Grease and Oil for Old Planer - Lubriplate good stuff?

[Patrick Irish]

The Powermatic 160 planer I got takes Lubriplate 630-aa grease and SAE 10w oil. The oil is for the gears, threaded handles and where the beds slide up and down.

There are several zirk fittings for the Lubriplate 630-aa.

Question #1 - Is Lubriplate 630-AA what I should stick with? It's a NLGI #1 grease. I'm not taking this machine apart so the original grease is still in there. Haven't turned it on either but from manually moving it, things sound and feel great. I found a supplier that can get Lubriplate. No other place within 30 miles of me has any NLGI #1 grease. If I end up having to tear the machine down, I'll probably go with a more advanced synthetic grease. Read that mixing grease is not good.

Question #2 - What can I used for SAE 10w? Is that the same as any old 10w-30? I read that ATF fluid is about 10w. This will be for the actual teeth and threaded rods.

[Bill Dufour]

interchange chart linked below. see last column on the right. I do not think the oil is critical. For gear boxes be careful if there is any yellow metal as the modern EP GL5 oils will attack yellow metal such as brass and bronze. I am not aware that grease has any issues.
Bill D.

http://www.graco.com/content/dam/gra...340580EN-A.pdf

for oil:

https://www.bobistheoilguy.com/forum...s.php?ubb=cfrm

[Bill Adamsen]

interchange chart linked below.

Great and complex topic and handy reference - thanks for bringing up. The NLGI "thickener" number is temperature and speed based. If you are replacing an NLGI1 with 2, is it important to completely remove the prior grease? Just looking at the charts, I don't really see an application (in the temperature range I can work) that wouldn't use NLGI2. I must say, the balance of attributes I always find daunting. Thanks for the yellow metal warning.

[Bill Dufour]

The yellow metal may be a worm gear or oil-lite bushing which you do not even see when you open up the gearbox. My Parks planer uses thick rear-end oil in the gearbox but I do not think it has any yellow metal in it. But better safe then sorry. I have heard of folks with a delta 18" planer with a worm drive feed roller that the $500 gearset is destroyed in under a year with the wrong oil.
When I bought the planer ,used, it had an almond inside the gearbox. So it is a good idea to change the lube on a regular basis.
Bill

[Patrick Irish]

No gear box on this planer. It's a belt driven machine. I found 630-AA locally, available monday. Lubriplate does not list 630-aa as copper tested however. Mobil CM-W is copper safe with a 1A rating. I may call Lubriplate in the morning and ask. Part of me feels if that's the grease Powermatic recommended back in the 60s and the grease is still around, it's probably safe to say it's a good grease to use.

[Jim Andrew]

I use a lithium base grease purchased at my local Coop for greasing anything with a zerk.

[Bob Vaughan]

About any grease will do since the parts don't use a high speed. I'll use wheel bearing grease often. As to the Lubriplate, I hate that stuff for the long term. It dries out to a sort of crumbly plastic coating and clogs things up. Check your clutch area for this buildup. Below is what I often see in the 160/180 clutch fingers.

lubriplate - 1.jpg

lubriplate - 2.jpg