Star Adventurer design fault

[Rustang]

Anyone else had this happen to the Equatorial wedge tightening spindle? It has literally sheared off so now doesn't tighten!, and just spins when the handle is turned ? 

Edited December 24, 2021 by Rustang

[Adam J]

22 minutes ago, Rustang said:

Anyone else had this happen to the Equatorial wedge tightening spindle? It has literally sheared off so now doesn't tighten!, and just spins when the handle is turned ? 

I don't tend to tighten it down that hard.

Not had an issue so far and never heard of this happening before on a forum and they must have sold thousands. 

Adam

[Rustang]

29 minutes ago, Adam J said:

I don't tend to tighten it down that hard.

Not had an issue so far and never heard of this happening before on a forum and they must have sold thousands. 

Adam

I didn't think I was tightening to hard either! It was a pretty clean break! 🤔

Edited December 24, 2021 by Rustang

[Adam J]

1 hour ago, Rustang said:

I didn't think I was tightening to hard either! It was a pretty clean break! 🤔

Might have just been a weakness in yours as opposed to a more general issue. Might be something that would 3d print. At least it not an expensive item. 

Edited December 24, 2021 by Adam J

[Rustang]

1 hour ago, Adam J said:

Might have just been a weakness in yours as opposed to a more general issue. Might be something that would 3d print. At least it not an expensive item. 

Very true, I've contacted Flo but will fix if I can sort something out. 

[Rustang]

Just an update, FLO has been great as usual and are hopefully going to source a replacement part. 

Now while it appears I could be the only one that's had this issue, it still confuses me as to how the end of what appears to be an injection moulded part has just sheared off. I work with plastics so do have some understanding, I would have thought if a more suitable material was used it would have just distorted, bent or worn away if over tightened, not sheared off like it has. The plastic at the end where it broke off looks glittery so to me it appears a more brittle material was used, not one with a high shear strength. The fact no one else has had this issue though, it may not be of concern but its a heads up to go easy on that locking clamp! 

Edited December 29, 2021 by Rustang

[BCN_Sean]

One of the first things I did was replace the lever when I got mine, the wedge really does show it was put together for pennies (the washers on the alt axis are where it is really noticeable, and any 0.5mm plastic disk is a lot better); any reasonable hardware shop should carry metal locking handles for a couple of coins a piece, though I can't remember off the top of the head if the thread on it is an M6 or an M8.

[Starresort]

On 24/12/2021 at 14:18, Rustang said:

Anyone else had this happen to the Equatorial wedge tightening spindle? It has literally sheared off so now doesn't tighten!, and just spins when the handle is turned ? 

This seems to be something similar as to what happened to mine, the lever just seemed to not be doing anything at all, so I was fiddling with it and then over tightened the screw in the middle and it snapped off inside... oops

I'm not sure what to do personally, I didnt get mine from FLO..

[900SL]

You're not alone, it's happened to a few owners. When I got mine I found a post or two on Google, when I was looking into how to shim it to correct the poor tolerances in manufacturing

[John Murphy]

Seems a fairly common problem. I found some maintenance tutorials on YouTube, a Guy named Andrea Minoia deals with how to fix it in this link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S2aZLzfOe9c&t=703s about 10:55 in. He gives a link where to purchase the replacement on Amazon. Hope this helps. 

BTW his other maintenance videos are also worth watching - clutch, gearing maintenance and backlash removal. I just finished up regreasing everything and currently running through a test to ensure no overtightening after backlash removal.