The only time I took apart a linear actuator was to re-glue the magnets to the sides of the tube.
They had come loose and were magnetised to the armature so it was just spinning on its axis with no drive.
I re-bonded them to the side wall of the tube, left it for a day or two for the bonding agent to cure then put it all back together.
The only place I applied grease when re-assembling was to the plastic cogs.
Since the fix the actuator has been OK, it makes the usual actuator noise when moving but nothing untoward.
.
View attachment 30983 View attachment 30984
Definitely not enough grease. You want enough so it's "scooped up" and distributed through the teeth while they spin.
Those magnets do come loose. A good epoxy works nice. Make sure (if you do see them loose) to reference where they originally were. Paint mark, whatever. So the N-S poles don't get mixed up. And clamp them firmly to the housing while the glue cures. Seal the edges with the epoxy so rust wont get under and pop them out again.
It's not necessary to take the limit switch gear apart. But be sure that the teeth are lined up before putting the cover back on.
Superjack is horrendous for quality. Compared to the big guys. It's almost like they are inviting failure.
I bought an entire replacement motor. The gears in the original were totally worn out and the aluminum coupling insert in the drive gear was split.
So what do you do? Open the new one up and check. Right?
No grease to speak of. The gear pins were dry. Main gear thrust surfaces were dry.
Moving into the motor. Both ring terminals and screws were loose. Brushes were softer than the softest pencil you can buy.
Dry bearings. Nothing. No signs they even used any lube at all. Within 2 or so months it stopped working. Both magnets came loose and were stuck to the armature.
At the time the brushes were quite worn. Lots of dust from them.
I use my actuator a lot for transponder hunting.
I feel as if I know this pos well. Made a 15 segment magnet wheel and added a schotty trigger hall sensor. Added a DPDT relay inside for a dynamic shunt brake.
When it shuts off. The armature stops dead in its tracks. Very very little count drift. Especially when 'bumping' the satellites to peak signal.
Currently. Depending on the dish position in the arc. I get close to 100 count difference in 2 degrees on Western arc sats. Towards zenith its around 80. Then over the top to the east holds 70 or so. So predicting where a sat is in the arc is pretty easy.
Then I added a sidecar ku lnbf. Once you calculate the positional difference between C and ku signal peak. For me around 300. It makes finding sats easy.
12' dish, Titanium ASC-1 mover. The software interface makes loading in new sat names and positions into memory a breeze. With the supercrap actuator I believe I actually polished a turd. But I won't ever buy another one when this one finally kicks the bucket. Never!