I'm having a little hard time understanding how to tune my coil liner machine. Mainly because I'm an amateur but also because the information I read is hard to apply to my machine since it's handmade. I always see people mentioning machines by product names and which power supply settings work for it but it seems very off from how I've been running my coil machine.
For example I've read that most people use 7-9 volts for lining with a coil machine and if I try that with my machine it would burn the back of my hand. Currently I run at 5.5 volts and I'm not entirely sure if it's too slow, however if I go past 6 it will start heating up considerably at the coils. Also might be important to mention I got 2 rubbers on it so maybe friction might heat it up too.
Also my power supply doesn't show RPM or duty, it just shows the voltage so I'm kind of relying on some other things I've learned from videos. For example I'll press the pedal and start dialing up the power from 0, once I hear the ''bzzt'' type of breaking point, I will move 1 or 0.5 volts further and put my finger on the armature bar to see if it can still keep going. Usually at the spot it will sound right, not too low but also not too disturbing. However in the videos I see that at low voltages people's coil machines will actually stop when they put their fingers on the bar and they'll kick start it with a touch at the back of the bar but even at 1v my machine won't stop working, it just makes a low buzz and continues as soon as I pull away my finger, leading me to think something's off with the tuning.
Lastly I've been leaving somewhat an approximate gap between the contact screw and the front spring. I've read that it should be about the size of a dime for a liner but I don't have dimes where I live so I'm just going with what I assume to be a ''coin sized gap''. It is slightly larger of a gap than what the guy that made the machine set up when he handed it to me, so perhaps this is the point where I'm messing up? Also if overheating is an issue with the machine itself regardless of how I tune it, I can always take it to the machine shop and get it checked out, but I don't want to go there if this is a blatant issue on my end.
I would very much appreciate your tips on tuning a machine and also would appreciate any ideas you might have as to what might be causing the overheating. Is the machine supposed to heat up if the gap is too large? Or is that a defect that I should get checked? Is the 7-9 volts thing default or is 5.5v that I've been running at also fine? Could these issues explain why I have choppy lines despite pulling steady lines and using plenty of shaken ink? Thank you very much in advance for any input you may have.
For example I've read that most people use 7-9 volts for lining with a coil machine and if I try that with my machine it would burn the back of my hand. Currently I run at 5.5 volts and I'm not entirely sure if it's too slow, however if I go past 6 it will start heating up considerably at the coils. Also might be important to mention I got 2 rubbers on it so maybe friction might heat it up too.
Also my power supply doesn't show RPM or duty, it just shows the voltage so I'm kind of relying on some other things I've learned from videos. For example I'll press the pedal and start dialing up the power from 0, once I hear the ''bzzt'' type of breaking point, I will move 1 or 0.5 volts further and put my finger on the armature bar to see if it can still keep going. Usually at the spot it will sound right, not too low but also not too disturbing. However in the videos I see that at low voltages people's coil machines will actually stop when they put their fingers on the bar and they'll kick start it with a touch at the back of the bar but even at 1v my machine won't stop working, it just makes a low buzz and continues as soon as I pull away my finger, leading me to think something's off with the tuning.
Lastly I've been leaving somewhat an approximate gap between the contact screw and the front spring. I've read that it should be about the size of a dime for a liner but I don't have dimes where I live so I'm just going with what I assume to be a ''coin sized gap''. It is slightly larger of a gap than what the guy that made the machine set up when he handed it to me, so perhaps this is the point where I'm messing up? Also if overheating is an issue with the machine itself regardless of how I tune it, I can always take it to the machine shop and get it checked out, but I don't want to go there if this is a blatant issue on my end.
I would very much appreciate your tips on tuning a machine and also would appreciate any ideas you might have as to what might be causing the overheating. Is the machine supposed to heat up if the gap is too large? Or is that a defect that I should get checked? Is the 7-9 volts thing default or is 5.5v that I've been running at also fine? Could these issues explain why I have choppy lines despite pulling steady lines and using plenty of shaken ink? Thank you very much in advance for any input you may have.
