Is Your Foredom or Wecheer Handpiece "To Hot To Handle"?

DakotaDocMartin

~ Elite 1000 Member ~
Joined
Oct 15, 2007
Messages
1,835
Location
Grand Forks, ND
Here's something from the Chipping Away wood carver's newsletter I found interesting. You shouldn't let your flex shaft handpiece hanging when not in use. :eek:

Hot_Handpiece.jpg
 

KCSteve

~ Elite 1000 Member ~
Joined
Jun 19, 2007
Messages
2,882
Location
Kansas City, MO
Huh. I loop mine up and over the motor hanger - leaves it horizontal and up over my head. Easy to reach when I want it, out of the way when I don't.

Did some early morning work on Sunday while the ever-indulgent wife was sleeping in and forgot one small disadvantage of my setup: I'm actually just beneath our bedroom. Right under my side of the bed, in fact. The flex shaft's hanger is screwed into a roof joist in the garage. Of course my roof joist is the bedroom's floor joist. It might be nice and quiet for me but I was reminded rather firmly that it makes a lot of noise up above. :eek:
 

monk

Moderator
Staff member
::::Pledge Member::::
Joined
Feb 11, 2007
Messages
10,857
Location
washington, pa
vibration aint for everybody, i guess. be careful, you may be cookin yer own breakfast every time you use the flex tool. as for overheating-- never noticed it when i used the foredom.
 

Brian Marshall

~ Elite 1000 Member ~
Joined
Nov 9, 2006
Messages
3,112
Location
Stockton, California & Taxco, Guerrero, Mexico
IF this were to actually happen the way it is described, I'd sure like to've been there to see it...

From my experience whoever wrote this "advice" - hasn't been around these tools for very long.

Sure makes him/her sound knowledgeable though, don't it?

And helps sell more fancy "proper" widgets! Which I am fairly sure is the point...



All you need is a 36" pipe section and a floor flange to mount it to the bench top. (coat hanger wire to rig fancy loops, if you feel you need 'em)

There are 12 flex shaft machines in 3 shops here. Some are over 40 years old.

ALL of them hang free down the front/side of the bench when not in use.


The wood folk DO tend run flex shafts full tilt boogie for longer periods than they were designed for. THAT heats 'em up.



Brian
 
Last edited:

Ron Spokovich

Elite Cafe Member
Joined
Dec 27, 2012
Messages
436
Never had a problem with either my handpiece or the flexshaft heating up in 30 years, although I don't use them continuously. Wouldn't be a bad idea in taking it down to clean out the sheath, and for general inspection. I do have some high tech grease for the purpose, but, again, mine doesn't heat up.
 

DakotaDocMartin

~ Elite 1000 Member ~
Joined
Oct 15, 2007
Messages
1,835
Location
Grand Forks, ND
And helps sell more fancy widgets! Which I am fairly sure is the point...

Yep! I think they want you to order out something that looks like this:
 

graniteguy52

Elite Cafe Member
Joined
Sep 7, 2008
Messages
257
Location
Bozeman, Montana
After a lot of years running and servicing Foredom flex-shafts (not nearly as many as Brian), I have seen a couple over-heating handpieces. I never really figured out the exact cause of the first one, but found that by out-smarting the handpiece by installing aircraft quality sealed bearings (with well greased ball bearings), made it get extremely hot even faster. Going back to the shielded bearings (with relatively dry ball bearings) took the warmth of the handpiece back to a useable level.
Too much lube in a Foredom hand piece is not a good thing, but it takes significant heat to liquify a good quality shaft grease so I'll continue to hang the hand piece "the wrong way".
 

Latest posts

Sponsors

Top