Tempest controller ball bearing retrofit

Last week, I wrote about my experiment to replace the bushings in the
Tempest controller with ball bearings.

I installed them this weekend, and the controller works very well. It
took about 15 minutes to set everything up and do all the work. All
that was required was to drill out the original holes using a 3/8" bit,
perfect diameter for the new bearings. I used my milling machine to do
this so I could line up the holes accurately, but a drill press would
work if you are careful. (If you were to drill the holes out so that
they were no longer in line with each other, the shaft may not fit
between the two bearings. And you'll say "DOH!")

The flanged bearings dropped right in, and I was able to button up the
whole assembly fairly quickly.

I did a small "spin - off" just to see if my efforts were worth while.
I spun both the original unmodified, teflon lubricated controller and
the modified ball bearing controller as fast as I could, each 3 times
and measured the amount of time it took until the thing stopped
rotating. My unmodified controller spun for about 6 seconds on average,
and the ball bearing controller spun for about 7 seconds on average.

Both are actually very smooth. I've definately come across Tempest
controllers that are rough, gritty, and noisy, and they would certainly
benefit from some sort of rework.

Anyway, if your controller suffers from excessive wear, install some
ball bearings! I spent $14 including shipping.

Joel-
Received on Tue Mar 17 10:20:01 1998