Hi,
At the moment I am relocating my hobby room, grown out of my old one, but will strip it, test the shaft, clean it and replace with oil as soon as I am able. Do you get any water getting into the hull from the prop shaft? Have you replaced your bearings at all and if so with what?
Thanks,
Vic

vic its an oiling tube not greasing tube. this topic of oil or grease is very contentious! !
Personally and its just my opinion all my boats are oil lubed. its noto so much the lube as some bearings are like dave said water cooled but the oil stays on the shaft protecting it from the water that will come up the tube. I can take any of my shafts out at ant time and they are always in tip top condition. when greased the grease spins off the shaft and eventually goes harder so not really doing anything. imo it zlows the shaft down. ill blow my own trumpet now. my club 500 is 4 years old and is 2012 runner up, 2013 champion, 2014 champion its the little tweeks that matter
have you taken the shaft out yet and rolled on glass like I suggested? have you taken the bearings out and tried them on the shaft?
time to take it apart to find the problem! 😀

HI Dave,
Slipway do not supply or specify any particular grease/oil, they do though specify the accessory as an oiling tube rather than a greasing one!

Vic

HI Vic
Do they also provide the lubricant with the "greasing" tube. Plastics all get hot with friction and any lubricant will have to withstand the temperature to be of any use.
I have watched Paul and his friends sail their very fast Club 500 models and am not surprised that there are problems with certain bearings. if he is using SHG bearings I would personally fit to my model. I do believe you will have to clean any residue on your shaft though as this will be from the problem bearings. it's possible that the shaft has been damaged by the heat generated and may also need replacing.

The water in the tube will travel up the shaft to lubricate the top bearing, but I am fairly certain the bearing in your boat are not ideal for the speeds you are running.

Dave

In that situation you would have a stuffing box on the end of the prop shaft tube motor end with a seal. Anyway it's quite normal to get water ingress through the prop shaft. At least it should stop it seizing. Also the forward motion of the boat would tend to drag out any water in the tube !! in theory anyway.

HI Dave,
I never new that some plastics were water cooled so I think you could be on the right track. Problem is though Slipway do provide an optional greaseing tube which indicates that grease is ok. Without packing the tube with grease water enters the boat via the tube. Problem is if the bearings need water to stop them seizing how do you get water to the top bearing (one nearest the motor) without water getting into the boat?
Has anyone thought of a Club 500 air boat? LOL
Vic

HI guys
I have been following your comments on this thread and offer my own thoughts.
I make my own bearings using many materials including some plastics/nylon. I have found that certain types are very difficult to turn and can even seize up my lathe when they get too hot. Given that there appears to be a film on the seized shaft at the bearing it would appear the bearing is melting and then welding itself to the shaft. Mineral lubrication is no good for many plastics and most use water to keep the bearing temperature cool.

You will need to remove any film from such shafts but do take care not to scour the surface.

Paul uses bearings sourced from SHG and I suspect these have been carefully chosen to suit the racing boats you are using. The company founder used to race model boats so they do know what is required.

I know we all think plastic is all pretty similar but there are many different types that have been developed for specific purposes and not all make good bearings.

Good racing
Dave

Have a look on shg model supplies website, they sell the acetate bearings, buy a few they are very cheap, and try on your shafts. I always do this, I replace them every season, and some fit real nice, some are sloppy, some are tight. Push fit into stuffing tube, use an old shaft or similar to knock the old ones out. it ill be interesting to see the reply from slipway

My bad, they are Oil / Water lubricated Acetyl material (Shaft Bearing 5mm (Pack of 2) )

HI Derek,
Yes I have informed Malcolm at club 500 slipway but have not yet rceived a reply. We have heard of one other person outside our group who has had the same problem. I am beginning to think the tollerances between the shaft and bearing are too tight and causing the shaft to heat up and expand, as it does so overheating the motor before the shaft seizes. The shaft, u/j, and motor spun freely on initial assembly and spun freely again once the shaft was freed. The boat has not been used very much since so I do not know if the problem will re-occur. As I have mentioned before the shaft was of a different silver colour where it rotates in the bearing when it was removed.
Vic

I go back to my earlier suggestion, have you contacted the Club 500 people themselves to see if its a reported problem/fault.
The only thing I have ever lubricated my boats with has been Vaseline squeezed into the tubes with a large syringe of the type you see on modelling stands at shows., sometimes with a bit of 3 in 1 oil mixed in if they have a lub point.

Has anyone tried fitting these Self-lubricated Sintered Bronze Bushing Bearing Sleeve 4mmx8mmx10mm in the shafts? I will need to turn the outer diameter down to suit leaving a small shoulder and the inner bore will have to be reamed out as the shafts, I believe, are 3/16" diam. They will need to be turned on a jig as this material will just crumbled if mishandled.

I am just asking about the acetate, the only acetate That springs to mind is used in nail varnish and I don't see the bearing connection either, hence the question mark.
Read pm devlins post.

OK Petty Officer Stour-boy, spill the beans! What has Acetate as in nail varnish got to do with bearings seizing? You have me beat.

Acetate as in nail varnish ?s

hmm..! lets think about this

The stock bearings in club 500 (assuming you still have them) are acetate (look like black plastic). These are water cooled, and by the nature of their construction, not metal, wont actually seize.

Roll the shaft on a piece of glass, this is an rc helicopter trick to check for bent mainshafts. See if shaft is bent.

I have also seen in club 500 when the boat is accelerated, the cheap u/j supplied fails, and the brass sleeve actually slips down the inside on the u/j either up to the motor, causing a motor seizure, which will resemble a shaft seizure, or down towards the propshaft and causing the nut to seize on the stuffing tube.

Got any pictures, we might see something 👍

An old trick with lubrication is to mix in some powdered graphite with the oil/grease whatever you are using as this one of the best lubricants you can use, not used it on mine yet as it is not assembled but would be worth a try,
Steve

Thanks pmdevlin for your reply,
On 2 of the boats I altered the u/j at the motor end to lock on with a grub screw and the motors are all held in with double sided tape bands so they are very rigid. They were all fitted out internally prior to the deck being fitted. The shafts all had endfloat. Even when the prop and locknut and u/j were removed we still could not shift the shaft until we gave a short sharp blow to the end it. The shaft was a dull silvery colour where they rotated in the bearing.

I race club 500, very successfully. Are you sure they are seizing? The shafts on these boats are threaded both ends, and you have to lock the nuts motor end otherwise they tighten up on themselves, and replicate a seizure, when its not. its a real fiddly job to do correctly, you have to leave a very small degree of endfloat in the shaft. its best to lock the prop, use a washer or two to ensure the thread on the shaft is not running in the bearing, adjust top nut to get endfloat, lock it up, and then the u/j position on the motor shaft will be correct. You need a flat on the motor shaft for the grub screw, or it will slip, and the motor and shaft should be lined up with the lining up sleeve you can buy, otherwise it wont be straight.

The motor mount is rubbish, its so difficult to line up once the boat is built. I lined mine up before the deck went on, which makes it impossible to service the motor 😯

I to have two early club 500 and touch wood never had a problem. I have used my boats several times on canoe lake Portsmouth which is salt water and lots of times on our local lake. They must now be supplied with different shafts strange?

I've remembered a guy at our club bought a new kit early in the year, and he had trouble with overheated motor, and I think seizing. He hasn't used it for a while probably due to this. I must ask when I see him.
They do have a tendency to "bounce" on the water. As I don't race/compete with it, I have put small trim tabs on the stern, angled very sightly down. What a difference. I can remove them and tape over the holes if I decided to race.
Have you been in touch with the makers to see if they are aware of the problem.

HI Vic

Is it posible that the shaft is not staight??? try rolling it on a piece of glass, it my be that thats causing a drag making the motor red hot. is one end or the other of the propshaft hot??? try a short run out of the water, another posibility is the U/J could be out of balance

Mark

Hi,
Thanks for replying. I also have one of the origionals that I bought second hand and also have had no trouble with this one, it is the new batch of boats that are all seizing up. There is lateral movement in all the shafts that have seized so this is not the cause.
Nice tip on the vaseline, appreciated.
Vic

Mine is among the first produced years ago by Slipway. Never had a problem. Still original shaft, and I sail on a salt water lake. Always used Vaseline by heating in hot water, then drawing into a syringe. Leave to cool. inject into hollow tube. Then insert shaft.
Are you leaving a bit of lateral movement on the shaft once installed.

HI Mark,
All the shafts are stainless, all brand new, one was running on oil rather than grease. When mine seized the motor was so hot I am surprised it did not melt the plastic of the boat, it suggests the bearing was gradually binding before seizing!
Vic

HI Howe

Could be that the shaft was slightly rough in finnish or had some surface rust after instalation, as it runs after removing and replacing the shaft try cleaning the grease out from both end bearings, use a pipe cleaner, have a look at any deposites, might find particles, if so clean the tubes out compleatly and use oil instead, not enough lub to the bearings.

Hope this helps

Mark