HMV 34 motor, help needed

[Henry]

You're welcome. Please let us know how it turns out.

[SteveM]

Good luck, and following with interest, as I have one of these giant motors (running, but probably in need of servicing soon) arriving today!

[nostalgia]

So here I am, three days later, and a total of around 25 working hours to conquer the "beast". I managed to get the shaft out after LOTS of heating, using a simple (and cheap) blowtorch. I almost felt like giving up during the first heating up tests, but after giving it one last and long try I was after 10-15 minutes of contious heating, finally able to move the shaft by hitting it with a rubber hammer and a metal dowel (I first tried a wood dowel, but it broke. I had to hit really hard with the rubber hammer, but slowly I was able to drive it out. Thank you to Soundgen and Jerry, for telling what to expect when doing this job, lots of smoke of burned grease, and lots of patience and hard manual work.
I spent 3 days, totalling 25 hours to dismantle the motor, clean the springs and reinstall the motor, thanks also Soundgen for telling about the mirror spring barrels, an uttermost important part of the work to take this into notice! No springs were broken, and no broken hooks inside the barrels, but I have never seen a more dirty motor with packed asfalt like grease. This motor can not have been in use for (many)decades. The seller of the machine said he had never been able to use the motor, and he had this machine for a long time, so yes..it makes sense. Since I do not use kerosene, but good old fashioned laundry detergent mixed with a car degreaser, I really had to work hard with the springs, even if they in advance had been soaked in the soap solution for some hours. Normally I have no problems cleaning a HMV spring after some hours in this solution, since the grease seem to dissolve totally, things this time were completely different. Again, I would not be surprised if the gramophone not have been in use for the last 50-60 years or so, and had caused the grease close to become petrified.
I upload some photos, since I understand Steve has one of this motors arriving, hopefully not as difficult to work with as this motor was.
The beast is tamed, but admittedly, I do not long for servicing another 34 motor in the next few weeks.

[JerryVan]

Congratulations!! Happy to have helped.

By the way, the spindle shaft and the gear that drives it looks very dirty and grimy. Is this a "before" picture? If not, you may want to clean up those gears and apply some fresh grease.

[nostalgia]

I may have mixed some before and after photos, since I was alone in the garage room with rubber gloves, and it was difficult to take photos during the process. The photo when the motor is inside the wooden case, is for sure taken after the service. I meticulously used tiny screwdrivers, wooden sticks..to dig out all dirt from the gears and spring barrels etc...after all parts had been soaked for hours. Every small tooth in the gears was cleaned until no more old grease was visible to the eye, even if sometimes a black thin layer was impossible to remove even if scraped with a needle. I think I spent 3-4 hours on the barrels alone, using steel wool, which also have been used on most other parts, to be able to remove the minicule parts and thin layers of petriefied grease that seemed almost to have been incapsulated by the metal. I have never seen this before on a HMV motor, on some parts not even a sander was able to remove this layer when being used.

[JerryVan]

Yes, the photo of the installed motor looks way better. You've done a great job!

[SteveM]

Thanks for all of the documentation and congrats on your completion of the job! I'll be bookmarking this page.

My 34 motor has arrived (inside an HMV 32) and it is brutal to wind up, just constant resistance, but it does eventually get wound. Probably on borrowed time.

I've done a 102 spring removal before, but I'm not sure I trust myself with this!

[HMVDevotee]

Congrats on your rebuild. I'll just mention, for future reference, my similar experience with a #34 motor lightly tapping a wood drift with a hammer. With no movement, I put a drop or two of penetrating oil on either end of the shaft, just enough that it flowed, filling the hairline cavity between the shaft and the cast frame, and let it sit overnight. The next day, a couple of light taps produced a little movement. A couple of more drops, another 18 hours, and, tapping alternately in both directions, it came free. Might not work in all instances, but it was an easy fix in my circumstance.

[soundgen]

Yes, the photo of the installed motor looks way better. You've done a great job!

Yes well done but you seem to have no lubrication of any sort on the cleaned motor why ? You still need oil and` grease on the cogs and bearings , grease particularly on the spindle worm drive

[Orchorsol]

Congratulations from me too - I have two, possibly three of these motors to overhaul sometime in future, so many thanks for publicising the difficulties and many thanks to all those who have offered advice! The forum is really invaluable.