Strange failure NOT !

[John Evans]

My tool dealer friend got in a couple of Bridgeport Eztrac mills last week and he and his employee were powering them up to check for issues. One powered up just fine,the other spindle was dead as a hammer but everything else was working OK. Finally Ron opened up the power cabinet and I spotted some paper work. Great! a wiring diagram. Now I'm a total loss on electrics. Manually engaging contactors got the spindle to run. I was looking at the wiring diagram to see what the control voltage was when I saw a "lube " label with a switch icon. Mill has a power way lube system, had a inch or so of lube in the tank. But added some anyway. Eureka !!! fixed that sucker!! Regular CNC machines will throw a alarm for low/no lube, but this basic mill didn't say a thing. Pure chance I saw that on the wiring diagram.

[spro]

Another sensor you knew could be there. Cool!

[SteveHGraham]

I hope you received a beer or something for that save.

[spro]

A beer? Are you serious? Let it remain unstated about how good works are repaid or not.

[GlennW]

I have a Tree CNC mill that I seldom use, but often manually pull the plunger on the lube pump if I walk past it just to keep the metering units from plugging up.

I decided to use the machine a few weeks ago, got all set up, and the spindle did nothing when I hit the foreword or reverse button. No fault message on the screen.

I figured while I was looking into the spindle issue I might as well hut the oiling plunger again to get the machine lubed up and remembered seeing a float valve in the reservoir. Took a look and sure enough, the reservoir was almost empty.

Dumped in some way oil and sure enough, the spindle came back to life.