New CNC Mill

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• About Tom

17 April 2010 Keep running up against space limitations on my Sherline mill. Been searching high and low for a good used smaller Bridgeport or clone mill. Probably located at least 50 of them in the past few months. Left the house several times to go visit, only to be informed that it had just been sold. There seems to be a huge market out there for older mills.

Finally looked at one in the Dayton, OH area which had been "sold", but the guy didn't show up at the appointed time. Spent four hours looking at it and placed some cash in the seller's hands. Went back today to pick it up.

Unfortunately, the mill is about 6" too tall to fit through my garage door. Tomorrow the disassembly begins.

Tomorrow Comes, and No Rain

Jim showed up early afternoon and attacks the problem. Finally discovered that there is no easy way to get that front shaft out. We could take the entire head off, but that would require a lifting device, and there's no room for one overhead in my garage. Had a forklift lined up, but I didn't have the contact information. Jim went by one of his friends house, turns out to be the guy I had lined up, but he had lost MY contact information. He shows up shortly with a fork lift. I'm in kinda over my head, but these two guys know what they are doing. Get the machine off the trailer, turn it around, tilt it ove on it's front face, and slide it through the garage door. They then turn it around facing the doorway, and push it back toward its evenutal location. After it's powered up and working, we'll shove it back the rest of the way.

Jim crawled back up on the ladder and put it back together. Don't have power to it yet, so can't prove that it works, but it was working when I first looked at it in the seller's shop.

Also picked up a 5 HP 3 phase "Delta" (brand) motor. It will become the idler motor in my 1 phase to 3 phase converter. The next step is to build a 3 phase converter, bolt the motor to the wall, and wire up everything. Then the mill has to move all the way to the left wall in the picture so that the motorcycle can come off the lift behind the mill.

The Best Laid Plans

Now several heads on the lists with more up to date information have convinced me to use a "Variable Freqency Drive", instead of a rotary converter. But that's another story in itself.