Centec 2A Refurb

Refurbing the Beaver VBRP mill has turned into a bit of a long term mission and has been delayed by building a new machine shop to house it!

As a result I saw a nice Centec 2A locally at a decent price so snapped it up in the summer. This is how it was on unloading.

Reasonably solid but not been used for a while and needed a good clean.

It has the fixed spindle vertical head and manual crosslide so pretty basic. It is running a single phase motor which doesn't quite have the oomph to turn the vertical head in the higher gears/speeds so may need to look at a bigger motor or converting to a VFD and small 3 phase for extra torque.

Paul.

Edited By Paul Major on 10/01/2016 10:08:53

So go onto cleaning it up over Christmas. Stripped the head, table, saddle and knee off and gave everything a thorough clean.

Actually was in quite nice condition, you can se ethe flaking on the column which I am guessing is from manufacture

Set about clenaing all the grime off the case, pulley etc.

Was able to get the saddle and knee set up nicely with the gibs with pretty much zero play. The table has more wear in the gib so was a bit more tricky but worked out OK with a bit of tightness at full right position. If I get a chance I might get/make a new gib strip and get the table ways scrapped but not esential.

Leadscrews have about 5thou backlash which doesnt seem to want to adjust out but I can live with that.

And all reassembled, haven't attacked the stand yet so that is still a bit grubby

Filled the box with Lumach 100 from Alex Oils which seems to be a close match for the original Vitrea 100.

Cheers,

Paul.

Is that lever hanging down for a rapid traverse used for setting up ? I seem to remember using a machine with that facility.

Lovely machine the Centec - a friend of mine has one. Originally came with the a wide drip tray now cut down and the rapid traverse again now modded to a hand wheel.

P.S. Look forward to more pickies as the project continues.

Edited By Johnboy25 on 10/01/2016 10:54:29

Yes the lever is for a rapid traverse, but you have to unlock a half nut on the end of the leadscrew, sowhilst it traverses rapidly it takes a few mins to engage!

This has a big drip tray as well, but at the moment it is filthy and just gets in the way so haven't fitted

Cheers,

Paul

It is running a single phase motor which doesn't quite have the oomph to turn the vertical head in the higher gears/speeds

With the drive belt removed the VH should turn stiff by fingers on the drawbar end. If not it could be old hard grease as it sets over the years.

The grease nipples encourage you to load lots of grease in when the angle drive should be in an oil bath not a grease bath. If the dip stick comes out all greasy and stringey, give it a bit of a clear out.

either way it's easy to pull the front off to check