Horizontal Mill Project

Hi all

As stated on another thread, I picked up a Burke horizontal mill recently, refurbing it is now my exciting new project now the Zyto and the Dore Westbury are working acceptably.

I eventually managed to get it into the shed and assembled. Next step is to strip, clean, replace, refurb all the bits etc.

I am already stuck.

There is a little power feed gearbox on the end of the table. it’s basically a worm and a gear attached to the x axis feed screw. I’ve got it mostly to bits, it was pretty much full of ancient grease and what looked like brass or bronze chips. So I’d better fully disassemble it.

To get the worm gear out , it looks like there is a pin through it’s spindle holding it . One end is rounded, the other looks like the end to try to knock through, I have tried hammering it carefully using a brass rod so as not to flatten it. But no movement. I’m reluctant to hit it too hard for fear of damaging something.

Any thoughts? Heat it? Freeze it? Drill it out?

Thanks

Steve

I'd try flushing it out first Steve - degreaser and old paint brush to get things moving.

Regards,

IanT

The pin may be tapered, in which case I suggest it's knocked out from the rounded end. If so, worth making a punch with a basin end to avoid spreading the pin end.

My experience of removing pins is limited, so wait to see what others say. However, when I fixed the shear pin on my lathe I had to remove the whole assembly and hold it in a vice. Then the pin came out easily! With hindsight, I think the problem was inadequate support in the lathe: I should have made something to hold the joint secure whilst tapping the pin out.

Are you an experienced dismantler with a good memory? I'm not! Taking anything remotely complicated apart I take copious notes and photographs, and carefully keep related parts together in boxes and trays. The number of times I've ended up with half a dozen screws, washers, collars and larger components left over...

Dave

Options: 1)soak the subunit and flush as per IanT and re-examine whether it's really necessary to disassemble. 2)Try tapping from the other side - however much it looks wrong - in case there's a subtle taper. 3) Heat as brass will expand more than steel, 4) drill out the centre of the pin carefully with an endmill if you can set it up for that.

pgk

DPound to a pinch it’s tapered use a dremel  to clean ends to determine which end is the smaller of the two and bingo

Edited By bernard towers on 12/12/2021 12:32:41

Be very sure that there's enough clearance behind to knock the pin completely out. If you knock it half way out and it hits the housing behind, you will neither be able to get it out nor turn the shaft to knock it back in again.

Well, I think I might pgk’s advice above and not fix it if it isn’t broke. I was really struggling to get the grease and swarf out from behind it, but I’ve achieved that now, and it seems to be in good condition, turning smoothly, looking straight.

To paint or not to paint…. that is the question lol. Opinions sought….

I’ve got the gearbox and X and Y axes to bits and cleaned up now, knee tomorrow evening. The bits I’ve polished have come up ver nicely.

I have a decision to make - do I paint it? I’m generally in favour of leaving machines in as original state as possible, but the paint it very chipped in places. It’s also very thick! To strip it all off may be a big job.

But it would look great fully refurbished. decisions ….

Also, at some point in its history somebody has ground off the name “Burke” from it. I’d really like to restore that if I can. Any thoughts as to how to do it would be welcome.

I have a decision to make - do I paint it?

Entirely your choice.

Paint?
Is it an ornament or a workhorse? Is it going to be susceptible to rust?
A nice tasteful puce or lavender with an attachment for the pot-pourri perhaps?
How about some fridge magnet letters stuck with JB weld and blurred with it - out of the box thinking. One of you will look like a burke

pgk

Taper pins are tapered and designed to stay in place,they rarely came loose in service,and when punching them out.and a short stubby punch is best,long thin parallell punches are too springy,The component with the pin in it realy needs to be placed on a heavy lump of steel to act as an anvil,so that all the energy given to the punch via a hammer is directed on to the pin,hitting the pin in the worm on a relatively small shaft in the housing will have little effect its just to springy and too much hitting will bend the shaft or damage the housing. The fit is too good for penetrating oil to have any effect. In your case I would clean out the housing check the worm for damage and if its ok leave well alone, Taper pins went out of general use due to manufacturing cost ,the roll pin has been a modern lower cost replacement though not as reliable,in cases of high torque loadings they tend to crush and come loose,

Stop taking the p1ss 😉

I like refurbing tools. I’ve fixed up loads of hand tools, planes and vices from car boot sales etc and got them back to the fabulous quality they originally were - a level of quality you can’t buy today unless you pay serious dosh. And I’ve done an incorrectly built Dore Westbury mill and a fairly shagged Zyto lathe. It keeps me off the streets and out of the wife’s hair.

It will add quite a bit of time to the re-build Steve but generally I think it's worth doing if you are stripping the machine right down - and you intend to keep it.

I started out to fix a few things on my Atlas MF but had to virtually completely strip it to get inside the headstock, so decided to re-paint her whilst in pieces. So everything was disembled, stripped, cleaned, masked up and brush painted (inside and out). I've used a good quality machine enamel btw. Found some worn/broken/missing parts in the process, so I'm making replacements and I've also decided that I might as well change all the bearings including the main Timkens!

It still won't be like 'new' but hopefully she will be much improved and more to the point, I won't be using the machine wishing that I should have done 'this or that' when I had the chance....

But it all takes time.

Regards,

IanT

Excellent, Ian. On my Zyto I left the paint as is (for now) but on the Dore Westbury I completely disassembled, cleaned, and sprayed over the old paint. It wasn’t in too bad condition, mainly ugly and chipped in places. But on this Burke mill I think it needs to go back to bare metal.

What stripper did you use?

thanks

Steve

Within my flippancy was a point - that reason for painting is important. It's up to folk to decide whether they are refurbing for satisfaction, practicality or bragging rights and entirely up to them whether they feel the need to go with original colours or stir up a few cans of leftovers and accept whatever that comes out like. When I dosh over the farm trailer there is still some pride to try and avoid runs or drips but at the end of the day it's gonna sit out in the rain and get loaded up with everything from compost to dung so I'm not going to spend as much time as I would on a piece of furniture.

Oh, and the lettering idea might even work.

pgk

Paint Panther mostly Steve. I also used Screwfix 'No Nonsense' paint stripper (easier/quicker to get locally when I ran out).

Both worked but the Paint Panther seemed quicker on a purely subjective basis and possibly needed less coats to get right down to bare metal. The No Nonsense certainly worked but seemed slower - on the plus side it is about half the price though.

I was very much a Nirtomors advocate at one time but it doesn't seem to be the same fomulation these days.

A messy job but old machines tend to use good quality castngs - always nice to see.

It's worth taking time to mask up carefully - just for the smaller detail here

Brush painted but hard wearing. Painting over small masked parts makes life easier. Colour may be contentious but it only has to please me!

But it does all take time....

Regards,

IanT

Edited By IanT on 14/12/2021 11:41:05

No !

..for the same reason I wouldn't repaint a 100-year-old motorcycle, if it still had the original paint on it..

Apologies, Ian, I see my post has popped up in an unfortunate place in the thread!

Edited By DiogenesII on 14/12/2021 11:43:13

There look to be quite a lot of resin letters available on eBay for making earrings and other girly trinkets. Stuck on with loctite and carefully sanded, then painted over with enamel machine paint, that might do the trick.

I have absolutely no problem painting over any age of machine (I have a 1915 lathe stripped bare) because 1. It's unlikely to be the original paint any way 2. If it is it's highly unlikley to be the same colour as when it was painted and 3. they were probably not so particular about the exact shade when it was first built.

If you want to make it 'original' by stripping it bare and re-painting it's a lot of work. There's likely to be a LOT of filler on those castings and many hours of filling and sanding ahead. If it were mine and given the way it's been previously treated, I'd be tempted to de-grease it and then run a DA over the paintwork, fill in the divots, sand back, filler primer and re-paint in whatever colour suits you.

I'm currently rebuilding a TOS milling machine which is about 5-8x the amount fo work you have there. Currently 5 full days in and I havent even got the main body of the machine home yet, just the anciliaries and I'm still doing filler.

No problem and certainly no offense was taken    

In fact I don't think the paintwork was "as it left the factory" because I found a job lot number under the top coat when stripping back. I suspect this machine may have come over during the war and was probably over-coated by Acorntools at some point. My Acorntools 7" Shaper has some of the same blue coloured paint on it too.

But the finish was pretty badlly chipped (back to bare metal) in places and whilst I'm not after a showroom finish, I think a clean & tidy one looks much better and is easier to maintain.

Anyway - everyone will have their own take on this topic but whilst I don't tend to make permanent mechanical mods to my machines - improving the cosmetics is OK in my book! I think my 'girls' (all my machines have names) prefer it too!

Regards,

IanT

Edited By IanT on 14/12/2021 16:39:13