KINETIC LOG SPLITTER PROBLEM CHATTER / JAMMING - SOLVED & THE SIMPLE $5 / 5 MINUTE FIX REVEALED

NO ONE KNOWS HOW TO FIX THE PROBLEM WITH THESE MACHINES - NO ONE !
BUT I DO AND I WILL SHARE THE FIX WITH YOU.
After tearing my hair out trying to troubleshoot the gear chattering sound issue that most of these Kinetic log splitters have or will develop, I finally found the issue and its as I always suspected a bloody simple fix.
Machines affected are generally generic units, however the unit I talk about here is a 4 stroke petrol Millers Falls Black Widow unit.
Jansen, Lickety Split / Doctor Rapid Fire / Millers Falls Black Widow / Jansen - they are All the same !
Chances are if your machine is making that grating / gear grinding sound as it jams up on tough or knotty timber - this problem is the issue despite the brand of splitter.
All kinetic units will develop this issue in time. If it suddenly develops a chattering noise and begins to jam, check out the fix here.
But ! - you might want to eliminate something simple first - have you greased or oiled the clutch steel spline or wedges on the splitting side of the machine ? If you have then you have effectively reduced your 30 tonne splitter to a 2 tonne splitter - all that lubrication allows the clutch to slip and there is your problem. Open up the clutch side of the bearing case (very simple) and clean all the grease and lube off everything but the bearings (good idea to repack those with grease) there should be no oil or grease on any clutch surface metal should engage metal not slip through grease contamination.
If this does not sort out the problem proceed to the fix as follows.
The problem gets worse the more the splitters used as the taper bearing on the cross shaft loosens.
ABOUT THE PROBLEM.
It has nothing to do with the clutch spring.
The cold hard fact is nearly ALL these machines are Chinese machines, rebadged and sold on in the USA, UK, Australia and around the world like ALL machinery. The parts are fairly identical in most machines and so are the fails.
The distributors make out that they are their own machines rather than rebadged Chinese machines.
The rack and drive gears in these types of machines are permanently meshed so that chattering noise has nothing to do with drive gears grinding on the rack (although it sounds very much like it is). Its not.
These incredible machines leave a hydraulic splitter unit in the dust in terms of speed and the huge consumption of fuel. They are so slow compared to these kinetic units.
The fix for this isn't difficult and parts do not fly out of the machine, everything comes out easily and the mechanism is simplicity.
I would recommend removing the drive chain, the chain sprocket, the clutch by pushing in and turning counter clockwise 1 cm, withdrawing the clutch spring to take pressure off the rack shaft. At the same time the bearings on both sides can be cleaned and re-greased and the shaft tensioned properly without the clutch spring in place. This will add another 30 minutes to the job but well worth while. Its a very very simple basic job.
SOLVING THE PROBLEM
The 40mm ID tabbed bearing stop washer located on the engine side of the machine.
That's the component that fails over time and weakens the splitters ability to punch through anything other than the softest of timber.
As the washer is a cheap Chinese part and its fail is possibly due to overloading the machine, the tabbed washers inside locater shears off over time and releases the bearings outer 40mm retaining nut - this nut is what tensions the bearing and shaft allowing the clutch spring on the opposite side to do its work. Rather than the clutch spring becoming weaker it grows longer and looses tension as it is decompressed due to the issue on the other side of the machine.
Only after the tabbed washer is replaced and the bearing nut is re-tensioned on the engine side will the machine run again as it did splitting everything you throw at it. Essentially this defect turns a 30 tonne machine into a 10 tonne machine and less until the bearing eventually falls out of the engine side of the machine.
So, strip out the guard cover on the engine side of the machine and examine that tabbed washer, replace it and re-tension the bearing up tightly and your back in business.
Please don't ask me about tension settings and where to get the part, tensioning bearings is pretty standard stuff really and machine shops and Ebay have listings for these 40mm tabbed stop washers.
In a pinch you can get by in welding a tab or centre punching a new shaft locator onto the old washer. That's what I did, and its been running great ever since. Yes - its fixed !
I guess the bastard distributors will enjoy huge benefits now for finally knowing why these machines fail. I guess future sales will include spare washers as part of the sale.
So much bad word of mouth has gotten around about Kinetics over this issue I discovered and published today for the benefit of people going through the same issue as myself.