[KC130LOADIE]

Tried posting earlier, but browser crashed after typing and uploading all the pics.


So, loaded up around 6:30 this morning and arrived at machine location about 7. Got Bobcat unloaded and trailer staged in back alley of welding shop.
Attachment 256122
So the back rollup door hadn't been opened in over 10 years. While I prepped the mill, drained the oil, made sure the knee, table, and ram were secure and flipped the head, the shop employees couldn't get the door open. After messing with it for awhile, my buddy pushed them out of the way to have a look, starts flinging pipes and other metal stock out of the way and delcares, "It's got a PADLOCK on it."



So, being a good welding shop, with many ways of making metal dissappear, the lock vanished and up went the door. We had to drag the mill a few feet away from the door, because it had been set on and improvised steel / plywood platform that made the ramp for the backdoor into a level usable floor space. Next, we spun her around, and SLOWLY drug her accross 1" plywood sheeting out onto level ground.

Attachment 256124
Next came out 2x4's inbetween the ram and forks. A 5,000 lb strap was attached to keep the ram from trying to slide off the forks and we were off to the races.
img_1398.jpg


We loaded the mill from the side of the trailer onto 4x4 dunnage, strapped it down, then drove the Bobcat back on.
img_1401.jpg
Attachment 256126
At this point, my buddies worked on getting the Bobcat secured, and I got to dust off my old C-130 Loadmaster skills. Luckily, I had access to 6 10,000 lbs chains, and 5 10,000 lbs jacks/devices. I had some really good carpet tile squares that would bend where you needed them too, and made a chain bridle around the base of the mill. Then I 4-Pointed it, with another dead-man back to the Bobcat, and a set of chains plus 5k strap over the knee.
img_1534.jpg
Attachment 256128
Upon arriving home 11.5 miles later, we reversed what we had done earlier and BAM! There she is.


(just ran into picture posting limitations, and CNCZon doesn't want to link to Photobucket).
Attachment 256130
In total, took maybe 2 hours from gaining access to the machine and it sitting in my garage.
Attachment 256132
Now onto crud, goo, and nastiness removal.


Here's a shot of the mainboard / computer side cabinet in the light of day. I wonder which of these components will be work saving?
Attachment 256134


I don't remember these being in the bottom of the cabinet before the move, but maybe they have / had something to do with the NC control not working?
Attachment 256136


On the mainboard side mounted on the door, does anyone have a clue what the brown breadboard is / was for? Add-on, upgrade, by-pass?
Attachment 256138
I got to finally access the middle, smaller cabinet in the back of the pedestal. What is a Nintendo cartridge slot doing in the back of my mill!?
Attachment 256140


Oh, more chips just hanging out.
Attachment 256142
I find it somewhat strange that on the Power and Driver side cabinet, it is pretty clean and immaculate. On the computer side, the air cooling fans are frozen, and everything has a residue on it. Next stop, do some "light" surface cleaning starting with the head.


Just some before and after of the head. Lots of goo and oxidized grease, oil, chips everywhere and in everything.
Attachment 256144
Attachment 256146
Attachment 256148
The serial of the table and head match.
Attachment 256150




Does anyone have any info on researching the pedigree of serial numbers?


More pics and stuff to follow as the Tree gets electronics pruned, and internals watered.


-Kit

[KC130LOADIE]

So I've been tinkering away. I've got the machine pretty "clean" from its former state. I discovered that the table had a drain in it after removing all the crud. I got top of the head off and am now going through the internals. I did discover that the horizontal gib for the saddle had the front end snapped off, and the adjustment screw was fubared.
Table Before
Attachment 257412
Table After
Attachment 257414
Horizontal Knee Gib busted with screw hanging out.
Attachment 257416
Who does this?!
Attachment 257418

So, Tree pruning progress has been made, but I am sorta kinda stuck as what / how to do next.
So, I was able to cleanly remove the motor, and get into the gear box, then remove the gearbox. I discovered that I do indeed have the rollers.
Attachment 257420Attachment 257426

As for the rollers, is the slop in the spindle people talk about result in a loose clockwise / counterclockwise direction? I could see that with rotational play between the spindle shaft and drive head rollers that that could end up poorly. Mine did have quite a bit of play back and forth, but after pulling the upper head, I didn't feel any kind of dents or divits on the spindle shaft.

As for the gearbox, how do I remove the main drive and driven pulley assemblies? I removed the large hex nut on the driven shaft, but can't get a gear puller in there. As for the gear / pulley on the other spindle to right, the spindle wobbles around, but again, I can't move it. Is the lower piece captured by the bearing cover bolted to the bottom of the gear box?
Attachment 257422

The next issue I have is the spindle feed system. The sprocket behind the Tree logo cover doesn't stay captured. I discovered that it is missing a set screw from the out side of the head. No biggie, I can get one and then grind down the end to make it smaller and capture the sleeve of the sprocket. BUT, I am having a hell of a time with the feed clutch. There appears to be a pin missing, and when I adjust down the pin retainer, it wants to bind up as the quill lengthens. Is there a specific gap between the Power Feed Clutch and pin retainer that needs to be set at the beginning?

[KC130LOADIE]

So the past couple days have been quite educational and frustrating. I have removed the upper head / gearbox, and am currently seperating all of the pulleys and gears.
Things to note are that the Reuland motor is pretty heavy, but you don't need an engine hoist or get up on a ladder precariously. I tilted the head 90* to the right, then cranked the knee almost all the way up. Next, I put some 2x4's and a carpet scrap underneath the head, and GENTLY cranked the knee up some more until contact was made. The four bolts came out, I made sure the speed was turned as low as it could go, then ran a strap over the motor and under the table. Last, I just cranked the table to the right on the x-axis and the motor slid out like butter.
Attachment 257580

For the gear box, getting the pulleys and gears out has been tricky. I took off the big hex nut on the spindle drive pulleys, then with the gear box secured, had to "tap" the spindle drive shaft down throught the bottom of the gearbox. Most other folk's gears & pulleys come off easily, mine not so much. After inspecting the bearings, spindle drive, and gears, my head might as well be fresh from the factory. All the fitment is TIGHT. There is no scoring, burrs, etc. to notice.
Attachment 257584

[fahrphrompuken]

Man that all looks real familiar. I just finished a complete rebuild of a Journeyman 320 a little over a year ago ( fahrphrompuken Gallery - My Photo Gallery ) . It looks like they use a lot of the same parts. Can you tell what the make of the CNC control is? It looks pre-Autocon for sure.
The "before" and "after" pics will be stunning!

[KC130LOADIE]

Man that all looks real familiar. I just finished a complete rebuild of a Journeyman 320 a little over a year ago ( fahrphrompuken Gallery - My Photo Gallery ) . It looks like they use a lot of the same parts. Can you tell what the make of the CNC control is? It looks pre-Autocon for sure.
The "before" and "after" pics will be stunning!

I dig your handle fahrphrompuken. That used to be on of my buddies common sayings when we'd tie one on and he'd start getting sick. Ah memories!

As for the mills, I do believe our heads are the same, except you have a bigger (more HP) motor. Even the pedestal looks very similar. I take it your head cannot be tilted or nodded?
The NC Controls were made by the same guys who wired the NASA Apollo Saturn V rockets. The stuff was archaic at best. The servo drives were made by Westamp. There are folks still running the controls though, so I'm saving my parts and maybe one day can help the budget. Your rebuild did turn out beautiful. How long did it take? What type of paint did you use? My machines' paint isn't half bad, but I do need to touch up some spots.
Are your on the Yahoo Tree group?

[KC130LOADIE]

I was able to get the spindle gears off. Everyone said that they either just slid off, and the spindle drive would come out of the bottom. Well, I played with this this for almost 5 hours, being very gentle and deliberate. In the end, I tried just a little tapping with this on the spindle drive shaft.Attachment 258022

The new hammer handle worked perfectly; it took about 4 taps to get each gear off, then another 6 to release the spindle out of the bottom. Upon inspection...these things look absolutely BRAND NEW. There are no sharp edges, scoring, wear lines, nuttin. I think this machine had soo little use, all of the components are just super tight fitting as if they came from the factory.
Notice the big hunk of belt? Most of it was stuffed in the corner, out of the way, but you could tell quite a bit had been shredded in the workings.
Attachment 258024

I usually don't like using the brute force method...but it worked out ok this time thankfully. Now, as for the driven pulley spindle and such...still no go. The gears refuse to come off the spindle, and aside from going gorilla on the bearing cover in the bottom, nothing seems to work.

Update:
After frustration and hours spent staring at the gearbox, I was able to finally get the driven pulley spindle gears off, well kinda. I was able to remove the top one, using a ghetto fabulous combo Napa / Harbor Freight gear pullers. I could see how to get the lower gear off, that is attached to the high/low lever, but since the lower bearing housing DID NOT want to budge without me breaking stuff, I figured that I should quit while I'm ahead. I'm 95% sure that I am the first person to ever go into the head, and all the bearings are smooth and the units' fit is so tight that I would end up breaking something if I kept pushing it. I used about 4 cans of brake cleaner in the internals, and fished out all of the broken belt bits and metal.
Attachment 258026Attachment 258028Attachment 258030

So, feeling somewhat accomplished, I did some more cleaning and inspecting. First the bad. One of the 4 roller for the drive spindle had a pretty good flat spot worn in it. Nor sure how bad it is, but none of the others had anything wrong with them, EXCEPT my Eccentric Pins are BOTH sheared. The spindle shaft felt fine on all sides, so I'm not sure where or how this happened. I guess I will be making some square rollers since everything is apart. -OR- Talk to Monica at ZPS, they got everything in a kit that is already fitted.
Attachment 258034Attachment 258032Attachment 258036

I am now at a point where I am waiting for parts for the head. I need to get an engine hoist so I can go through the table and knee, but in my quest of perfection, I ended up wire wheeling the High / Low Selector handle, the Knee Crank handle, the Quill Feed Handle (lots of rust on that one), and fixed (almost) the quill power feed. I still need to make a 3rd pin for that though, but it is adjusted and working.

Finally, I have to admit I think I have a disease. It's called OCD and ARS because I ended up doing a light polish job on the front portion of the head. I gota admit it did turn out pretty good, but my hands and arms are pretty tired. What do you think?
Attachment 258038Attachment 258040

[KC130LOADIE]

Well, I had to look at drawing & pictures of other Tree spindle drives to realize, My Eccentric Pins were ALL sheared off. Everything was still mounted, but I think only the surface rust was holding them in. Now I have a pretty good idea why the mill was retired in the first place. The good thing is that it appears it was retired somewhat early in it's life, since everything on the inside is still brand new lookin.

I've also started working on the Bijur Oil system. Pretty nasty stuff, I just ordered replacement parts, (reservoir & gasket/filter kit). The price was under 40$, but shipping is a flat 18$, so 48$+. Too bad I didn't order my oil window at the same time.
Attachment 258274Attachment 258276Attachment 258278Attachment 258280Attachment 258282

Today was quite productive. I am awaiting my head parts from ZPS, so started in on removing the table and saddle. Since I have ballscrews, and they don't seem to be misbehaving, I opted NOT to open up the ball screw nut. I might change my mind later, but since I have never services a ball screw...I think I might leave well enough alone.

So, first I removed as much of the stuff from the right side of the screw.
Attachment 258284Attachment 258286Attachment 258288

Then I removed the retaining nut, hand wheel, 200 count dial, and spanner nut from the left. Next, I removed the left screw support. Now I didn't want to remove the screw, as all of the balls in the nut would come out, but I also could NOT get the right screw / servo mount to release from the table. I even put a 2x4 between the saddle and servo mount, and the screw backed out of the bearing, though it did pull it back toward the knee somewhat.
Attachment 258290

I still could not get the right servo mount off!
After lots of PB Blaster, I re-positioned the mill with my trusty pallet jack and got my workbench / welding table lined up to recieve the table. Here is a tip for both removing parts off your mill and any thing in general.
BEFORE getting impatient and pounding on stuff, make sure you have removed ALL of the screws!
Attachment 258292

I removed all of the table gibs. My welding table is on wheels, so I set up some cribbing and began slightly lowering the end of the mill table that was over the welding table, then did a kind of leapfrog with the wood underneath. I would just raise the knee sllightly to remove the 1st pieces of wood, then chock the table. I would then push the mill table along the wood, lower the table again to slip the "new" wood underneath, then raise the knee again. This took maybe 5-10 minutes.
Attachment 258294
A couple tips:
1. Back the screw out to the opposite side that you will be unloading the table off of as much as possible.
2. Ensure that the table you are moving the mill table onto can take the weight....that hunk of cast iron is STUPID heavy.
3. It helps if you push other cast iron for fun when not pushing your mill iron around.
Attachment 258296Attachment 258298
Once I got 90% of the mill table onto the wood, I lowered the knee again just slightly to let the welding table take the load. Then I un-chocked the welding table and rolled her away.
Attachment 258300

Once the table was clear, I began to inspect the top of the saddle. YUK! The oil galleries were all klugged up.
Attachment 258302
The above pic show all the dried out oil and nasty that I pulled out of the oil passages. Next I removed both the left and right flat gibs of the saddle that provide vertical restraint of the saddle to the knee. The right side is attached to the ball screw nut bracket. That takes a little finnese to undo. Warning! The right and left flat gibs are decievingly heavy.

The left gib is pretty staightforward. I don't have a saddle lock, so it is just 4 hexhead bolts.

The right side has a plethora of bolts. It is also keyed to the ball screw nut bracket, and keyed to the saddle. To remove the gib from the ball screw bracket, move the saddle positive on the Y-Axis towards the column until the screw clears the 2 hex head nuts holding it on. It is a semi pain to get a wrench on them. Once they are removed, then remove approx 6 screws that hold the gib "up" onto the saddle. It took a little wiggling gently, but the gib came free. Again...be careful, it's heavy.
Attachment 258304 Left Gib Removed
Attachment 258306 Right Gib Installed

Attachment 258308 Right Gib Removed

Time for a cerveza.

[KC130LOADIE]

So yesterday was the least fun I have had working on the Tree. I got the oil system purged of crap, and got the saddle back onto the knee after some light stoning of some slight damage on the knee way surface. Next came the table, and installing and re-installing the ball screw ends / supports that are connected to the table. After messing with it for 3 hours, I discovered ghat I jad put the lock nuts in backwards.

Got the gearbox and head all put back together with the new square rollers. Installing the new belts in the gearbox was pretty no-brainer, besides getting the driven spindle gears lined up. What did suck, will always suck, and I am LOATHE to repeat is re-installing the new Reeves belt and motor / driven pulley system. This process kicked my ass. I found out after. Screwing with the belt, spindle brake, speed adjustment, and getting the motor lined up that I had forgotten to replace the motor mount bracket/ring. Dammit. So, I pulled everything apart. Trying to get the belt installed with the lower variable pulley not connected seemed impossible. So, I remove the spring clip to the upper half of the driven pulley. That was scary as the spring retainer promptly shot itself across my garage. After using every swear word in my vocabulary (and I have a good cussing background - prior USMC) I almost threw in the towel. Then the spring clip fired itself into the bowels of the head!

I just couldn't let it beat me, so after fishing out the clip, inverted the head, got some pieces of wood, and used the table to compress the spring on the driven pulley. It still took awhile and was plenty scary with less than an inch of wood holding the fury of the sping back, but I finally won! The head is sitting with fresh oil and newly greased zerks.
Attachment 259430Attachment 259432Attachment 259434


[B]Day 2[B]
Got the entire head back together and situated. Installed the motor brake with too much droop. The brake would come in contact with the lower pulley when trying to get higher speeds. I had to remove the motor to adjust the stop screw, but I have gotten pretty good at it since I have taken-off and replaced the motor about 5 times now.

I hooked up my VFD and the partially completed power cabinet for testing, and after some goofing with the VFD (RTFM!) she started right up. I am getting a high pitched squeal from either the motor or VFD when the motor is spinning up, but I can't hear it once on speed. For now I have the VFD just to be an ON/OFF control at 60Hz, but need to find out if my switches that came with the machine can be adapted to act as remotes to the VFD. Time to bust out my electronics for Dummies. The big this is that the Tree is ALIVE!
Attachment 259436

Next thing to do while waiting for my cabinets to get back from the powdercoater is to layout and wire-up the power cabinet backplane, adjust the square rollers on the spindle, finnish cleaning up the Bijur auto oiler, adjust the gibs all-around, get new wipers for the saddle, and fabricate a better pendant articulating arm for the controls and future monitor / keyboard set-up. Ohh, and some little touchup paint in a few spots.

Something kinda funny; I have gotten used to the mill being in a somewhat "clean" state. I decided to remove the old, cracked, swollen wiring to the limit switches and cleaned them in the process. It's pretty amazing how much gunk and sludge I have removed off everything, and didn't really realize it until I started scrubbing the switches.

[G59]

Nice job. I noticed that in the picture with the eccentric adjusting cap screws, you are missing the lock. its just a flat piece of spring steel held with a small cap screw and it locks them in. That's what that hole in between the eccentric pins is for.

[KC130LOADIE]

Nice job. I noticed that in the picture with the eccentric adjusting cap screws, you are missing the lock. its just a flat piece of spring steel held with a small cap screw and it locks them in. That's what that hole in between the eccentric pins is for.

Hey G59,

That was before I put them back on.The tolerances are pretty tight.

-Kit

[G59]

Cool.

Are you repainting the whole thing? Making a CNC retrofit? What control will you be using?

[KC130LOADIE]

Cool.

Are you repainting the whole thing? Making a CNC retrofit? What control will you be using?

The majority 85% of the paint is in great condition, so I am just going to spot paint to protect the metal. CNC retrofit is in the future, but I will be doing it from pretty much scratch. I am still torn between going with the Centroid/Ajax setup (turnkey, more money $$$) or a Mach3/LinuxCNC with Vitalsystems - DSPMC /Mesa Electronics (cheaper but more reliant on self-engineering). I have a pretty in-depth I.T. background and mechanics; I am currently brushing up on my electrical knowledge.

For the short term, I am getting the mill to be a solid manual machine while I figure out what I want to do. I do have the old X&Y servos and their resolvers, along with the original drives, but I really don't want to mess around with the old gear.

I looks like there can be fantastic deals to be had, but cobbling together a system from a bunch of different vendors could be more of a headache than it's worth. This machine is strictly for me to learn both machining and machine system knowledge at this point, so I am not worried about using it to make any money (yet).

If I just stumbled into $5,000 I would drop in the turnkey Centroid in an instant. Unfortunately, I don't have that problem as of now. One thing is how to achieve Z axis movement. I am thinking about using the knee. I do have to get a ballscrew for it though. My X&Y are already ballscrews. I have seen some mechanize the spindle, but you are limited in depth.

-Kit

[Alaska Bob]

Hi Kit,
Looks like good progress. Thanks for posting all the progress pictures. I just rewired my control box, trying to make it neat and organized....with some success. I also added a smoothstepper and first impression is very good. It is much smoother.
I saw your comment about making it a manual machine for the short term. Not sure if you are aware that the ball screws don't have much holding power. e.g. My knee is a ball screw and I have a brake on my servo. With no brake it will just back drive down upon power loss/shut down. I'm not sure how well it will work manually for x/y.

Bob

[Alaska Bob]

I just found some discussions on practicalmachinist. Looks like running the ball screws manually can work quite well depending on the pitch and how tight the ways are. I'm interested to know how it works for you. I like the idea of being able to run manually for quick jobs.

Bob

[G59]

It actually works quite well. No backlash to worry about so you can climb mill. Just make sure to disconnect the motors from the drives to prevent back feeding current to them .

[KC130LOADIE]

Hey AlaskaBob & G59,

I could see the knee wanting to "free fall" being on a ball screw. In the aircraft I used to fly in, the landing gear operated on 4 ball screws. One of the emergency procedures if the gear wouldn't go down was to disengage the hydraulic / mechanical linkage and the gear would free fall. (quite quickly I might add)

From what I have been reading, it seems that ball screws not holding position well is more from people that had never tried it. Not that this is apples to apples, but it seems (from my VERY limited experience) that even climb milling with acme screws is completely doable; the depth of cut has to be VERY light though. Maybe I'll learn the hard way and have a part shoot out of my vice.

Thanks for the props on the work so far. It has been 90% enjoyable, except when I got something out of sequence. Sometimes putting something on is a whole lot easier than taking it off.
I think I will be able to actually start making chips manually in about 1-2 weeks. I just dropped off the electrical cabinets today, and they should be ready next week. While I don't "have to" get my extra 200-count dial and handle set-up on the right side of the table that normally has a servo attached to it, I am looking to make a screw extension / handle mount. I am going to reuse the steel resolver screw mount, and make an extension that bolts into it. I would like to have a set-up in the end that could have some sort of quick release for the handles down the road for when the machine is in CNC mode. I can just pop off the handles so they aren't flying around. Right now, only the left side and Y-axis have handles, and they are the type with the spring loaded handle. I'm not a fan.

Question for anyone following this: Does anyone know of a good way to un-bend the end of an acme screw? The knee screw is bent at the end with the handle. I am figuring it got tapped by a forklift. It works fine, but for trying to put a knee motor on it wouldn't work due to the eccentricity it has when rotating.

[G59]

The knee is on a ball screw? I always thought they used acme? You also can lock the knee once in position with the handle on the left side of the knee, so no free fall.

[Alaska Bob]

G59,
My machine is a 2UVR-C that has been converted to CNC by Textronix for use in their model shop. It has several differences to the the Journeyman series. The knee lock is gone, and they didn't have a brake on the old DC servo. They do have a stiff spring that the knee lands on upon power loss to the servos. I have replaced all the old DC servos with Emerson and the one I got off ebay happened to have a brake so it works well on the knee to keep it from falling when I power down.

Kit,
That's cool about the landing gear. I do remember that I did cut some metal manually when I first got the machine. Needed to makes parts for the mill, with the mill, so I could fix the mill. :-) I wasn't worried about any precision, and I conventional milled but I didn't have any issues. It was only later that I learned of backdriving ballscrews. Specifically when I removed the lock screw on the knee servo pulley while the knee was raised! Luckily none of me was under it.

Bob

[KC130LOADIE]

G59,
My machine is a 2UVR-C that has been converted to CNC by Textronix for use in their model shop. It has several differences to the the Journeyman series. The knee lock is gone, and they didn't have a brake on the old DC servo. They do have a stiff spring that the knee lands on upon power loss to the servos. I have replaced all the old DC servos with Emerson and the one I got off ebay happened to have a brake so it works well on the knee to keep it from falling when I power down.

Kit,
That's cool about the landing gear. I do remember that I did cut some metal manually when I first got the machine. Needed to makes parts for the mill, with the mill, so I could fix the mill. :-) I wasn't worried about any precision, and I conventional milled but I didn't have any issues. It was only later that I learned of backdriving ballscrews. Specifically when I removed the lock screw on the knee servo pulley while the knee was raised! Luckily none of me was under it.

Bob

That must have induced a little bit of pucker.
I think I had asked you this before, but what were you able to get the drives and servos for?

[Alaska Bob]

I managed to get my drives/servos for probably about $150 an axis. But that is a lot of ebay waiting and hunting and a few broken drives were purchased in the process (not included in my estimate) It seems though that there aren't as many good deals on the emerson / control techniques items lately. I have had poor luck with the EN series of drives purchased off ebay. I have 3-4 that showed up broken. I have had excellent luck with the eb-205 drives and all the other EB and EI drives.....they all work. All the MG NT servos arrived operational as well. The cable cost is a big adder as they have mil connectors on them. But the Emerson drives will work with many other mfg servos if they have encoders. And many of them use cheaper connectors. Tamagawa TBL-i work well. I would say 400 watt minimum. I have a 400watt driving the knee with a 10:1 reducer and get 55ipm . X/Y are 750Watt servos. I limit the rapids to 200ipm and limit the acelleration to a point where I am not afraid of breaking something. I have an simply supported X axis ballscrew so even at 200ipm I am pushing the limits on the critical speed of the screw.

The only other drive I have messed with is the Mitsubishi MR-J2S . There are some 3axis lots on ebay sometimes. Just make sure they are the ones that take pulse train input.

I do have the old NC400 Contrave drives and DC servos that came out of it. I would consider getting rid of if interested, but I cannot say they work. The drives are more work then I am interested in. They are analog of course.

Well that is a long winded answer to your question Kit! :-)

Bob