eskimo
Member
Every once in a while I come across someone who goes above and beyond in customer support and I long for the old days when that was not the exception, but the rule.
My Rikon mini lathe had acquired a peculiar rattle last week. I cleaned everything off, hit it with the air compressor (only the air, not the compressor itself) and tightened every nut and screw I could find. No luck, still rattled. Undaunted, I fired up the PC & went to the Rikon site. Dowloaded the exploded view of the lathe, perused the FAQ's and read the troubleshooting documentation.
Back in the shop, despite my best efforts, the lathe kept rattling along. Finally, I called Rikon at 4:00 Friday afternoon. I explained my situation to Roy, who informed that sometimes it's "wicked hahd" to find a renegade rattle. (Did I mention Rikon is located outside of Boston?) After hitting all the usual suspects, Roy asked me to hold the phone next to the lathe and turn it on and off. After a couple of iterations, he says, "I heard something like that a couple of years ago in Denver. It's the set screw in your spindle lock gear (actually, he said "geah")."
For the 45 minutes, he walked me through dismantling the head stock, tightening the set screw (Be sure and put a drop of CA on it so it doesn't loosen again) and putting everything back in order. I flipped the switch and it sounded like new again.
I got my lathe back in good shape, learned a lot about the inner workings of the machine and got my faith restored that customer support still lives.
Not a bad way to spend an afternoon.
My Rikon mini lathe had acquired a peculiar rattle last week. I cleaned everything off, hit it with the air compressor (only the air, not the compressor itself) and tightened every nut and screw I could find. No luck, still rattled. Undaunted, I fired up the PC & went to the Rikon site. Dowloaded the exploded view of the lathe, perused the FAQ's and read the troubleshooting documentation.
Back in the shop, despite my best efforts, the lathe kept rattling along. Finally, I called Rikon at 4:00 Friday afternoon. I explained my situation to Roy, who informed that sometimes it's "wicked hahd" to find a renegade rattle. (Did I mention Rikon is located outside of Boston?) After hitting all the usual suspects, Roy asked me to hold the phone next to the lathe and turn it on and off. After a couple of iterations, he says, "I heard something like that a couple of years ago in Denver. It's the set screw in your spindle lock gear (actually, he said "geah")."
For the 45 minutes, he walked me through dismantling the head stock, tightening the set screw (Be sure and put a drop of CA on it so it doesn't loosen again) and putting everything back in order. I flipped the switch and it sounded like new again.
I got my lathe back in good shape, learned a lot about the inner workings of the machine and got my faith restored that customer support still lives.
Not a bad way to spend an afternoon.
