So I’m trying to put together my 3.1 rotator, it’s going together good but for some reason when I lock my worm gear down, it no longer is able to spin.
Things don’t look warped or offset.
It does turn if you use a drill though. Just can’t hand turn it. Is that normal?
See attached picture.
Anyone got any recommendations?
as a side note, I took things apart and greased the gears some more and seems to be turning a lot better now.
I am having the same issue at the moment…
i’ll try the tipp mentionend in SatNOGS in Portugal, Lisbon
and loosing some screws and fasten them one after one while it is turning nicely seems to help too…
if you have any other hints please let me know! 
I was seeing the same thing. Used the drill worked fine. Added the belt gears on the motor and the worm drive, and since you have a large fulcrum (large diameter on the gear) it turns really easy. In other words, that all-thread is very small so your leverage is almost nothing.
I also added lithium grease to my gears (hence the white “stuff” in my photos)
Herb
Yeah I used silicon grease on mine.
I just took a few parts out to get the drill on it. I removed the gear end and pushed the 3d printed support bracket down as far as it could go so I could grab ahold of it with the drill.
Wow, it’s like a race! I’m at the exact same point as well, it moves but not as free as I’d like it to yet, just put it together last night still got to tweak it and add some lithium grease.
I found if you take two nuts and jam them together on the M5 threaded rod then you can put a socket adapter on it to hook up to the drill, very easy to play with after that. something you can leave on permanently if you want as well.
Take a picture of this.
Found another great way to loosen things up and get things running smooth, without sanding forever.
I used some 400 sandpaper and fed it into the gears (with the grit facing the worm gear) and ran it through a few times using the drill… the difference is incredible… smooth as butter afterwards, and it doesn’t take long. just don’t overdo it! You don’t want to go so far that you end up with slop
