Replace bushes with bearings in bandsaw?

[Unmarked Bill]

Messing around with a little old 10" bandsaw, the lower wheel runs on bronze bushes. There's a primitive hollow-bolt setup to run grease to the shaft. I thought it might be a nice upgrade to replace the bushes with roller bearings.

It occurred to me though, would they have purposely used a bush because a bandsaw is so inherently side-loaded? I haven't dug this far into a bandsaw that I can remember.

It'd be easy enough to just replace the bushes if that's the better way, but just as easy to throw roller bearings in with a spacer up the middle.What do you think? TIA...

 

[crguy]

You may not have enough room to put bearings in there.

 

[matt_i]

If its a vertical which doesn't twist the blade then I think a couple of your generic 62xx-2RS-ish bearings will do fine. Light press fit ID, push fit OD. Here is where you need to be able to turn and bore to 0.0005" precision.

There should be some kind of roller (or flat) guides for the blade on both sides of the cut or the blade would just be pushed off the crown of the wheels.