I did some sausage processing last week and toward the end of the session, I noticed that it was becoming harder and harder to crank the plunger out of the tank.
I only use the fast crank to pull the plunger out of the stuffer and the other gears for stuffing.
But, it seems like the gears are catching and not running smoothly. It works much better but is still noticeable when stuffing, but is much more prevalent when removing the plunger with the fast gears.
I took the top off and checked out the gearbox and I cannot find any gears that appear to be damaged. There was a small little bit (really not that much) of metal dust on the gear housing.
I see that there are some set screws that I tried adjusting, but that just made the crank handle higher and didn’t seem to fix the problem.
To me, it just seems like the gears are not seated together as far as they should.
I just bought this stuffer on 11/2016, so I am guessing well beyond the warranty period, but should I really have to be dealing with gearbox issues this soon?
Are there any other possible fixes? Or is my only option to order a new gearbox?
I am going to send a message to Walton’s Customer Service as well but thought I would ping this group to see if you have any other suggestions.
Thanks,
NDKoze