[ZZII 527]

Hrm. I was having a similar issue with one of my gearboxes this week while installing a new carrier. It was binding at a particular angle and it seemed like the shaft was forcing the sun gear to be off center in the planetaries. The solution (which I can only semi-jokingly recommend) was to find the position of most binding, lay the flat spot of the sun gear on a vice, and tap the bearing block gently with a hammer to try to force the end of the shaft to bend slightly in the opposite direction. It seemed to work, but it may have been all in my head.

Getting the alignment perfect on these gearboxes is a tough but worthwhile adventure. I reassembled two this week: one went together with no problems at all and drew less than 2.5 amps. The other had alignment issues, most caused by my new carrier plate, and originally drew over 4 amps. But after breaking it in, tearing it down, polishing the bearing block to make it a better fit into the ring gear housing, and reassembling, it is now also down to 2.5 amps and sounds a lot happier.