Originally Posted by
levada
I have experienced the same thing with older machines. More than once I have cleared up this problem by installing a new "behive" spring. Stands to reason that the spring just gets tired after a whole bunch of years. Be careful when taking the tension mechanism apart, you want to be able to put the pieces back in the right order... This is a cheap fix, the spring only costs a few dollars, and it doesn't have to go to the shop, if you are reasonably handy, you can swap it out yourself like I have.
I have cleaned dried up oil off beehive springs and seen a tension work a lot better. Is the take up spring behind it gunked up? Some times I've taken a tension all the way apart, cleaned in de-greaser and put back together and for what ever reason - it works much better.
http://www.tfsr.org/pub/technical_in...echanism_2.pdf I have found the info on tensions to be very helpful. You do have to be able to follow directions to a T.