Vandercook Uni III - very sluggish

My vandercook carriage started running very slowly from the start. It comes back from the end of the bed at relatively normal speed, but the speed going out is terribly slow.

Is this points? Is this electrical or something to do with the carriage motor? That motor is sealed and I don’t believe it needs lubrication, correct?

any suggestions for fixing or for people who work on Vandy’s in the DC metro region would be greatly appreciated! thanks, johnny

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You can fix this yourself. There are four switches on the back of the press. Part number is BZE6-2RN2. You can buy them on eBay. My guess is the one which is third-closest to the feed board end of the press is stuck. You can turn the press off and just manually actuate the toggle on the switch and it may work itself free, but I would suggest replacing it and maybe all of them if you can afford to!

The innermost two switches slow the cylinder as it approaches the end of the press. The outermost two stop it. So if you press runs slow in one direction, it is an inner switch. If it won’t run at all in one direction it is often an outer one.

DGM

Thank you so much! There were old replacement microswitches with the press and the front ones have larger parts than the back ones… Oil had gotten into the casing which I guess is why they were not working so well? I’m going to order some new ones, though, because it’s still not so fast. This was a great help,. thanks again, johnny

Thank you so much! There were old replacement microswitches with the press and the front ones have larger parts than the back ones… Oil had gotten into the casing which I guess is why they were not working so well? I’m going to order some new ones, though, because it’s still not so fast. This was a great help,. thanks again, johnny