HEQ5 Strip down: Legendary black gunk!

[samtheeagle]

Well I'm finally getting around to stripping the second hand HEQ5 down today, following Astrobaby's guide (ta muchly!), and lo and behold the famous black gunk, shed loads of it! :S

So far everything looks ok... The only issue I'm having is getting the roller bearings out, they don't seem to want to shift Anyone got any ideas?

Cheers.

[samtheeagle]

Damn it! I've mashed up one of the roller bearings trying to get it out I've popped it open and tried to sort it, and I think it's ok, maybe, but I'd still like to replace it. Anyone know of a good place to get 6006Z bearings from? Found one for ~£18 on ebay... Seems a bit steep for what it is, but I suppose it's precision engineering...

DOH!!!!!

EDIT :- Found some! http://www.bearings-online.co.uk/item/Brand_Deep-Groove-Ball-Bearings_6006-2Z_0_0_37_0.html

[beamish]

Right, I'm book marking that page- Always wondered where I could get replacement/improvement bearings from , TA !!

[samtheeagle]

Figured it might be popular... That's why I posted it! I got two for just over a tenner delivered.

Hope they come tomorrow!

So anyway... Circa 6 hours later... I've got the DEC axis back together, subject to taking it apart again to replace the dinged bearing. Now this is slow, but I've had the day off and didn't want to rush anything. All in all it was pretty straight forward, just the stuck bearings that stumped me, but I have found a tool combination that seems to remove them in a non destructive way now So tomorrow I shall attempt to RA axis!

[Astro_Baby]

Oh dear that looks like nasty grease there for sure. Eeeekkk

The two HEQ5s I have stripped have not had the dark goop in them but they have both been VERY underlubricated.

[samtheeagle]

To be fair, apart from the worm and main gears the other bits seem to be well greased with "normal" grease. None of the black gloppy, or clear super sticky tack that's often in Sky-Watcher stuff.

RA axis is coming along nicely now, much easier having the experience from the DEC...

[Euan]

Really yucky isn't it, it's more like tar than grease.

I don't understand why they don't make them with decent grease, for all it costs, it's a noticeable difference in smoothness

[samtheeagle]

Yeah, tar is absolutely right! Nasty horrible tack. Like you said, it's hard to understand why on Earth they'd put such rubbish in there.

[MrJulius]

Hi Sam the Eagle

Could you please give me the insight on how you removed the roller bearings? On my Heq5 one of the 6006ZZ bearings is stuck on the RA axis, not inside the mount. I tried to grease it to make it slide off the axis and I also tried hot water but it is still stuck This makes it impossible to change the bearings which I now have destroyed in the trying to remove process

The other 6006ZZ bearings are stuck inside the HEQ5 pro.

I also had the black tar how did you remove it? I tried WD-40 and regular dishwasher soap, but it is still not gone from the worm gear.

[Astro_Baby]

Are those the bigger bearings ? I assume so.

This is similar to the problems I encountered with the EQ6 where the main bearings were stuck fast.

The solution I employed was to emery cloth the shaft a bit which had a lot of rough areas, use grease liberally and to gently tap with a small wooden mallet. To remove the main bearing from the RA shaft was the best part of an hours work.

Can you post a pic of whats stuck on your mount ?

There is another solution which is to remove the spindle from the main blocks of the RA and DEC. Thats a real game and a half and I never documented it for the simple reason to try and remove them was too tough.

If your still stuck I'll post up tomorrow but if you can add some pics so we can see the problems it would help.

Mel

[MrJulius]

Thank you very much for the suggestions Mel, also your guides are extremely helpful

My problem is like your problem with the EQ6. The bigger bearing is stuck on the shaft. I will try with a rubber mallet and more grease.

I will try to take a picture later this week, but it is basically stuck just underneath the black painted part of the shaft trapping the big brass worm gear.

http://www.astro-baby.com/heq5-rebuild/ra015.jpg

[samtheeagle]

Yeah, all the bearings gave me grief, but that one especially so. After a lot of finger killing pushing and pulling I found that a helpful technique was to wiggle the bearing, by pushing up on one side and pressing down on the other. It needs to be prefectly aligned to the shaft to come off, and sometimes it gets a bit of a slant on when you're struggle to get it to move. Lots of wiggling sorted it out for me Eventually it'll get past the sticking point.