Between 705 & 1200 SQ/FT From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

[larry_g]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

Hi, new best friend! I'll be sending you a PM with some questions as soon as I'm done with this response.



1.) Need to find (impossible) or make a replacement for the missing overarm bar.
2.) Need to find a suitable single phase motor for the rapids and figure out how to wire it up.
3.) Coolant motor (and possibly pump; I haven't pulled the cover and looked) does not exist.
4.) Two of the oil/grease ports on the right side of the saddle are plugged. Need to get them unplugged, hopefully without having to remove the table, as a half hour of staring at it got me no closer at all to figuring out how the hell I'd go about doing such a thing.
5.) There are about 30 oil/grease fittings and two oil reservoirs on this machine, and I have no idea what goes in any of them and how often. I'm not going to so much as fire up the spindle until I get to the bottom of this. Translating French manuals has gotten me about a fourth of the way there on this front, but I'm not even remotely confident.

I got your PM and replied a couple of times. I also edited my above post so go back and read it.

For the over arm I think that you might get by with out having the rack gear in it, just use the one with the rack and remove the gear driving the second one.

My machine uses NO grease, all are oil and yes there are a ton of them.

The coolant motor has a pump bolted to it so most likely both are missing.

lg
no neat sig line

 

[BORING HOP YARD]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

I ended up deleting what I was trying to say before I posted. Thinking out of the box.
If, as in the "big if" if the 3 phase rapid motor is good, it may be cheaper to convert the rapid motor with a VFD rather than changing it out to single phase. I would bet you could convert for less than $100. Evilbay has a bunch of them and you dont need anything for high horsepower. I took my drive motor to a place in Portland to have them bench test it, I'm sure the greater Seattle area has some good motor shops that could fix you up. The concern I have about finding a rapid single phase would be the frame of the motor itself. Is it common or unique, did they make you machine in a single phase configuration. If its common you have a real good chance, if its unique maybe not. On the oil, my Cincinnati had a long list of oils that were superseded over and over again, I ended up using Mobil Vactra number 2 for my way oil.
Hope this helps

 

[nmk_61802]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

One of the minor side effects of this pandemic is that it's turned me into a hypochondriac. Every time I have a sniffle, "Is this COVID?" Every time my throat is sore, "Do I have coronavirus?" Every time I drink six beers by myself in one night, "Am I an alcoholic?"

Nah...

Lucky for me, local breweries and bottle shops are coming to the rescue in this time of need. I figure I'm stocked up for at least another week of not leaving the house:

You had me at "Dark Beer". Bealching Beaver P-B Nitro is one of my favorites. Sadly they are not sold around here, but I always try and get some when I am near the West Coast.

 

[GeddyT]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

Dang that was a long thread of high and low emotions! Good read though. Looks like everything worked out.

Hi, DeeDubz, thanks for stopping by!

You had me at "Dark Beer". Bealching Beaver P-B Nitro is one of my favorites. Sadly they are not sold around here, but I always try and get some when I am near the West Coast.

It's one of my favorites, too. Interestingly, that bottle on the far left is a chocolate peanut butter stout from Lost Coast, and I think it might be even better. One of the highlights so far. (Update: I find this coronavirus definitely targets the liver and belly fat region. Supplies are dwindling at a faster rate than expected.)

I ended up deleting what I was trying to say before I posted. Thinking out of the box.
If, as in the "big if" if the 3 phase rapid motor is good, it may be cheaper to convert the rapid motor with a VFD rather than changing it out to single phase. I would bet you could convert for less than $100. Evilbay has a bunch of them and you dont need anything for high horsepower. I took my drive motor to a place in Portland to have them bench test it, I'm sure the greater Seattle area has some good motor shops that could fix you up. The concern I have about finding a rapid single phase would be the frame of the motor itself. Is it common or unique, did they make you machine in a single phase configuration. If its common you have a real good chance, if its unique maybe not. On the oil, my Cincinnati had a long list of oils that were superseded over and over again, I ended up using Mobil Vactra number 2 for my way oil.
Hope this helps

I'm not an electrician, so yesterday's investigation of the machine wiring covered a range of emotion, from confusion to concern. What I can gather from looking at it and from talking to the previous owner is that the machine is wired up very primitively. Pretty much everything has been disconnected except the single-phase spindle/drive motor wired to the start/stop switch. With just a single contactor, the motor can only spin in the forward direction, so there's no spindle reverse.

This will be fine to get started, but I now have a few concerns. For starters, I would have to go the VFD route like you suggest or replace the motor with a single-phase to get the rapids working. Also, though, is that the spindle no longer has a brake, which is a bit concerning.

I have to think on this a bit more, and I have a feeling a complete rewiring will eventually be in order, but first I just want to get the machine running as it was.

 

[GeddyT]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

WARNING: MAYBE TWO PEOPLE HERE WILL BE INTERESTED AT ALL IN THIS POST. READ AT YOUR OWN RISK OF BOREDOM.

Update #1: My lower back is still f#$%ed. I can barely walk, so I doubt I'll be very productive through the rest of my vacation week. I don't know why I thought bending over and picking up a couple hundred pounds of cast iron was a good idea.

Update #2: I now have an English manual for the mill! The previous owner reached out to tell me he found a collection of printed/copied material in English, so I went and picked it up.

It's a gold mine, and I now have a far better understanding of the control scheme and how to operate the machine. What I was really excited about, though, was settling once and for all the machine lubrication requirements. With just three pages left, I finally got to the part about lubing the machine, and...

It's in French! Gaaaaah!

At least it was another view that I hadn't had yet, so out came the phone for some more translating. One thing is settled, and that's that Vactra #2 is the oil of choice for nearly all of the lubrication points:

The only other oil it calls for is in the gearbox reservoir, and that calls for Mobil Vactra Heavy Medium:

These two oils are consistent with different manuals I have seen for this machine and similar models from the same manufacturer. What's different is what to do about the universal head spindle:

And a better translation:

The way that reads to me is that the spindle housing holds shy of a liter and a half of Mobil DTE Light oil. I looked it up, and Mobil DTE Light exists and is an ISO VG 32 oil.

What's also interesting about this is that the spindle bearings are, indeed, lubricated by grease. There is a single flush lubrication fitting on the machine that takes grease instead of oil. It's labeled as "A" on the drawing and is right on the side of the spindle housing:

This is where things get interesting. This drawing claims these spindle bearings take Aeroshell grease, either Aeroshell 1 or Aeroshell 11 (hard to tell). Neither exist. In one of the French manuals I have, though, the lubrication section translates to exactly this:

Grease and full of oils
Capacity and quality of oils used:
- 25 liters of oil for the gearbox
Mobil Vactra Oil Heavy Medium.
- 2.5 liters of oil for the bowl of advances
Mobil Vactra Oil Heavy Medium.
- 4 liters of oil for slides (centralized lubrication tank + LUB lubricators)
Mobil Vactra Number 4 - exclusively -
- Pinion grease, type Mobilplex 48 for head drive pinions.
- Aeroshell 7 grease - exclusively - for horizontal spindle bearings and T.U.

"T.U." has to be the abbreviation for Téte Universel, which is the universal head spindle. Mobilplex 48 not only doesn't exist, but it's been seemingly erased from history. I found a different vintage machine that called for either Mobilplex 48 or another grease that I could find information on, and this other grease has been superseded by Shell Gadus S2 V220 2. At this point, whatever, it'll work. Only place this is used is the universal head gearbox. I ordered a case of it, as it wasn't much more than a single tube. Should last forever.

Summary:

• Gearbox (both) oil: Vactra Heavy Medium.
• Way oil: Vactra #4 if you believe the French instructions, but everyone seems to be using Vactra #2, as indicated in the other French instructions included with the English instructions (what!?...), so whatever. #2 it is.
• Universal head drive gears: Shell Gadus S2 V220 2. Whatever. It's grease.
• Universal head spindle housing: Mobil DTE Light.
• Universal head spindle bearings: Aeroshell 7 pumped into the grease fitting for the lower bearing every 500 hours and disassemble and re-pack the upper bearing every 2000 hours.

I need to pick up a tube of Aeroshell 7, unclog those two oil ports (I'm hoping compressed air does the trick), and I'm set. We'll see how it goes. I might even hunchback my way out there this afternoon if I get brave.

 

[C_F]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

Update #1: My lower back is still f#$%ed. I can barely walk, so I doubt I'll be very productive through the rest of my vacation week. I don't know why I thought bending over and picking up a couple hundred pounds of cast iron was a good idea.

Sadly, I know how bad you are currently kicking yourself. Up until around age 32 or so, I was indestructible & never gave lifting heavy things a second thought. Then one day, I was getting ready to yank an engine from a truck...I unbolted the hood, then picked it up over my head, walked it around the side of the truck, to lower it into the bed. The combination of turning & lowering, suddenly something went ZAP! I dropped to the ground & laid there for a while, thinking "so THIS is what old guys feel like".

I'm 55 now, and let me tell you, it has taken a few painful instances since then to find out just where my limits are. In my younger days, I wouldn't have hesitated to lift a couple hundred pounds, I used to do it frequently. Not any more though!
Anyway, try to relax as much as you can, and heal up.

Man, that translator tool on your phone is really cool!

 

[GeddyT]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

Man, that translator tool on your phone is really cool!

If you have an Android phone, it's on your phone too!

Thanks for the well wishes.

 

[larry_g]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

Good post. My book for the model 51 has nothing that I can find for lubing the head. So I may have to revisit my head and determine if my spindle bearings should be packed with grease like a wheel bearing. Outside that it seems that both our machines use the same lubes.

You spoke of spindle braking, On mine the brake is on the start handle. Move the handle to the right and the spindle starts. Move it to the left and a mechanical brake is applied, good for loosening the drawbar bolt.

Similar on the rapids motor, lift the handle and the motor is turned on. Continue lifting and the clutch is engaged. You can feather the handle and slip the clutch to control the speed of movement. I had to replace the rapids motor on my machine. The original motor was some European like C face mount. I was able to adapt a NEMA C faced motor to it with minimal work. I do remember having to make a coupling from the motor to the machine as shaft sizes were not the same. That was many years ago and the memory is slipping away these days.

lg
no neat sig line

 

[GeddyT]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

Larry, I'll have to check, but the exploded diagrams make it look like the spindle motor brake is integrated onto the back of the motor. I assumed it would have had to have been jettisoned to make way for the new larger motor. I'll have to see if there's an inspection window through which I can look for it.

 

[racer-john]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

GettyT You and I are in the same condition, but I am 87. Was installing a TPS on my
'89 Chev PU and of course you have a whole pile if bits to remove before getting at the TPS and I noticed that the plate holding three modules was cracked. So hunchbacked my way to my bench to weld it up and also make it less of a pain to replace. That part is done and the paint is drying. I'll finish it to-morrow, back williing.

 

[86turbodsl]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

Nice mill. Looks like a copy of a K&T. The guys on PM will be very helpful as long as you are respectful. They dont necessarily always like newbs over there. Look around and see if there's any plans for a parking lift. A lot of the horizontal/vertical mills came with a parking lift that lifts the head off and puts in a park position somewhere on the mill. You won't want to be lifting it on and off much without one or a jib or something.

 

[BORING HOP YARD]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

One more comment about braking, my mill is missing a brake arm as well.
When I bought my VFD it had a feature called "dynamic braking". I needed to tap on the mill so I wanted to be able to switch directions rapidly. I had never seen my mill run up to this point and after with some programing issues finally got the mill up and running.
I kept getting an error code that I could not get figured out, it had to do with the dynamic braking, something about the motor overloading the VFD back feeding it. So after about 2 weeks of making programming adjustments after work I decided to see if I would get the fault if I just turned off the dynamic braking so I did. The mill stops in plenty of time to switch directions for tapping. Bottom line for my mill it doesn't need a brake. I'm hoping its not that the mill has a high rotational force the motor has to overcome to rotate the spindle.
The mill seems happy, motor runs cool. I guess my point would be working one step at a time.
I would also recommend asking all your friends if they know an commercial electrician, "hopefully one that will work for good beer". I found one of my Daughters good friends had a good friend that is a commercial electrician that likes good microbrews. Anytime we have a get together when we invite family and friends, he gets an invite. He is a great guy. These guys deal with old equipment like your mill all the time.
I would bet your more interested in having someone help you then do it for you.

 

[larry_g]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

Nice mill. Looks like a copy of a K&T. The guys on PM will be very helpful as long as you are respectful. They dont necessarily always like newbs over there. Look around and see if there's any plans for a parking lift. A lot of the horizontal/vertical mills came with a parking lift that lifts the head off and puts in a park position somewhere on the mill. You won't want to be lifting it on and off much without one or a jib or something.

The parking lift is there. Look at it here; http://www.lathes.co.uk/gaston-dufour/page4.html

lg
no neat sig line

 

[86turbodsl]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

EDIT:
Dug around on the PM and now it makes sense. Quite different than most of the other horiz/verts. NOT MUCH on PM on this mill. Hope it's in good shape and no issues, or you'll be querying far and wide.





The operation of the lift is not obvious to me.

Sent from my LG-TP450 using Tapatalk

 

[larry_g]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

Coronavirus, Week 3.

In other news, out in the shop, I found that a puddle of oil has appeared beneath the mill's vertical head:

This discovery has really driven home that I have no idea how this thing is put together or what I need to do to keep it running properly. Oil in the vertical head is news to me, so I should probably figure out how to check for and fill/dump said oil and figure out how often I should do so. I think I'm going to need to track down an owner's manual for this thing, but everything I can find is either in French or is somebody online ripping people off for $150 for unauthorized copies. I may have to just bit the bullet.

Gotta look at the bright side, at least it hasn't been running dry. My son who flew on CH53's said if the thing stopped leaking they had to land because they were out of oil..

lg
no neat sig line

 

[GeddyT]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

GettyT You and I are in the same condition, but I am 87. Was installing a TPS on my
'89 Chev PU and of course you have a whole pile if bits to remove before getting at the TPS and I noticed that the plate holding three modules was cracked. So hunchbacked my way to my bench to weld it up and also make it less of a pain to replace. That part is done and the paint is drying. I'll finish it to-morrow, back williing.

Luckily, my back is about halfway, uh, back today, meaning this is my usual "overdoing it" strain that I do to myself two or three times per year. Usually takes as much as a week to get back to normal, but it always gets there. Unfortunately, now that my back is feeling better, I'm starting to notice a lot more that I also sprained my wrist a little. This is something that I've suffered with for a long time, I believe since an old motorcycle crash tore the tendon in the wrist that holds the ends of the forearm bones together. It makes that wrist really easy to sprain, and it can take weeks to heal. The price we pay for having fun...

Take care of your back, and good luck finishing your project.

Nice mill. Looks like a copy of a K&T. The guys on PM will be very helpful as long as you are respectful. They dont necessarily always like newbs over there. Look around and see if there's any plans for a parking lift. A lot of the horizontal/vertical mills came with a parking lift that lifts the head off and puts in a park position somewhere on the mill. You won't want to be lifting it on and off much without one or a jib or something.

The Practical Machinist site template is burned into my eyes at this point... I haven't posted there yet, but I've learned quite a bit. As for the parking lift, Larry nailed it below. Moving forward, I can get the universal head on and off fairly easily. The problem was getting that head from the ground onto the dovetails. That wasn't so easy, as that sucker was heavy!

One more comment about braking, my mill is missing a brake arm as well.
When I bought my VFD it had a feature called "dynamic braking". I needed to tap on the mill so I wanted to be able to switch directions rapidly. I had never seen my mill run up to this point and after with some programing issues finally got the mill up and running.
I kept getting an error code that I could not get figured out, it had to do with the dynamic braking, something about the motor overloading the VFD back feeding it. So after about 2 weeks of making programming adjustments after work I decided to see if I would get the fault if I just turned off the dynamic braking so I did. The mill stops in plenty of time to switch directions for tapping. Bottom line for my mill it doesn't need a brake. I'm hoping its not that the mill has a high rotational force the motor has to overcome to rotate the spindle.
The mill seems happy, motor runs cool. I guess my point would be working one step at a time.
I would also recommend asking all your friends if they know an commercial electrician, "hopefully one that will work for good beer". I found one of my Daughters good friends had a good friend that is a commercial electrician that likes good microbrews. Anytime we have a get together when we invite family and friends, he gets an invite. He is a great guy. These guys deal with old equipment like your mill all the time.
I would bet your more interested in having someone help you then do it for you.

DEFINITELY more interested in learning than having it done for me. Confession: I am not exaggerating that I spent two hours online yesterday afternoon trying to figure out how to read these motor wiring diagrams:

In trying to figure out how to reverse my motor and what components would be required, everyone always draws up these little diagrams with terminals and lines. I'm thinking, "Am an an idiot? It's just lines and dots; why is this so hard to get!?" I figured it would be a five minute search, but it took two hours before I found--on YouTube of all places--somebody finally explaining that a line drawn between terminals means those are connected to each other. Duh...

So it took roughly 10 hours longer to figure out than it could have if I knew somebody who could walk me through it all, but I think I have this mill's wiring figured out--both the standard wiring and how it's wired now:

The standard wiring is three phase in to three motor starters, one with an auxiliary terminal to activate the motor brake. The spindle brake is an electrically activated physical brake built into the standard 3-phase motor:

As the mill sits, there will be no brake on the spindle, and the spindle start/brake lever that Larry described (mine is labeled the opposite of how it looks in every manual I've found and how Larry's works, interestingly). The spindle forward/reverse selector switch is not wired up, and even if it were, the only way to reverse rotation would be to stop the motor, wait for a complete stop, switch rotation direction, and start it again.

Where I got into "motor diagram hell" yesterday was in trying to figure out what I would need to do to both add a single phase rapid motor and wire up a spindle motor reverse. It was not encouraging... For now, the mill runs and will make chips as soon as I finish getting it lubed and greased. I'm just going to run it the way it is and debate what I want to do moving forward. It's possible, like your mill, it just stops fast enough on its own that I don't need a brake. It's also very rare that I would need a spindle reverse. The rapid motor? That one's going to bother me, so I need to figure it out.

I also need to decide whether I want to go nuts and pull the table off to clear the oil lines. I couldn't get oil into five of the six ports on the front of the saddle, although all I have is a cheap little oil can. I ordered the push style oil pump linked to above, and it's supposed to generate more pressure. I think I'll try that, then maybe pull the table if it doesn't work. Compressed air didn't get in at all.

A couple last questions for Larry:

I'm confused about the auto feed forward/reverse lever on the left side of the machine. What is that for? The spindle is reversed electrically, and the table/knee/saddle feeds all have a lever that can be switched either way. Why the reverse gear for the whole shebang? And where to you usually have that set?

I spent at least 15 minutes on my back under the knee, looking up into the gear box in the knee and trying to figure out how it all worked. At first I was looking for some kind of physical brake acting on the gear train when the spindle on/brake lever is pushed toward brake, but in the process I ended up down the rabbit hole of figuring out the xyz auto feeds. With any of the three auto feeds engaged, I could turn the main pulley on the back of the machine, and the spindle would turn but the table wouldn't move. The universal shaft on the left side of the mill is turning, so power is being transmitted to the knee, but something inside the knee is not engaging to lock the table feed to the spindle drive. Is there some kind of clutch in there that only activates at high speed? If you turn your spindle by hand with one of the feeds engaged, does the table move?

I guess I could just wire it up and get to the bottom of that really quickly, but just curious for now and wondering if I am missing something simple.

 

[GeddyT]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

The operation of the lift is not obvious to me.

Just realized I didn't respond to this. To remove the universal head, you crank the "slide bracket" forward, which just extends the dovetails higher. You then place a block or something on the table, between the table and the universal head, and crank the table up until the universal head slides up onto the slide bracket. Clamp the universal head to the slide bracket, crank the slide bracket--now with universal head attached--out of the way to the back of the machine. You then just have to unbolt the drive gear from the horizontal spindle, crank the overarm support bars forward, hang the outer triple clamp to the outer end of the support bars, and install the horizontal arbor. It's not bad as far as these setups go.

 

[larry_g]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

DEFINITELY more interested in learning than having it done for me. Confession: I am not exaggerating that I spent two hours online yesterday afternoon trying to figure out how to read these motor wiring diagrams:

This diagram is for a 3 phase motor, you'll have to find on for a single phase motor where it usually shows reversing wires #5&8

In trying to figure out how to reverse my motor and what components would be required, everyone always draws up these little diagrams with terminals and lines. I'm thinking, "Am an an idiot? It's just lines and dots; why is this so hard to get!?" I figured it would be a five minute search, but it took two hours before I found--on YouTube of all places--somebody finally explaining that a line drawn between terminals means those are connected to each other. Duh...

So it took roughly 10 hours longer to figure out than it could have if I knew somebody who could walk me through it all, but I think I have this mill's wiring figured out--both the standard wiring and how it's wired now:

The standard wiring is three phase in to three motor starters, one with an auxiliary terminal to activate the motor brake. The spindle brake is an electrically activated physical brake built into the standard 3-phase motor:

As the mill sits, there will be no brake on the spindle, and the spindle start/brake lever that Larry described (mine is labeled the opposite of how it looks in every manual I've found and how Larry's works, interestingly). The spindle forward/reverse selector switch is not wired up, and even if it were, the only way to reverse rotation would be to stop the motor, wait for a complete stop, switch rotation direction, and start it again.


View media item 102387
The above diagram is from my book and is the start switch/brake actuator. You can see the brake bands part 150-151. I only have one direction on my spindle, no reverse.

Where I got into "motor diagram hell" yesterday was in trying to figure out what I would need to do to both add a single phase rapid motor and wire up a spindle motor reverse. It was not encouraging... For now, the mill runs and will make chips as soon as I finish getting it lubed and greased. I'm just going to run it the way it is and debate what I want to do moving forward. It's possible, like your mill, it just stops fast enough on its own that I don't need a brake. It's also very rare that I would need a spindle reverse. The rapid motor? That one's going to bother me, so I need to figure it out.

I also need to decide whether I want to go nuts and pull the table off to clear the oil lines. I couldn't get oil into five of the six ports on the front of the saddle, although all I have is a cheap little oil can. I ordered the push style oil pump linked to above, and it's supposed to generate more pressure. I think I'll try that, then maybe pull the table if it doesn't work. Compressed air didn't get in at all.

A couple last questions for Larry:

I'm confused about the auto feed forward/reverse lever on the left side of the machine. What is that for? The spindle is reversed electrically, and the table/knee/saddle feeds all have a lever that can be switched either way. Why the reverse gear for the whole shebang? And where to you usually have that set?

I do not have a auto feed fwd/rev switch on mine. I can only assume that if your running the spindle in reverse that you would switch that so the handles activating the feeds are still marked correctly. I.E. the table left will be correct when you activate it.

I spent at least 15 minutes on my back under the knee, looking up into the gear box in the knee and trying to figure out how it all worked. At first I was looking for some kind of physical brake acting on the gear train when the spindle on/brake lever is pushed toward brake, but in the process I ended up down the rabbit hole of figuring out the xyz auto feeds. With any of the three auto feeds engaged, I could turn the main pulley on the back of the machine, and the spindle would turn but the table wouldn't move. The universal shaft on the left side of the mill is turning, so power is being transmitted to the knee, but something inside the knee is not engaging to lock the table feed to the spindle drive. Is there some kind of clutch in there that only activates at high speed? If you turn your spindle by hand with one of the feeds engaged, does the table move?

I looked under there years ago, got out and on my knees and said a short prayer it never breaks. I do know that the feed handles have to be fully engaged. It's easy to move them and assume they are engaged, and they are not' so make sure they are fully engaged. If you engage the table X feed and try to move the table with the hand wheel it should be locked and the hand wheel will not move it.

I guess I could just wire it up and get to the bottom of that really quickly, but just curious for now and wondering if I am missing something simple.

I think that your machine is a fair bit different than mine. Are you sure yours has a reversing spindle? Mine never had that feature. It only turns clockwise so that it will power a drill bit. So if you can drill a hole then your turning the correct direction. I got a NMTB40 to #4 Morse tool holder so I can use my big drill bits in the HZ spindle. Set your speeds and auto feed Y and it will chew a big hole without flinching. Actually I have a second one I can sell you if you get to that point. I miss ordered and received two.

I also have bee thinking about your rapids situation. I think the VFD on the rapids motor above is a good one. The action of the rapids handle is that the first movement starts the motor and continued motion engages the clutch. So a VFD should work. Use the switch in the machine to give the VFD a start input and the rest as factory. Basically you replace the motor start relay with the VFD.

I also have pondered the coolant pump issue and most likely an add on pump would work and be easier to find that the original. Me, I use a drip feed oiler to drop oil on the cutter. In the home shop your not going to be running production where coolant is needed most of the time.

lg
no neat sig line

 

[harley jim]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

To reverse a three phase motor just reverse any two wires of 1,2, or 3

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[GeddyT]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

To reverse a three phase motor just reverse any two wires of 1,2, or 3

Sent from my SM-A102U using Tapatalk

I wish it were that easy! Unfortunately, one of the previous owners ditched the three-phase motor for an old GE single-phase motor that time has forgotten (google the model number and... zero results. I didn't even think that was possible!). Already being wired for single phase was a selling point to me, but now that I've been looking into how to get the machine fully functional, I might have rather just hooked it up to an RPC and been done with it. On the other hand, I like a good challenge.

This diagram is for a 3 phase motor, you'll have to find on for a single phase motor where it usually shows reversing wires #5&8

Larry, that was just a random picture that I pulled off the web to demonstrate the diagrams that everyone on this forum can read except me. Once I got the door off my motor, I actually found that its diagram was both different and easier for me to visualize:



The two starting capacitors have been hand-drawn in, which raises even more questions, but whatever.

The above diagram is from my book and is the start switch/brake actuator. You can see the brake bands part 150-151. I only have one direction on my spindle, no reverse.

Oh, yeah, your machine is DEFINITELY different than mine. Mine for sure has spindle reverse controls:



And this is the "Start Forward/Start Reverse" lever on the left side that I can't figure out what it does (although I think your theory for its function is probably spot on):



The way you actuate your spindle/brake sounds exactly like it works in every manual--French or English--I've found for my machine, but it's either labeled backward or functions backward on mine:



I crawled under and gave it a long look, but there's definitely not any kind of physical brake mechanism in there:



On the bright side, I got the table feeds figured out, and they're definitely functional. I should have been looking at the handwheel dials instead of trying to see the table move thousandths of an inch with my bare eyes...

 

[GeddyT]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

Today's project: Remove the IR pump and motor from its receiver for cleaning, pick up the receiver, and move it outside for cleaning. Went pretty well!

On the bright side, the pump and motor are on the ground for cleaning and the receiver is clean, drained of 50 gallons of water and mud, and placed in its new home:

On the downside, it's going to take quite a bit of work to get anything back out of the IR pump. The pulley end of the crankshaft has at least a sixteenth of radial play. That bearing is definitely shot.

 

[larry_g]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

I crawled under and gave it a long look, but there's definitely not any kind of physical brake mechanism in there:

On the bright side, I got the table feeds figured out, and they're definitely functional. I should have been looking at the handwheel dials instead of trying to see the table move thousandths of an inch with my bare eyes...

Another guess; That green box is the actuator switch for the original motor brake. So then the question I have is; Do you have a spindle brake to hold the spindle while tightening the drawbar?

Another way to look at those motor wiring diagrams is the DOT where wires meet is a wirenut or ring connectors bolted together that holds those numbered wires together..


lg
no neat sig line

 

[GeddyT]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

Another guess; That green box is the actuator switch for the original motor brake. So then the question I have is; Do you have a spindle brake to hold the spindle while tightening the drawbar?

That green box is, indeed, the actuator. It's a three way switch, so it engages the spindle motor in one direction and the brake in the other. Now that I've seen that switch, I'm a little concerned, as there's no way in hell there's going to be any replacing it if it goes bad, so I'd have to rig up some other linkage to a modern switch.

The spindle does not have a brake for tightening the drawbar. That's half the reason I wanted to sort that problem out. Might just have to use a pin spanner on the tool holder while tightening the drawbar.

 

[GeddyT]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

Nice little diversion today: Got assigned the task of building the garden gates to keep the deer out. My previous gate lasted ten years, but it was a solid sail, weighed a ton, and finally ripped off. The new one is about a fifth of the weight, still really solid, and I think looks even better:

Cedar with pocket screw joinery. Hopefully it lasts another ten years.

In other news, a big box from McMaster-Carr showed up today, so hopefully I can get the mill wired up and running tomorrow!

 

[Vette60]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

Hey Geddy.

Enjoying your posts here from Richmond. Good luck getting your mill up and running. Looks like it will be a nice addition.

Hope things are going well for your out your way.

 

[C_F]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

Nice little diversion today: Got assigned the task of building the garden gates to keep the deer out. My previous gate lasted ten years, but it was a solid sail, weighed a ton, and finally ripped off...

Oh sure, don't show us your previous behemoth…
The new one looks good, no question.

 

[GeddyT]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

Oh sure, don't show us your previous behemoth…
The new one looks good, no question.

I just dug through the thread, figuring there must have been a shot with that gate in it. This is the closest I could get:

You can see it's already barely hanging by a thread there. A windstorm last year ripped one of the hinges all the way out, and that was that. Over a decade ago, here's what I thought made sense for building a garden gate: 2x4 framed, sheathed with CDX, with tight 1x4 vertical overlay. Framed a pocket on the back side for holding gardening tools. Whole thing weight a mere 10,000 pounds and had no openings for wind to pass through. Pretty smart.

Hey Geddy.

Enjoying your posts here from Richmond. Good luck getting your mill up and running. Looks like it will be a nice addition.

Hope things are going well for your out your way.

Thanks for chiming in. And for providing a nice segue. The mill runs! I finally gave up on figuring out how to make everything function exactly like it did when new and got around to just making it run.

I still don't get why embedding video is verboten here, as "gallery" is right in the forum title, but it's not my sandbox. Anyway, here's a video that's about as entertaining as paint drying if you've seen a mill turn its spindle before.

We've been doing "Shop Time With Dad 101" as part of the kids' homeschooling, and yesterday they got hit with quite a bit. We learned about what it looks like inside of a breaker panel; which lugs to NOT get anywhere near, even when the main breaker is flipped; measuring, cutting, and reaming conduit; pulling, stripping, labeling wire; installing breakers and what they do; removing knockouts; expanding knockouts with a step drill because my dumb *** insisted on going 3/4" inch for all of the conduit in the whole shop; wiring up equipment:

When it was all done, they were excited to see the machine run. Lacking any tooling, there was no fully testing the mill, but my son asked for a lathe demonstration to see what that was all about. I showed him drilling, facing, turning, and parting, and he ended up with a little aluminum wheel. He wants to make three more today so he can build a little car.


Question for all the machinists in the room that also have old, slow mills: This mill's spindle tops out at 1600 rpm, and I'll mostly be cutting aluminum with it. In reading manufacturer's recommendations, even HSS end mills call for spindle speeds three times what this mill is capable of, and that's for a pretty fat cutter, not something tiny like 1/8". What tooling are you buying (material, flutes, coating, etc.), and how are you getting around spindle speed limitations?

 

[Trapps]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

Post 1 – “More pictures less words”
Post 5 – the retraction we all appreciate

This thread delivers,
with humor and details
like darts from the quiver,
and some nearly epic fails
When the contractors leave you in the lurch
And projects sometimes prove, life is a ‘Birch’
a dried-up little river, a great big heavy mill
loads of perseverance, a testament of will
From Chicken Poop
to Chicken Coup
Great Writing and Great Pics,
some nifty clever, little tricks
Dirt bikes and track bikes
a pair of happy little tykes
Absurd archaic local permits
And pesky 5 bend conduits
From Woodcraft to metal craft
And Motorcycles in the house
cute and fun Family krafts
and some almost scary ‘ouch’
Like quality Garage Journal crack
This thread keeps me coming back
Quarantinis now imbibed,
color me now fully subscribed

 

[GeddyT]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

Post 1 – “More pictures less words”
Post 5 – the retraction we all appreciate

This thread delivers,
with humor and details
like darts from the quiver,
and some nearly epic fails
When the contractors leave you in the lurch
And projects sometimes prove, life is a ‘Birch’
a dried-up little river, a great big heavy mill
loads of perseverance, a testament of will
From Chicken Poop
to Chicken Coup
Great Writing and Great Pics,
some nifty clever, little tricks
Dirt bikes and track bikes
a pair of happy little tykes
Absurd archaic local permits
And pesky 5 bend conduits
From Woodcraft to metal craft
And Motorcycles in the house
cute and fun Family krafts
and some almost scary ‘ouch’
Like quality Garage Journal crack
This thread keeps me coming back
Quarantinis now imbibed,
color me now fully subscribed

STAY!

Congratulations on providing the best post on my thread! I know which build I'll be reading next.

Thanks for the laugh. Mrs. GeddyT was a high school English teacher for ten years, and she really got a kick out of that as well.

 

[larry_g]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

Do you have the option of putting a larger drive gear on the HZ spindle? How do you adjust the gear mesh or is it fixed, like mine? It seems looking at yours you could slide the head up a bit to gain some speed.

lg
no neat sig line

 

[GeddyT]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

Do you have the option of putting a larger drive gear on the HZ spindle? How do you adjust the gear mesh or is it fixed, like mine? It seems looking at yours you could slide the head up a bit to gain some speed.

lg
no neat sig line

Correct. There's a big stop-bolt that goes in the top of the dovetail mount casting aiming straight down. Screw that in more, and it will raise the universal head up more to make room for a bigger gear. You'd then just tighten the four regular dovetail clamp nuts as normal. Thing is, I'm not sure where I would get such a gear, and I'm not sure the spindle and its bearings are rated for more speed.

Doesn't matter, though. Picked up a cheap 3/8" four-flute uncoated HSS end mill from Grizzly today (amazing that I live less than two miles from one of their two showrooms in the country), and took it for a test drive through some aluminum bar stock I had laying around. With the spindle maxed and the end mill at about a 75% depth of cut (about 3/4"), I slotted into the stock about half the cutter's diameter, then sent it on its way down the Y-axis at a middling feed rate (this was a very scientific test...) to see what would happen. This is a live look at me activating the table feed and bracing for flying chunks of high speed steel:



Instead, what happened was... largely nothing. I wouldn't have even known the tool was in the stock were it not for the beautiful chips piling up. I don't think the slow spindle speed is going to a problem. Sure, surface finish won't be showroom quality, but this machine hogs through aluminum like the proverbial butter, so no complaints at all. It'll do what I need it to do:



I uploaded this very first test cut to YouTube, but I'm sure you've seen similar a thousand times. The only reason this video is noisy is that the handle on one of the table handwheels is a homemade replacement and needs a nylon washer or something to tighten it up. The machine itself is impressively quiet, even when cutting. I'll have to try some steel and see how that goes.

A big box of DRO showed up on my porch today, so that's the plan for tomorrow if getting the oil passages on the saddle cleared up works out. If I have to remove the table to sort out the oiling situation, I'd rather do that before installing the glass scales.

 

[larry_g]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

Thing is, I'm not sure where I would get such a gear, and I'm not sure the spindle and its bearings are rated for more speed.

Where to get the gear..you make it, you have the tools now.

On your vid things look good. These machines will move a lot of metal. I have yet to bog down the machine other than the time I was drilling a 1" hole in a piece and failing to take into account that the drill bit was carbon steel, not HSS. It basically turned the work piece into a grinder and the drill bit was like a pencil in a pencil sharpener.

lg
no neat sig line

 

[GeddyT]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

Well, getting the DRO installed, uh, stalled. Should have looked at the mill ahead of time and worked out a plan so I'd be ready. The Y-axis is going to be particularly difficult to figure out, requiring some pretty long custom brackets to space the scale and the reader well out from the knee. So I've ordered some metal, and it'll be a bit of a wait.

Since all I accomplished today was setting up the badminton net and playing a ton with the kids (not complaining), I'll toss up a diversion from my lack of progress:

My buddy Andrew has gone full Edward Scissorhands, only with a plasma cutter and welder instead of shears, and with metal instead of shrubs and trees. He's made so much awesome lawn art that he's run out of places to put any more. Mrs. GeddyT noticed he posted some pictures of his art on Facebook in an attempt to move some out of the way to make room for new projects, and I asked him to send me a gallery of the whole lot so that I could share them here, as I think this sort of thing is super cool. At any rate, here's a sample of his Edward MIGhands collection, made mostly of shovels and bicycle parts:





















The more I think about it, he should really start a thread here. He gets so much more done in his small shop than I'll ever get done in mine. I'll pester him.

 

[mybigwarwagon]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

Well, getting the DRO installed, uh, stalled. Should have looked at the mill ahead of time and worked out a plan so I'd be ready. The Y-axis is going to be particularly difficult to figure out, requiring some pretty long custom brackets to space the scale and the reader well out from the knee. So I've ordered some metal, and it'll be a bit of a wait.

Since all I accomplished today was setting up the badminton net and playing a ton with the kids (not complaining), I'll toss up a diversion from my lack of progress:

My buddy Andrew has gone full Edward Scissorhands, only with a plasma cutter and welder instead of shears, and with metal instead of shrubs and trees. He's made so much awesome lawn art that he's run out of places to put any more. Mrs. GeddyT noticed he posted some pictures of his art on Facebook in an attempt to move some out of the way to make room for new projects, and I asked him to send me a gallery of the whole lot so that I could share them here, as I think this sort of thing is super cool. At any rate, here's a sample of his Edward MIGhands collection, made mostly of shovels and bicycle parts:





















The more I think about it, he should really start a thread here. He gets so much more done in his small shop than I'll ever get done in mine. I'll pester him.

Dang it. The wife saw that. Now she wants some art.

 

[GeddyT]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

Dang it. The wife saw that. Now she wants some art.

I haven't talked to him in a while thanks to the quarantine, but here's a link to his Instagram feed if you're interested. Looks like there's a website link at the top of his IG page, and he has an email address there if you don't do Instagram.

If you do get a hold of him, pester him to start a thread here! I think it would be a pretty good one.

 

[C_F]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

Those looks great, he's got some skills!

 

[Vieux]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

I've read your entire topic. I am amazed that you do this very cool!!!
I subscribe and will look forward to following updates.

 

[Botje]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

Soo! Read through your whole thread during the last few days. Impressive results, really like the outcome and must admit, if I'd start such a project, a lot of it would go down the same slippery slope between funny failures, expensive happenings and amazement at the crazy way for example contractors 'operate' (did not say work). Anyway, stoked to see the results and happy to see you having a lot of fun in your new workshop!

Nice mill you've got there. The horizontal spindle will come in handy as well, I'm sure.

The European style tefc motors mostly have standard mounting. I would go for vfd on the feed motor tbh, smooth start and stop also makes the mechanics of the machine happier. I could keep an eye out for a usable motor but then the voltage is probably still an issue, everything this size runs 230/400vac 3-phase.

For spindle grease, kluber nbu 15 is often used for these kind of applications. SKF sells a (AFAIK) similar grade, maybe a but less high end, and much cheaper, called lglt2. Changing the grease could be cheap insurance sometime down the road, as spindle bearings are expensive and difficult to set up usually. But first don't worry about it if it runs smooth. Disclaimer, I have a similar vintage mill, broken down to the last bolt, for the last 5 years at least. Need to find time to assemble it again

 

[GeddyT]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

I've read your entire topic. I am amazed that you do this very cool!!!
I subscribe and will look forward to following updates.

Oh man, I'm honored! Yours is one of the threads I'm subscribed to as well, as I always love seeing your work.

Soo! Read through your whole thread during the last few days. Impressive results, really like the outcome and must admit, if I'd start such a project, a lot of it would go down the same slippery slope between funny failures, expensive happenings and amazement at the crazy way for example contractors 'operate' (did not say work). Anyway, stoked to see the results and happy to see you having a lot of fun in your new workshop!

Nice mill you've got there. The horizontal spindle will come in handy as well, I'm sure.

The European style tefc motors mostly have standard mounting. I would go for vfd on the feed motor tbh, smooth start and stop also makes the mechanics of the machine happier. I could keep an eye out for a usable motor but then the voltage is probably still an issue, everything this size runs 230/400vac 3-phase.

For spindle grease, kluber nbu 15 is often used for these kind of applications. SKF sells a (AFAIK) similar grade, maybe a but less high end, and much cheaper, called lglt2. Changing the grease could be cheap insurance sometime down the road, as spindle bearings are expensive and difficult to set up usually. But first don't worry about it if it runs smooth. Disclaimer, I have a similar vintage mill, broken down to the last bolt, for the last 5 years at least. Need to find time to assemble it again

Man, if there's one upside to this virus, it's that everyone is becoming a better reader! My thread may not be the oldest or have the most posts, but I'm a bit of a... whatever the digital equivalent of a windbag is...

Thanks for the tips on the motor and the grease. I ended up down a loooong road with the grease, finally settling on a grease that The Internet tells me is 7 degrees of Kevin Bacon from the grease that the French manual calls for (Shell Aeroshell 7). At some point, I waived the white flag, said "good enough," and ordered a surplus tube off eBay.

Then I pumped 80 grams of it into the grease fitting. EXACTLY 80 grams... Manual says this covers one of the bearings, and the other must be removed and repacked. Spindle is quiet as a church mouse, so... I'll get to that when I get to that. Or probably not.

The motor was even a bigger rabbit hole, with me pulling the entire electrical system--motor and all--out of the machine to trace it all out and figure out what to do about it. Only to, again, wave the white flag, admit defeat, put it all back together exactly how it was, and plug it in. Now that I've actually run the machine, I'm not really missing the rapid motor. Not having a spindle brake is a bit of an inconvenience for mounting tools, but whatever.

Thanks for stopping by and chiming in. Hopefully I have some actually interesting stuff to add to the thread over the next couple weeks, as I'm working out mounting the DRO Y-axis onto the mill when there are so many control levers on both sides of the knee.

 

[Pressingonward]

Re: From losing everything to being cash-poor and shop-rich in "only" five years!

Nice progress on the mill!

Here's a few tips on cutters that I'll pass along:

2 flute endmills are generally recommended for aluminum. 4 flutes tend to get plugged with chips and destroyed. This is more critical with smaller endmills. Personally I LOVE 3 flute endmills for aluminum. You can cut faster than a 2 flute, they are stronger, and they have less chatter. I like the aluminum-specific Accupro brand from MSC. They regularly have a 40% off sale, so don't buy them full price. The uncoated ones are best for your purposes (cheaper, and you don't need the extra feed rate that the coating allows). They might be a bit spendy to start out with though since you'll probably make a few mistakes as you learn to use your new toy

HSS works well for aluminum. Carbide is stiffer which works better if you need a long stick-out (end mill sticking further out of the toolholder to reach deeper into a pocket or other feature you are milling), but is more brittle and less tolerant of mistakes. I prefer carbide for small bits (less than 1/4") since you often need a long stick-out.

Do not try to use bits with the common Ti-ALN or other Ti- coatings on aluminum. Lots of sources say these coatings are great for every material, but they're not. The coating will bond with the aluminum and destroy the bit quickly. ZRN and Ti-CN are the only two I know of that are actually good for aluminum. But again, I don't think you need coated endmills. I say this more in case you get some used tooling from somewhere and there are some coated bits in the mix.

Not sure if I've recommended it on your thread yet, but Gwizard from CNC cookbook is great for calculating feeds and speeds.