Garrard 301 grease versus oil bearing rebuild...

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Lenny bought himself a Festivus present that was well past its once in a decade overhaul... and my table was a touch rumbly and the motor ran warmer than I liked, so my partner and I cleaned the bearings and motors, and did the general cleaning that allows you to examine the moving parts while poking around...

I'm not going to tell you how to take it apart... that is the easy and fun part... take lots of photos as you will be glad when you forget which directon the grease port faced...

first set of pictures are of the grease bearing table... the spindle still looks pretty good... some visible marks, but nothing a fingernail can feel... 

same with the bottom... seems just fine.. 

miscellaneous small parts... do not lose them!... grease port... bearing... and gasket (which I just cleaned and reused)...

blatant hammertone photo... 

bearing with new grease... I used bicycle teflon grease... I had it... it works great in a much tougher application, so.... 

grease inside.. use q-tips... there is a hollow inside between the sleeves... stuff with grease, but do not worry about it being perfect as we will stuff it from teh side port in a few minutes... 

I greased this bottom plate as well... the only purpose of this is to keep the grease inside... 

grease spindle (duh)

I would overstuff at this step as we want it to squish out on the next step... 

success!  we have our first mess!

squirt grease into the side port until it is completely full...

I love my cream colored 301 with the hammertone grease bearing.. it may not be worth as much as dave's recent score of a hammertone table, but it is my favorite...

the grease port has to be installed after dropping the bearing into the table... so 

prepare for mess number two!

you can tell if the table is oil bearing or grease bearing by the label.. Schedule 1 is grease bearing and Schedule 2 is oil bearing... so here start the oil bearing shots...  

 

internal parts... note how there are fewer parts...

bearing is the same...

the hammertone is now gone... and the grease port is plugged... and 

the completely round top now has a straight side... 

here you can see the idler wheel after some "rubber reviver" has been applied... and the magnetic brake has been cleaned up, straightened, and the rough edges taken off... not sure how it got a little banged up... who knows on these old tables?

and here we first get a glimpse of my partner... say, those are small hands!

yep, yet another installment of child labor... it is meant to motivate you to try things yourself!  worst case, you end up shipping it to the same guy you were going to pay $$$ to clean the table anyway..

and yes, my phone is now covered in grease... gross...

peace,
me