Member postings for Nigel McBurney 1

interesting mill,could it have been a prototype that never went into production? looks like its made from castings,a nod and tilt vert head so somebody went to a lot of trouble, to make it and generally the proportions look ok,the moveable top ram with the large stud ,nut and washer looks crude but then its obvious,same type of adjustment as a shaper ram,with Clarkson collet holder in the spindle I would think that there is a good chance that the taper is two MT

Hi I have an 00mnimill and the original hand book. For the adjustment of x and y slides the instructions are poor and ust nearly lines long,the x and y slides are adjusted by using tapered gib strips and these are adjusted by push and pul screws at each end of the gibbstrip. As there is no indication which end of the taper is thickest and its not visible,so experiment,slacken one screw a turn or two,and then screw in the screw at the other end if the slide goes tight then the second screw is at the thick end of the gibb ,unscew the second screw a little tighten up the screw at other end and and test the fit,and carry on adusting the tapered gib until the correct clearance is achieved,and there are no tight spots. Te instructions in the handbook are very brief as in the days when this mill was made ie 1960s I expect the majority were in commercial use and most users were apprentice trained, and knew what to to maintain the usual machine tools so istructions were very brief,Very often the instructions were brief, there is a diagram and six lines of instructions on horizontal spindle adjument minimum .0004 ins axial float , no max given and yet it says great care must be taken when adjusting these bearings,Regarding the vertical spindle,there are no instructionsat all for adjusting the bearings and there is only an exploded dwg on pages detailing the parts list.I do not see how the front of the bed is 5 thou higher at the front,which I assume mean the handle end, I can understand the front being lower if the vertical z axis slides were slack and the weight of the knee caused the whole lot to drop. Now the z axis vertical slides do not have tapered gib strips,they are plain and parallel,and adjusted by slackening slightly the three bolts with heads facing front,and pushing the gib sideways towards the v slide,this gib is adjusted by 2 socketgrub screws and lock nuts, Not easy to adjust,I cannot undestand why Elliotts did not use taper gibs on the z axis which are a lot easier to adjust, Elliotts could at times incorporate some cheap nd nasty features, On the sales leaflet I have which came with machine it cost £705 where as a ML7 lathe equipped ready to go was £82 or £120 equipped,so an 00 was relatively epensive.

If your drills are pre war then you may find that some could be carbon steel rather than HSS easy check is when grinding them HSS gives off reddish colour sparks ,carbon drills give off white bright sparks. Carbon steel drills are not much use nowadays cutting speed is far too low and the temper easily lost,if I find any in a job lot they go in the bin.I have a full set of fraction drills from 3/64 to 1 inch theres nothing odd or unusual about them, the larger sizes are very useful for roughing out holes when turning,and as every one now has gone to metric a lot of my drills paricularly the larger ones have been gifts,or bargains found at auto jumbles/tool dealers and many were new and if I get multiples i can have one of them permantly backed off for brass and cast iron, 3 very common "odd"sizes found are 47/64 , 53/64 and 61/64 which were commonly used for tapping drills for British standard pipe threads.Some other good buys have been long series drills ,they are very useful .

Use strops,not chains,it you lift on the cast cross braces chains would be ok but as the motor adds weight to the rear of the lathe so there is a good chance that the lathe will tilt ,and a chain around the cross braces could rub or damage the machined edges of the bed,for machines of up to say 3 tons proffessional movers use strops, Larger modern machines tend to have lifting rings built in at the top of the machine,and then the crane will lift a ring and up to 4 chains with hooks, most modern machines that I have had some involvement with have large relatively flimsey covers and cannot be lifted with a strop around them. I doubt if your Boxford weighs 400 kilos i would have thought a lot less.Lifting on the bed castngs will not harm the lathe,as others have stated some lathes just have a tapped hole in the bed,My Colchester Triumph at around two tons could be lifted on one Tapped hole of around 1 inch UNC, just make sure the eye is stamped up with max weight,there are a lot of eyes around not marked and a bit suspect,

My old boss always said that when using very small drills and taps,spit was the finest lubricant ,that was back many years ago ,in the days before Rocol ,though when I make propane gas jets for the burners in hot tube gas engines using drills around no 75/77 i still use spit on the drill.I have not tried paraffinor kerosene on aluminium,though I suspect that kerosene (Heating oil) would be better as it is not so refined,the old paraffin that was sold by ironmongers was possiblly somewhere in between,the later refined paraffin ,pink or blue depending on the manufacturer and still sold today at very high prices. Find a friend who has oil heating and scrounge some kerosene off him. Aliminium extrusions can be very sticky so avoid deep threaded holes,I would avoid going past twice diameter on a small tapped hole,and also try drilling a larger size tapping drill and use a drop of Rocol cutting fluid.

Over the last 30 years I had at one time 4 lathes,Smart and Brown plain lathe lathe,new Myford S7,and Colchester Master and Triumph,The S7 is single phase, I have no problems with single phase,never experienced any of the complaints about vibration or low torque,perhaps new s/p motors are foreign rubbish, the two Colchesters ran on phase converters,the B&S ran on rotary converter, I am now down to the Master 2500 long bed and S7, I consider the Master is better than the student1800 , the Master has forward/reverse clutches,pumped lubrication to the headstock,dual dials,5 hp motor. My work is models ,stationary engine restoration , some automobile and motor cycle work ,plus full size steam. what ever you buy ,for home workshop and car work get a lathe with a good size spindle bore Master and Student have 1 5/8 bore and both have a good swing of near 19 inches,essential for brakes discs and clutches, though I do miss the 2 inch bore of the now departed Colchester triumph, go for a long bed,the short bed Colchesters were ok for training but not much elbow room.I did have shortbed Student for a while which also had variable speed, a horrible lathe which quickly departed. Your post went overboard on a Harrison,some people like them,but I would not have one as the saddle handle is too close to the hot swarf end of the saddle.Why did the Triumph have to go,well old age and the weight of the chucks and other loose bits was causing some health problems. Though if you wanted to do serious car and motor work and your younger and fitter,the Larger long bed Triumph is the tool for the job.Avoid the older round bedColchesters they are now around 55 years old and many are well worn .by the way my liking for forward and reverse cluthes is that motor runs continuosly and imperial /metric screwcutting is easier.

where I worked and was trained we had some plain lathes,including a small pultra,if anyone was caught by the boss turning something like a tough bolt,silver steel or indeed any steel type they would have got a right telling off for putting such a strain on an instrument making lathe,as I did when I started to make a silver steel pin as the Boxford was not avaailable,I got a right old bol....g I never did that again, misusing such a fine lathe should not be contemplated,although finishing clock spindle ends is acceptable using a graver as very little metal is removed,its more of a polish.

Bought my M&W adjustable square (new) over 50 years ago,very useful,the narrow rule makes a good depth gauge,the blade with ends at 30 and 45 degrees is useful for getting into narrow spaces and for marking out the two most common angles,a very good high quality though expensive tool.

ARC euro list ER collet wrenches which engage with 4 slots in the collet nut,the one that I use is painted green and shown on ARCS web catalogue,these grip better and less liable to slip plus the handle,they are strong and take fair amount of abuse,lot better than C spanners,

ref John Haines post on travelling microscopes, the third link down. I had an apprenticeship with the PTI who made this travelling microscope shown,A range of travelling microscopes or as we knew them as Vernier microscopes was made,they varied in size ,some measured in horizontal and vertical planes with two scales ,I have one of the medium size ones,found it at an antiques fair.It was an excellent apprenticehip. Production was in batches of a hundred ,98 had metric scales and 2 would have imperial scales,as most schools and science facilities in the 1950s taught physics /chemistry in metric, they found that there was a demand for around 2% in imperial and these would be sold within the next year.

I agree 10 degree top rake,plenty of front clearance to avoid the tool rubbing on the bore,as its cast bronze there can be hard surface inclusions which will take the edge off a nice sharp hss toolbit,so take a roughing cut through the bore with either a hss tool or a brazed on carbide tip, and also rough face each end of the bore to remove the cast surface, cutting speed 100 foot per min, cutting between centres is not as rigid as boring with work held in the chuck,so the larger the tool tip radius will increase the risk of tool chatter,a sharp tip rad will incurr less chatter,too but can result in a rougher finish,though the finish is more dependant on how good the tool tip is honed with a medium India oilstone.to get a good finish on gunmetal te tool must be sharp.

Before the horrendous price rises in postage stamps,if you failed to get a card from a distant relative or old friends who you never see and just make the annual contact with,you assumed they were departed from this world if no card arrived,now you are not certain what their status is,have they departed or are they fed up with xmas and the affordability when on a pension.

If a manufacturer fits a 1450 rpm motor giving a top spindle speed of around 1200 rpm then stick with this speed,running a 55 year old roundhead model would at very high speed be rather foolish.Students of this era had splash lubricated headstock gearboxes and the oil was not filtered when on its way to the very expensive Gammet spindle bearings. Also an old worn gearbox spun at twice its recomended speed has oil which is likely to be contaminated with specs of steel which will ruin the bearings. Much later Colchester students were not much faster,the Master did have for a long time a top speed of 2500 rpm and last ones 3100 though these and the 2500 had 5 hp motors.The Masters even though they had gear boxes similar the students had one advantage, a pump and a large oil reservoir which supplied oil to the top of the gearbox and gave a more positive lubrication. If you try to virtually double a motors speed electronically or double spindle speed mechanically then a lot more powerful motor will be required ie at least 5 hp. Also if the bearings fail with this proposed speed increase the new bearings will probably cost more than the value of the lathe.So be content with what you have got,Another post said that they used a Myford S7 for small high speed work which is what i do. There one big advantage with two lathes,one lathe can very often be used to make spares,modify or repair the other lathe.Faceplates also have a maximum speed which are sometimes marked with the speed.A gap bed student or master will take an 18 inch faceplate which could burst right in front of you.If you had a good apprenticeship and had owned your own lathes for over 60 years you will find that speed is not everything,if very fast speeds are required for producing many thousands of parts then buy the appropriate lathe,

I would NOT run any diesel on straight central heating kerosene,I have read somewhere that Gardners were reputed to state that kero mixed with a proportion of clean new lubricating oil can be used in diesels. I cannot remember the ratio quoted but at the time I thought that it was a lot of lube oil per gallon of kero, red ag diesel was the cheap answer but the tax rules have changed regarding use, eg construction plant ,groundcare tractors etc now have to use white diesel which is heavily taxed,Though a stationary engine collector and restorer,I do not use any of my engines for emency power, I have used a 1800 watt Honda petrol generator which I bought over 30 years ago,and this has seen me through many power cuts as in my part of rural Hampshire the overgrown trees and hedges are always bringing the wires down. A petrol engine is economical to run in the smaller sizes,and starts easily provided the carb is cleaned due to the bio fuel clogging any petrol carb,the only snag with my generator nowadays is that the electric from the unic is not sufficiently regulated for modern electronics,so I do not risk using my computer, if this digital method of operating the BT telephone system comes in though the halt on installations is currently halted I would have to get a better regulated generator,so would go for a larger generator diesel with electric start. and better regulation. If your generator is similar to the petter engines down the road on the cress bed I hope yours is a better starter in the winter,a couple of Petters in the dumpers were pigs to start,

Best place for it,only rode in one post war sit up and beg Ford for a few miles ,awful ride, I was once asked to help a friend to get the rear brake drum off a similar Ford ,I could not get it off apparently a special puller was required as the drum and hub were in one piece and I was later told that it was a taper fit on the half shaft. Thats also just like the rear hub on a Triumph Herald ,taper and key fit,another friends car ,a really big screw puller would not move it, so it went to a local garage where they used a hydraulic puller and then had to nearly burn righ through the hub with oxy torch and it then flew off with some force.They did it and saved the half shaft.

I just wonder about the cause of the problem,the gear /sleeve might have been sintered steel,as a key integral with the gear may have been necessary as a keyway cut through the gear and sleeve and a separate key would have reduced the wall thickness and caused the gear to split, The short keyway milled in with key held in by socket screws seems a good solution, to retain the strength of the gear/bush. Around the time ie 1960s Villiers engines used sintered gears in their gear boxes particularly the final drive sleeve gear which would shed its teeth all too often.I doubt if a broach could have been used to to produce the bore and keyway as the bush wall is too thin. A broach would have cost less than a sinter tool but the whole bush and gear could have all produced in one hit by sintering,

Sitting here with not much to do I have read the posts a few times,the critical part of Marks last post is the statement that with no adjustment to the boring tool and after making several passes the the x axis of the bush stays relatively constant yet the y axis gets bigger, this surely indicates ,assuming the table locks are on ,that the bush is moving or springing towards the tool.perhaps opposite sides of the bush are springing in or just one side. this could be checked by marking out blue or a felt tipped pen marks around the id of the bush,then see if the blue is removed by the boring tool in one place or two. Not knowing what type of engine the rod comes from it ot easy to find the problem though a split bush of the is size with a wall thickness of one mm indicates possibly a post ww2 design. In my restoration work I have found many instances where motor components do get distorted and these thin walled bushes do not make contact all around the bore, itsno good saying bore out the con rod eye to get a true bore and then fit a bigger bush as nno doubt the engine requires one of these thin wall bushes to maintain reliability and as I would think that bushes of this type would come in one stanard size, to check that this the problem ,press out the bush rotate it 90 degrees ,press it back in,set it up as you had and see if the oversize boring still occurrs on the y axis, One way to get another check would be to machine up a free cutting steel bush with a lot thicker wall say 5 mm or 6mm press that into the con rod and then try boring that out with exactly the same set up on the mill and the same cutting tool, if that machines ok then it is the con rod at fault. The position of the split in the bush relative to the two machine axis rmallow the bush to springegarding the mill you try the following, are the vertical column securing bolts tight,check that the the column is truly vertical to the table by using a good engineers square which are usually more accurate than an angle plate, attach the dial idicator via a magnetic base to the vertical head casting,NOT the spindle or quill. if the column is true then tram the spindle. Can you let readers know what engine this con rod fits and age ,it might help. Not quite relative to this probem but it may be of interest, when I was still at work,35 years ago, alloy castings with accurate bores coming off a robotic machining cell had a quality problem down in a bore there was a groove similar to a circlip groove, it was machined by a cutter similar to a T slot cutter,the cutter in a toolholder went down into the bore started spinning up to cutting speed and then moved over to get the depth of cut and then by driving the x and y axes to describe a circle of the table the groove was cut in one pass. Known at the time as circular iterpolatation,if the groove dia started to reach drawing limits an increase on the cnc controlled diameter could be dialled up quickly without adjusting the tooling by hand, well all went well for a long time until it was found that the grooves were oval, a bit of investigation revealed that a thrust bearing had failed on one table ball screw resulting in loss of table travel. That was one problem at the time with an enclosed machining cell with multiple machines,robotic work loading and cnc inspection which only at that time only measured some features, plus if that bearing was making a noise it cannot be heard by operators outside the very large cell.

Using propane torch and firebricks and water quench I found en 8 does not fully harden and it shrinks, I thought that leaded mild steels should not be welded or case hardened.

Just thinking today boxing day 2022 is exactly to the day 60 years ago when the last really big uk freeze started with snow falling around 3pm in Hampshire. The long winter of 1962/3 lasted until March. I rode my trusty Greeves 250 all that winter,best bike then for bad conditions,coldest day was 4 F and that was really cold when wearing a Barbour suit weather proof but not warm ,of course that must seem mild to north Amercan inhabitants. I was only 6 years old during the 1947 big freeze so dont remember much as i was ill at the time and did not go out, When I read that Montana is down to minus 50 I do wonder how farm animals survive and does antifreeze work,I suppose people are used to low temperatures but minus 50 must be really exceptional.

Buy the largest r/table that you can afford/lift/ and will fit your mill, small ,r/tables are ok when fitted with chucks but when it comes to clamping work direct to the table a lot of space is required for clamps,though extra space can be achieved by fitting a subplate to the table,secured by countersunk screws fitting into the t nuts,and then drilling and tapping the subplate with a suitable pattern of tapped holes. when I could no longer lift a very heavy French Dufor 12 inch table I swapped it for an industrial Taylor Hobson 10 inch table , I now use it on my Elliott 00 omnimill and though its a little large for the mill it will take most jobs and clamps,my small far eastern 6 inch r/table has not been used for many years ,generally too small ,