I get a free mill!

[vpt]

Thank you!

Working from the top down.

[eKretz]

Looks like you got a nice score there, congrats. She is shaping up nicely, looks like it's still in great shape.

[vpt]

I am very pleased with it so far! Thank you!

Tilt bolt/shaft was broke. Worst job getting that thing out. Had to hammer, cut, hammer, cut, dill, cut, hammer, till finally got all the pieces out. Worm is ok. I salvaged the hex end of the shaft and welded on a new chunk of steel to machine down. Just waiting for it to cool now.

[vpt]

It has some wear, still doesn't feel clapped out though when yanking and pulling on it by hand. Good enough for free. 🙂

[eKretz]

It will still probably make plenty good parts over short distances. You may want to check contact on the gibs and relieve the centers a bit if there's any rock where the gib is contacting only in the center at any point in the travel. That will help at least a little bit. When the ways get worn concave in the middle the gibs tend to take the opposite shape - that can cause trouble in areas of the travel where the ways are less worn. That will probably show itself when you put the clamp on and things move around a lot on the DRO. It may be that it won't matter for your work though, depends on what you're doing with the machine.

[vpt]

Absolutely! I'm not to worried about it. This is just a drill press and dirty mill for me. I have a good tight Lagun for stuff that needs to be right.

The "flaking" doesn't seem to be all that deep on this mill, so where it is wore off still isn't all that bad really. Even still I can't complain about anything for free. Lol 🙂

[vpt]

Replacement lower housing came in! Everything seems to measure out and be exactly the same as a Bridgeport.

[vpt]

Did some more cleaning and inspecting. I am fairly convinced this machine only had one op to do and that only involved the y axis. Both the knee and x ways are in mint condition. I am having a hard time believing what condition this machine is in. I feel like I am missing something. I can't imagine anyone just throwing out such an apparently nice machine. Even the oiler has good clean oil in it yet and all but one oiler seem to work. The one rear x axis oiler doesn't work but I believe it is because the copper line is smashed flat.

[The Metal Butcher]

Check the worm on the head. If it the rod goes through and the shaft is in double shear, good. Otherwise you may want to modify it.

[vpt]

Check the worm on the head. If it the rod goes through and the shaft is in double shear, good. Otherwise you may want to modify it.

Funny you mention that. The shaft was broke. Just today I finished the new shaft, drilled the head deeper so it passes threw and is in a double shear setup now. Not even knowing that was an upgrade I just did it. Lol

Old single shear shaft:


New longer double shear shaft.

[vpt]

Mill is looking better and better! It is hard for me not to get to carried away with cleaning though. I would love to just strip it completely down and clean every single last part and bolt. But I just don't have the time for that now.

[The Metal Butcher]

Funny you mention that. The shaft was broke. Just today I finished the new shaft, drilled the head deeper so it passes threw and is in a double shear setup now. Not even knowing that was an upgrade I just did it. Lol

Old single shear shaft:


New longer double shear shaft.

Well either you have better sense than a Bridgeport engineer, or hindsight. We made that fix based on some advise from a rebuilding book.

[vpt]

Well either you have better sense than a Bridgeport engineer, or hindsight. We made that fix based on some advise from a rebuilding book.

It just seemed to make sense to do it that way. Almost all worm drives I remember working with are supported on both sides of the worm. Kind of interesting why they didn't do it that way from the begining though. I assume they changed the design at some point threw the years?

[The Metal Butcher]

It just seemed to make sense to do it that way. Almost all worm drives I remember working with are supported on both sides of the worm. Kind of interesting why they didn't do it that way from the begining though. I assume they changed the design at some point threw the years?

Yep. We stole a worm from a later machine.

[junkaddict]

The **** people throw away. Looks like it is coming along nicely.