Turn Your FX-120i into a Prometheus

[steckmeyer]

We received ours on Saturday. My son hooked it up in about 15 min. The build quality is very good and It works as advertised.

 

[jlow]

You guys must live really close because it looks like the Canada Post takes two weeks to get from New Brunswick, Canada to Michigan, US... Still, I am very glad that it is on its way!

 

[DSP10]

Received my unit today and it works very well, easy to install and set up. Played around awhile with it and it consistently throws a charge to plus or minus one stick of powder, which is more accurate than anyone can shoot. Thanks for putting this together Adam, you have a winner.

 

[jlow]

You guys must live really close because it looks like the Canada Post takes two weeks to get from New Brunswick, Canada to Michigan, US... Still, I am very glad that it is on its way!

Ha Ha, looks like the post office guesstimate of 2 weeks for the auto-trickler to get here was totally wrong - I got mine TODAY! So really only one week which is very reasonable considering that it had to go through customs. Perhaps just a conservative estimate just in case things get caught up there.

It's put together now but having worked at a match today for 8 hours in high heat, I am just too tired to go further until tomorrow!

One question I have is putting the tube in the trickler, the instruction says "leave a very small space between the pulley and trickler to ensure the tube rotates freely". The tricky thing here is the "very small space". When I leave something like a mm between the two, the 2 pulleys do not line up vertically as the one on the tube is quite a bit further in. If I leave a generous space i.e. 1/4", the two lines up better. The question is which is the correct distance?

 

[DSP10]

The motor pulley is radiused enough that the belt doesn't come off. If you get it to close when that when the motor slows down to the final trickle the bushing will rub just enough to make the belt slip, a small gap fixes this.

 

[jlow]

The motor pulley is radiused enough that the belt doesn't come off. If you get it to close when that when the motor slows down to the final trickle the bushing will rub just enough to make the belt slip, a small gap fixes this.

Right, I understand why you don't want the bushing to rub - that makes sense. The question is how big the gap should be? Normally, the best/proper set up for function is when the two line up. Perhaps it would not slip off even when it is not lined up but perhaps there would be an effect on wear on the belt. So just basically wondering if there is any down side to having the two pulleys line up

 

[jkl]

I received mine today, takes about 15 minutes to set it up. Great instruction they were very easy to follow. I've thrown about 50 sample weights. Power trickled exceeds my expectitaons. I like to run the side shields so I drilled a hole for the tube. I am trying to fing the best spot for the pan before I stick it down.

 

[Twoboxer]

Also got mine today, installed it, and ran only a couple of test throws. So far, I like it. Will be doing some reloading within a few days for a real test.

Noted the following:

1) My scale's rear metal plate had a plastic 10-pin socket affixed to its back side with double stick tape. A 10-pin ribbon cable was plugged in and led somewhere back into the scale's internals.

I removed the socket from the metal plate and tucked the cable back into the scale's base. There was no electrical connection between the plate and the socket/cable. I'm guessing the cable is for some other feature, perhaps in a higher-model scale.

This ribbon cable wasn't mentioned by anyone else and was not shown/mentioned in the instructions. Anyone else find one of these? My scale was purchased 7/9/2014. Anyone know what it might be for?

2) The 4-pin cable from the tumbler seems like it can be installed two ways. Is there a required orientation?

 

[jkl]

Mine had the cable stuck to the plate also. I scratched my head on it for a minute. I did just what you did.
On the trickled. Adam said attach like the picture so I did. No problem.

John

 

[DSP10]

Right, I understand why you don't want the bushing to rub - that makes sense. The question is how big the gap should be? Normally, the best/proper set up for function is when the two line up. Perhaps it would not slip off even when it is not lined up but perhaps there would be an effect on wear on the belt. So just basically wondering if there is any down side to having the two pulleys line up

If you put two pieces of paper between the closest spots on BOTH SIDES you shouldn't have any issues with it binding. The biggest down side I could see by lining the pulleys up would be the excessive leverage on the trickle tube with it being further away from the trickle housing which would cause more wear where the tube goes through, you'd still need another spacer to fill the gap so the tube couldn't wander back and forth.

 

[jlow]

There certainly would be more leverage, but the amount of leverage that small pulley belt count put on that trickler tube is very small compared to what it can take before it starts to even bent slightly. Wondering is potentially an issue but I will check today when I test it.

 

[jlow]

I ended up with a 2 mm gap which seem to work fine. Lube the rotating part with a little Rem oil which has Teflon in it and that seems also to work well.

Worked with TAC today to see it in operation. The tickler worked as advertised – pretty much dead on or 0.02 grain off at most. Since TAC is a ball powder, I used the faster speed setting and shim the trickler slightly to get the speed up. Worked perfectly.

One suggestion for the manual to update is how to reset the target weight to a new value. It appears that you cannot just stop the trickle, put the new amount in the pan and press “start” because it will still remember the old weight. You have to watch the digital display and press “start” long enough to see the double blink of the display – that tells you it has accepted the new value.

The other suggestion and this is not related to the automatic part of the machine but to the RCBS trickler itself is if you are using ball powder (cannot speak about the extruded stuff yet since it will be the next stuff to be tested), be very careful if you are going to switch powder. This is because if you don’t get all the old powder you just used out and you put in a different powder, it can cross contaminate the next batch. The problem areas and the fix is :

1. The front part trickler tube itself can hold a significant amount of residue powder that sticks to the inside. Turning the tube to the vertical position and tapping on it pretty vigorously will remove most but not remove all the powder. I would suggest using compress air to be sure.
   
   
2. The other end of the trickler tube where the green handle sits is also hollow. Because of this, the tube section past the dowel pin and the green handle itself can hold on to a lot of powder. Part of it is the dowel pin holds back the powder hiding in that area when you try to dump it out, the other problem is the green handle cap just wants to hold on to the powder. After finding this out, I inserted a piece of foam which basically blocks the tube from the dowel pin area to the end so that no powder can get into this area - that works!

Like I said, not a problem at all if you know and take the proper measures and does not detract from the excellent operation of the auto-trickler.

 

[Twoboxer]

Mine had the cable stuck to the plate also. I scratched my head on it for a minute. I did just what you did.
On the trickled. Adam said attach like the picture so I did. No problem.

John

Thanks for letting me know I wasn't the only one with the cable lol.

On the 4-pin cable, let me re-phrase.

The picture's orientation certainly works . . . I'd like to know from Adam if the 4-pin cable can be inserted the other way as well.

 

[jkl]

Finished loading some 308's I shot yesterday and it is faster and worked as well as I expected. Very easy to change charge weights.

John

 

[adamjmac]

Right, I understand why you don't want the bushing to rub - that makes sense. The question is how big the gap should be? Normally, the best/proper set up for function is when the two line up. Perhaps it would not slip off even when it is not lined up but perhaps there would be an effect on wear on the belt. So just basically wondering if there is any down side to having the two pulleys line up

I don't fully understand how a 1/4" gap would make things line up, I'm not picturing it. The two pulleys should be lined up when the small pulley is only 1/16" or so from the body, and the green handle is pressed on to set the position of things so it shouldn't float around. Let me know if there is still confusion and I'll post a clearer picture.

 

[adamjmac]

Thanks for letting me know I wasn't the only one with the cable lol.

On the 4-pin cable, let me re-phrase.

The picture's orientation certainly works . . . I'd like to know from Adam if the 4-pin cable can be inserted the other way as well.

The 4-pin works both ways, thanks to some clever (ahem) engineering

The 10-pin connector is probably for one of the A&D expansion modules. Just tuck it back out of the way.

 

[1lnbrdg]

I don't fully understand how a 1/4" gap would make things line up, I'm not picturing it. The two pulleys should be lined up when the small pulley is only 1/16" or so from the body, and the green handle is pressed on to set the position of things so it shouldn't float around. Let me know if there is still confusion and I'll post a clearer picture.

I received mine in yesterday, started putting it together last night.

The pulley and the drive on the hopper spindle do not line up when you get the drive over the pin. It's about 3/16" out of alignment. Clearer pictures? Great Idea, maybe I'm doing something wrong.

 

[jlow]

I don't fully understand how a 1/4" gap would make things line up, I'm not picturing it. The two pulleys should be lined up when the small pulley is only 1/16" or so from the body, and the green handle is pressed on to set the position of things so it shouldn't float around. Let me know if there is still confusion and I'll post a clearer picture.

Adam – First, to reiterate, not posting to slam the product – I LOVE IT, what else can I say? Just working through what I would call a minor problem and looking for help.

So here are two pictures. What you will see is in both images, I put in two vertical parallel lines using Photoshop. One to show that the lines are parallel to the large pulley, and two to show that the center of the large pulley does not line up with the center of the smaller pulley. FWIW, I used a pair of caliper to measure the distance between the small pulley and the body of the trickler – 2.19mm.

I should add that I did try to move the large pulley wheel further in - an obvious possible solution. There is a set screw that is actually visible in the photos that if you loosen will allow you to move the pulley. Unfortunately, it appears that that large cylindrical part that is attached to the pulley is too large to enter the space in the trickler. Did not want to force it, thus the question.

 

[1lnbrdg]

Adam – First, to reiterate, not posting to slam the product – I LOVE IT, what else can I say? Just working through what I would call a minor problem and looking for help.

So here are two pictures. What you will see is in both images, I put in two vertical parallel lines using Photoshop. One to show that the lines are parallel to the large pulley, and two to show that the center of the large pulley does not line up with the center of the smaller pulley. FWIW, I used a pair of caliper to measure the distance between the small pulley and the body of the trickler – 2.19mm.

That's what I see also.

 

[1lnbrdg]

1. The other end of the trickler tube where the green handle sits is also hollow. Because of this, the tube section past the dowel pin and the green handle itself can hold on to a lot of powder. Part of it is the dowel pin holds back the powder hiding in that area when you try to dump it out, the other problem is the green handle cap just wants to hold on to the powder. After finding this out, I inserted a piece of foam which basically blocks the tube from the dowel pin area to the end so that no powder can get into this area - that works!

Like I said, not a problem at all if you know and take the proper measures and does not detract from the excellent operation of the auto-trickler.

I inserted some foam rubber to plug the tube also. Great modification!