BT 3000 Ryobi saw

[Harry Niemann]

Has anyone replaced brushes on this saw? mine seems to have lost power.

[Mac McQuinn]

"E-Replacement parts" has a diagram and the parts. Looks to be an easy job.
Good Luck,
Mac

Has anyone replaced brushes on this saw? mine seems to have lost power.

[Mike Goetzke]

Has anyone replaced brushes on this saw? mine seems to have lost power.

I suggest you go to bt3central(dot)com for info..

Mike

[David Hostetler]

Which motor? There were 3 different ones.

[Dan Grebinski]

Might want to ask the guys over at BT3Central: http://www.bt3central.com/forum.php

[Phil Thien]

Other possibilities:

(1) Recently moved saw to new location and using long extension cord, or house wiring is insufficient.

(2) Dull blade.

Have you removed your brushes? It has been a while since I removed mine but they sure don't wear very fast.

[Ron May]

Has anyone replaced brushes on this saw? mine seems to have lost power.

I have overhauled quite a few of the BT3000 motors and replaced brushes... it is an easy task when the motor is removed from the saw. A little more difficult when mounted in position. However, like someone else said, there are different motors, and the very early ones take a different type brush that is extremely hard to find. Depending on how much you have used your saw I would venture to say your problem isn’t the brushes but more likely the bearings. There are 5 different bearings in the drive system all subject to going bad, but 3 of them seem to be more vulnerable than the others. What typically happens is the bearings overheat and the lubricant breaks down. In no time they can go bad eventually seizing up. The torque of the motor may still turn the arbor but it won’t be at full power. If you continue using the saw you will eventually burn the motor up. I have taken bearings out of BT3000 motor/drive assemblies where you cannot turn them with your hand… they are totally seized up. You might check the brushes and see if there’s still some brush material left, if there is, most likely the problem is bearings. Check this link... the motor on the right is much easier to pull a brush and check. The one on the left is more difficult and new brushes are hard to come by. http://www.bt3central.com/showthread...ghlight=motors If you need any help feel free to PM me.

[David Hostetler]

Can you please explain what you mean by "mine seems to have lost power."

I own one of these saws myself, the newer variant though, the BT3100-1, and have had it where it seemed like it was bogging down even though there was no stock going through the blade...

The bearings on mine spun freely. And all the wiring checked out. I went ahead and ordered a set of brushes from M and D Mower (cheaper than ereplacementparts if you are buying several parts at once, M and D has BAD shipping rates... but overall good prices, and the shipping can be overcome with a larger order compared to other vendors...). I discovered with the side panel off that even though I use fairly effective dust collection, I was still getting plenty of dust inside the cabinet that gets pulled into the motor housing... I took the compressed air blow gun, and simply blew out the motor through the vents (carefully, in short gentle bursts), and gave it a good going over, and all my power came back.

The motors are shown in the BT3Central.com forum thread shown HERE. The early 15 amp motor physically resembles the even earlier 13 amp unit. The earlier 13 amp model brushes are now quite hard to come by, but the ones for the newer style 15 amp are still fairly easy to get.

The process was pretty simple, just clean the area out with a blow gun, remove the brush caps one at a time, pull the old brush / spring assembly out, drop the new one in, replace the brush cap, do the other side and button the housing up... Maybe a 10 minute job.

[Julian Tracy]

How cool is it that 7 replies in, no one has felt the need to call the BT saw's crap.

I had one (Early USA model) as my main saw for years - great saw, better even than my current jobsite saw, a Bosch 4100. Yes - I wouldn't take a BT to a jobsite without expecting to tweak all the adjustments after moving it, but in a stationary shop, a great little saw. The Freud 36 TK blade that came standard on the early models was a gem of a blade and well worth sharpening.

Only sold mine when the amazing deal on the Granite topped Ridgid 4511's happened at Home Depot and then after a couple years with that, found a 1946 Unisaw - my current (and last?) saw.

JT

[David Hostetler]

I am actually kind of a fan of the BT3x00 series saws... Shockingly well made, but yeah, moving them around a lot and twisting the housing tends to knock alignments out. In shop use though, they are stable as all get out... Just regular maintenance and it has been a great, accurate saw. I have grown to love the SMT, and the T slotted rails, fences etc... allow for an amazing array of jigs, fixtures, and clamps.. Yes I wish they had used a regular induction motor, and a cast iron top would have been great, but that would have more than doubled the price of the saw putting it well out of the target market that Ryobi built them for...

I have seen far too many of these saws that have been parted out due to bad brushes / motors that quit that the owners can't figure out how to fix... Most of the time it is the brushes that go bad. However it is possible that an armature, field winding, or even bearings go back / lock up. You should know how to at least troubleshoot the problem. You may want to google "Troubleshoot Universal Motor" and try to find a good tutorial on troubleshooting this.

[Charles Lent]

I had an early BT3000 for about 10 years and the only thing that went bad on it while I had it was the little timing belt between the motor shaft and the blade arbor. In my opinion, the saw had many good design points, but not having a miter slot permanently attached to the table so it would stay parallel with the blade was it's biggest design weakness. Using jigs and fixtures that were designed for use on other saws with miter slots made them bbvery difficult to use accurately because of this. My BT3000 stayed in my shop the whole time that I owned it, so I never had re-alignment problems from moving it like others have. I was able to upgrade to a used 1980's Unisaw with a Unifence and it was a night and day difference in accuracy and ease of use over the BT3000. I gave the BT3000 to my oldest son and his wife and they are still using it.

Charley

[Ron May]

How cool is it that 7 replies in, no one has felt the need to call the BT saw's crap.

I had one (Early USA model) as my main saw for years - great saw, better even than my current jobsite saw, a Bosch 4100. Yes - I wouldn't take a BT to a jobsite without expecting to tweak all the adjustments after moving it, but in a stationary shop, a great little saw. The Freud 36 TK blade that came standard on the early models was a gem of a blade and well worth sharpening.

Only sold mine when the amazing deal on the Granite topped Ridgid 4511's happened at Home Depot and then after a couple years with that, found a 1946 Unisaw - my current (and last?) saw.

JT

Although I pointed out a potential issue with the BT3000 motor bearings, in no way do I consider the saw bad. Frankly I think the BT3000 is one of the most innovative saws of our time. The out-of-the-box thinking by Ryobi and their engineers is to be commended. Not many companies are willing to take those risks. I've owned the saw since it was first introduced and enjoy using it. It has its limitations like every product, but when used as intended it performs well. I love it. As far as the bearing issue, it is very easy to overcome…. Just blow the saw dust away from the motor following each use. It doesn’t hurt to also maintain a sharp blade, and properly sized extension cord. Do this and you’re not likely to have problems.

[Harry Niemann]

Found my problem. The rear motor bearing was slowly freezing up. It froze up tight and stopped. It practically welded the bearing race to the armature. Had to cut it ff with a dremel tool.