Member postings for old mart

Loctite 601 or 638 are quite fast curing, but if you need more time to assemble things, then 620 is your best bet.

I fitted a 100psi gauge to my Royal Enfield Constellation. To make a flexible pipe to get round the steering head, I pulled the cable out of a length of HT lead, it being large diameter with a small hole and it worked quite well. The pressure when cold went up to at least 90psi, but only reached 15psi when hot. There was nothing wrong, but that 15psi seemed awfully low at the time. The pressure and scavenge pumps on these bikes are oscillating type like the Mamod toy steam engines.

I have looked on the Warco site at the current mill, and as there is so much plastic bodywork around the head that it would be difficult to add a digital scale. The scales that I have bought are intended to be vertical, so the numbers are the right way round. Arceurotade have some of these.

I have measured the X axis travel after adding the extra thread to the leadscrew and fitting two nuts for backlash reduction. It is 18 5/8" for the longer bed. The travel is not symmetrical, it moves two inches more to the right than to the left. I don't think there is any easy way of increasing the travel and am pleased that it is about the same as before the modifications. The next mod to the X axis will be a round 5" wheel at each end.

The possible difficulty with getting the programming right, they all seem to be different, and not intuitive either caused me to do some research into many different types before getting one.

I bought one from this firm: **LINK**

They are not the cheapest, and VAT is added to their prices, but their own guides in pdf form make the wiring and programming so much easier.

I am using W10 and edge, and even when googling it and selecting different results, it still doesn't work. It lets me log in but that's all.

I bought a number of used 6mm solid carbide cutters from a firm advertising on ebay. It was a risk, but they were under £1 each. When they arrived, I checked them using a magnifying glass and immediately ordered some more. They were plenty sharp enough for my purposes, they must have been used on cnc mills and discarded after a fixed ammount of use. They are my do anything and not worry about the cost cutters.

I use this forum and also the USA based Home shop machinist forum. It seems to be locked on one page at present, can anybody verify this?

I presume that your gauge has to look the part, ie vintage. If it is solely for safety reasons, a 100 psi digital one would be accurate at 15 psi and not need any special connections. For an actual 30 psi gauge, you would need an adjustable relief valve (spring loaded ball), with a sintered inlet to stop muck,and a return pipe back to the sump. A restrictor between the sintered filter and the relief valve would ensure that very little oil was used therefore not starving the bearings.

It is interesting to know that a half size engine will end up being 1/8 of the capacity, so a 750cc engine will be 94cc.

I would take it apart, it is pretty easy.

Take the motor off.

Take the head off (two shcs)

Remove the heavy head mount.

The bed

The cross slide Y axis

The knee

The door

The column (four bolts inside, this is the heaviest part)

The tray

The base (not as heavy as it looks)

If you have lifting gear for the whole thing, it would still be best to at least remove the motor and head, and use the bar that holds the head on to run the slings around. The bar is steel, and the clamps should be easily able to take the weight, just leave the bar clamped up as per normal.

Check out the thread by Miles Hellon, "Restoration and modifications to a Tom Senior Light Vertical Mill"

Edited By old mart on 17/10/2019 22:30:31

Edited By old mart on 17/10/2019 22:47:22

The second picture in todays series shows another way of tramming the mill. There is a ground surface about 6" long on the left side of the head, and I put a lever dti on the bed and used the knee to run up and down it. The VFD set between 25 and 75 Hz results in a speed range using the pulleys of 174rpm to 2900 rpm. The view of the underside of the quill shows the oil seal which caused me so much hassle.

I have one of the 100mm Bison vises up on the bed with a new key for the 1/2" slots, I haven't checked the alignment yet, it may need a skim of the rear of the key.

The new rubber sheet to protect the rear of the X and Y axes is nearly complete and the polycarbonate guards are at an early stage.

I bought a set of the tee slot clamping nuts, studs, etc and wasn't happy with the looseness of the 3/8" tees in the slots. The nuts have been tapped out for 10mm helicoils, a metre of 10mm studding will be cut up and new tee nuts are being made for a better fit, in addition to the half dozen 10 mm ones we already had.

I have been having trouble with the internet, and, just when I want to put more photos on this forum, the site is acting up. Never mind, Ill have another go.

A few more pictures, the machine is close to cutting metal.

I still had overheating problems with the spindle bearings today. Two possibilities are common when overheating is present, too much preload or overpacked bearings. I removed the spindle from the quill to confirm that I hadn't overpacked, and I adjusted the bearings for zero slack, but no preload. This was done with the quill lightly clamped down onto vee blocks, and a dti to check axial float. Back together at 3000 rpm, the overheating was exactly the same. A clue as to the culprit was the fact that the top bearing was not getting hot. The oil seal which was fitted to prevent contamination of the lower bearing was to blame. It is a double lipped seal with the inner size the same as the od of the spindle nose. I had removed the garter spring and greased it before fitting it. I cut off the inner seal lip leaving only the outer lip. This didn't matter as the seal was not there to hold the grease in, but to keep the bearings clean. No more overheating.

Your link got me through to a synthesizer site, was it supposed to?

The Schneider VFD which I bought for the mill has a default ramp up and down time of 3 seconds, this can be changed, but I don't know if changing it to 1 second stop would act like a brake. Another option is coast to a stop. Fitting a reversing switch option allows you to throw the motor into reverse.

Three phase motors come with different numbers of poles, from 2 upwards. These are the common types in small motors.

2 pole 3000rpm                                                                                                                                                                  4 pole 1500rpm                                                                                                                                                                  6 pole 1000rpm                                                                                                                                                                  8 pole 750rpm

I bought a 6 pole which is listed at 935rpm, and have set the VFD to run from 25Hz to 75Hz (467-1402 rpm), which in conjunction with the belt pulleys, gives a useful spread. Lower frequencies lower the power of the motor, 25Hz loses 50%.

Edited By old mart on 15/10/2019 13:46:17

Not a waste of time at all, helping others and knowing others can help you is a very important function of any forum.

Unless you want to use a full range of twist drills, you don't need a full set of collets as milling cutters come in much more limited shank sizes.

Maybe their logic in putting the hole there was to show oil even if it was empty, the required level being from 1/2 to 3/4 up the glass. Some of these sight glasses are pretty vague as to whether they are full right up or empty.

Forget my thoughts on a groove.

Edited By old mart on 14/10/2019 21:53:37