from walking?

[MAXANT]

Thats not my price, nor would I ever spend that much on them!

[Fuzzy]

"In other words, is she starts a shaking, it holds that speed until the shaking goes away.
"

Roland,

I'd give you the attaboy just for persistence and diligence. Although, the quoted statement above is illogical. If the shaking is the start of resonance it will get worse by staying at speed. You must either move down or up enough to move off the harmonic curve. If you move down you will likely never finish extracting ... I know because I used to have loads that took an hour to spin out. Now the longest load takes 10-11 minutes.

But It is your time and money so go for it.

And oh by the way THANK YOU for documenting the damage that occured to the equipment. -- Fuzzy

[EastSideBuzz]

Thats not my price, nor would I ever spend that much on them!

Too funny. Not your price it was the check saying what the price was. Should not have cut and pasted it that way. Sorry for inferring that it was your price. I would pay 20 bucks a piece for them max. Just to have cool casters.

[bermybee]

I repaired a large 70 frame extractor that was bolted to the floor, and run for extended periods unbalanced, The Stainless steel fatigued and cracked.

Just to put this in perspective.
Do you know the make of that extractor?
Gauge of SS used?
Was it welded or soldered?
Was it a leg-ed extractor where the legs supported by the top and the bottom ring on the extractor or was tank the only support for the top Chanel.
When you say "extended periods unbalanced" was it loaded properly or was quarter deep the rest mediums situation.

[bmcmahon]

Great thread. Thanks for all the ideas. I decided to try a double thickness of 2'x2'x3/4" ready cut plywood panels from Home Depot for my Dadant Ranger. I used 3 3" casters and secured the honey filtering bucket with a rubber cord borrowed from a tree staking kit. 4"x4"s slip comfortably under the sides with about an 1/8" to spare so I think I'll frame it in 4"x4"s to give it more bulk and stability. I did run the unit and bring it up to full speed with no shakes, rattles or rolls.

[max2]

Looks good but the base looks a little large - do you need to lean across to put the frames in?

[Reid]

. . . . As to why 3 casters... In a triangle pattern that is outside the center of gravity a 3 legged stand is ALWAYS stable on it's own. By design it cannot wobble. A 4 legged design is never actually stable because it is not possible to have all 4 legs touching at the same time. You will always get some wobble (perhaps small) from any chair on a hard surface. Any wobble at the base is magnified 2-3x at the top.

Fuzzy

Fuzzy, thanks for confirming the path I was about to take. A couple of us at work were just discussing this very option to solve our mutual extractor problem. With your posts and confirmation from others I've got myself a project for this weekend.
~Reid

[bermybee]

Just to put this in perspective.
Do you know the make of that extractor?
Gauge of SS used?
Was it welded or soldered?
Was it a leg-ed extractor where the legs supported by the top and the bottom ring on the extractor or was tank the only support for the top Chanel.
When you say "extended periods unbalanced" was it loaded properly or was quarter deep the rest mediums situation.

No answers Roland? Poor built (engineered) equipment will break.

Maxant have you ever had a costumer complaining about the stainless cracking on one of your machine that has bee bolted down?

I understand the physics behind easing the bearings up, and the whole extractor for that matter with wheels, yes. But my thing is why would you want any thing above a 20 framer wandering around your honey room. Would you buy a Ford F150 load it up with Portland cement bags, attach a trailer to it, start it up and then carry it around on a huge flat bed because you didn't want to put unnecessary stress on it's parts? No it was built to work.

[Barry]

A spring, on the other hand, STORES energy and returns the 50-80% of the ENERGY when the load is removed. Therein lies the problem. If you hit exactly the right speed ( matching the speed that the spring RELEASES the ENERGY) then the spring will amplify the load and tear up the extractor. This is a phenomenon known as resonance and can be extremely destructive in mechanical situations. Imagine if each spring bounce amplified the load by only 10% each rotation. It does not take long to go ballistic .

A washing machine works very much like an extractor. If I'm not mistaken, washing machines employ three springs. Why don't manufacturers design extractors the same way? Springs work if used right.

[MAXANT]

No complaints about ss cracking on any of our machines.

[Roland]

Bermybee, sorry, typed in reply a few days ago, must have hit the wrong button.

Do you know the make of that extractor?
I believe it was a Hubbard, circa 1980

Gauge of SS used?
Thick enough, it's twin survived just fine. No problems welding.

Was it welded or soldered?
TIG welded 304, I TIG welded also.

Was it a leg-ed extractor where the legs supported by the top and the bottom ring on the extractor or was tank the only support for the top Chanel.
It was a legged design, with a conical bottom, the cone pointing down. The 4 legs where 2 inch angle? welded by the outer ends of the angle to the sides, for about 6 inches, with a truncated cap.


When you say "extended periods unbalanced" was it loaded properly or was quarter deep the rest mediums situation.
Some one removed the spacing pegs from on sector, and placed a frame or two more in that sector only, hence the imbalance. I replaced the pegs, and it functioned fine after that.

Barry, spent time under your wash machine, EH?


I worked on a shaft balancing machine, and it functioned well with out of balance shafts. The shaft was mounted by live centers, in a very light frame,that was suspended by springs. The shaft would spin on it's center of mass, not the machined centers. Sensors would detect the motion of the frame, and indicate the heavy side position and mass.


I hope this posts, and answers all questions.


Roland

[bermybee]

Thick enough, it's twin survived just fine.

Some one removed the spacing pegs from on sector, and placed a frame or two more in that sector only, hence the imbalance. I replaced the pegs, and it functioned fine after that.

Roland

s ENGINEERING!!! THERE IS A REASON THINGS ARE BUILT THE WAY THEY ARE.s
Well I would break too. No extractor is built to withstand that type of torture. Plus how old is that extractor again it probably been running like that for the past 20 years

Do the math and correct me if I’m wrong. A full medium box has 40 pounds of honey. That’s 4 pounds a frame (if he uses 10 frame boxes) plus the weight of the frame it’s self. (http://www.beeclass.com/dts/honeysuper.htm) That’s 8 + pounds in one side. A 60 frame extractor is 52’’ wide at 75 rpm, quarter power that’s 4.16 G’S. That’s the equivalent of a 33 pound imbalance on one side. In a 70 framer that’s almost like putting a full small box on one side of an extractor.

A full deep box has 60 pounds of honey. That’s 6 pounds a frame (if he uses 10 frame boxes) plus the weight of the frame it’s self. That’s 12 + pounds in one side. That’s the equivalent of a 50 pound imbalance on one side. In a 70 framer that’s almost like putting a full medium box on one side of an extractor.

Come on now.

[Fuzzy]

Reid,

Did you complete your extractor mods as you indicated? If so how did it work out for you ?

Fuzzy

[Reid]

Reid,

Did you complete your extractor mods as you indicated? If so how did it work out for you ?

Fuzzy

Indeed. Thanks for asking.
The extractor is a 4 frame Dadant tangential, hand-crank. Purchased used, but used only twice.
I don't have a picture handy and don't have time to deal with it tonight, so I'll describe it.
For simplicity (and because I didn't want to purchase another piece of 3/4 ply, I use a square piece with 4 casters and wide enough for a 5 gallon bucket to sit underneath
Four, 2"x3" legs angle out to attach at each of the 4 corner above the casters. The legs angle up to a mitered box constructed of 2"x3" where the corners of the box extend just beyond the tank ~1 inch. The box is inset in order to more easily tilt the extractor to drain. The legs are tall enough to accommodate my sieves that rest atop the bucket.
The extractor is held tight to the base with the brackets it came with and some added chain (forming an upside-down 'Y' of sorts) and a turn-buckle to each leg to really tighten it up.
The box was built to nicely seat the standard 10-inch reflective dish-type utility lamp to warm the honey before straining.

Right when I finished it my engineer co-worker/beekeeper friend on the other side of Puget Sound asked to borrow it. He extracted 5 gallons or so with it with only complements, no complaints, and no suggested modifications. He said that under a full load it would initially oscillate about 1 inch until the load balanced and the speed was increased, at which time the oscillations dropped to something less than that.

I've got a couple of deeps and a Western of knotweed honey to extract. If I notice anything different I'll post it here.

So far so good and WAY better in comparison to the heavy box it was on before while we leaned on it trying to keep it from walking away.

Mission Accomplished!

~Reid

[max2]

Here's my Maxant 1400P. It's bolted to 3/4" plywood on a 4x4 frame (there's a stringer in the middle too.). Fuzzy's right. Start it slow. Let it balance. Smooth as silk.

http://s404.photobucket.com/albums/p...=iphone101.jpg

I'm getting to this issue....haven't read all the posts as yet. I like the caster idea. IN my case I have to tilt the the whole show at the end to get the last drop out. How you deal with this with wheels??
thanks - max2

[Josh Carmack]

Casters will work, they allow the load to average as mentioned by others, the bearings are still imbalanced due to the imbalance being relative to the assembly. A portion of the load has been removed, instead of withstanding the total weight of the imbalance, they now only withstand the force of shaking the platform VS the entire unbalanced load. Energy cannot be destroyed, but can be transferred. Springs will work as well, albeit they will transfer more energy outward of the assembly then caster will. If it were me, I'd go with spring loaded mounts, there are millions of washing machines that do the same thing billions of times a year. Springs only become a problem at the point they can no longer absorb the energy without bottoming out. Me personally, I'd go with springs.

[Adrian Quiney WI]

Josh, I have been happy with my castors. It would be interesting to see if anyone has gone the spring route? Would the difference between the weight of a load of laundry, and the weight of a load of frames have any impact on this idea?

[Josh Carmack]

Ohh no, in no way am I saying that castors are a bad idea, or a compromise they will allow the extractor to better handle an imbalance, VS springs, the difference being that springs keep the average position where you need it to be for plumbing. A flexible rubber or other connection will work with springs as long as it has more flex than the springs.

As far as the load differences would be, I'm going to say they will average out greater in an extractor by a fairly large amount. Water being 8.3 Lbs per gallon and there probably isn't more than 3-4 gallons at most when the unit starts to spin. The total load difference being only relative. Bigger load, longer stronger springs, or greater throw on a castored unit.

[NowThen]

Max2,

To get the last honey out of the extractor, I turn a chunk of 2x4 on edge under the rear of the platform. This tips the extractor forward just enough to get the honey moving toward the gate. A long handled plastic spatula speeds things up.

[max2]

NowThen -"I turn a chunk of 2x4 on edge under the rear of the platform" - this is pretty well what I do at the moment too. BUT with casters I would assume it would be more difficult. The extractor would try to run away?