The Home Machinist!

Naw. I'll just display my stupidity here and get it over with. I've noted that gibs are manually adjustable to work the loose area yet get tight on the less worn. One idea is to replace the gib screws with small hydraulic senser deals. Tiny little units which working in reverse, perhaps, Press out a pin against the gib. These are tied together by manifold which is at a set pressure. So theoretically they seek a balance between the worn and unworn.

Sorry I have not checked in lately. By the way Hijackers are welcome here. What fun is a forum without other input. Nice project for 800.00


Decided to put mine back together until I had the money to do all the bed and knee grinding at one time.

In the mean time, I have been making parts on it for a Pacific Locomotive I am working on and have yet to run into anything that the wear on the machine is an issue.



Still pursuing the scraping class with Richard King and hope to hold a three day seminar her after the first of the year. We would hold it here in my shop near Huntsville Alabama and it would run over three days on how to straightend and rescrape the ways.

If anyone is interested drop me a pm

_________________
Charlie Pipes
USMC Retired

Project:

2.5 Baldwin 2-4-4 Conversion
1.6 Southern Railway PS-4

One of my lifelong tenets "Try it before going to extreme repair".
I appreciate and understand that working to spec., Government work and customer demands wouldn't tolerate an attitude like mine.
I am now the only "customer" I need to satisfy and git'r'done is oftimes more expedient than "recondition the machine until it equals or supercedes it's manufacturers brand new specs".
Apologies to all who cling to the perfection they have learned to attain, I admire it.

Came into a little extra playmoney so the new toy arrived today



It also looks like I will also be able to attend the scraping/Machine rebuild class by Mr. Richard King in Janurary if all goes well

_________________
Charlie Pipes
USMC Retired

Project:

2.5 Baldwin 2-4-4 Conversion
1.6 Southern Railway PS-4

This is going to take a while to get right.

Read the book and must say this thing for cheap model has plenty of whistles and bells.

Instructions easy to follow but generic hardware needs help.

_________________
Charlie Pipes
USMC Retired

Project:

2.5 Baldwin 2-4-4 Conversion
1.6 Southern Railway PS-4

Pipes,
You are making much better progress than I am, mine is about where I posted last. I am looking forward to your posts about how this works out, as I hope to work on mine some more after things cool down a bit (I am a fan salesman, and winter is the slow season for me). Keep us posted on how this works out!
-Hack

Well I have already run into the issue that many others have commented on. The univiersal mounts, Aren't. I will have to run by my local metal shop and pickup some aluminum plate and angle.

I also mounted the first rail a little high to be able to use the guard that came with it. Will need to relocate it.

The functions of being able to do holes on a circle, on a slant and being able to round corners is intesting and I look forward to trying them out.

_________________
Charlie Pipes
USMC Retired

Project:

2.5 Baldwin 2-4-4 Conversion
1.6 Southern Railway PS-4

In the small amount of time I had this weekend I managed to mount and adjust the X and Y axis scales. While the universal mounts are not all perfect they do, with modifications, fill most of the bill. One thing not included are the 12 M4 metric screws needed to mount the traveler to the brackets. Other wise plenty of screws washers and the like.

This is the X axis prior to me removing the blue alignment pieces that helps to align everthing. Also before the large shield that covers the entire setup.



The blue plastic piece is an alignment aid. Everything is adjusted to have the blue plastic firmly against the scale thru the entire travel. After all is aligned it is disposed of. Although I will keep mine just in case I have to move it later.



Overall I am impressed with the quality of the kit so far. I have also ran test on both the x and y axis by doing a one inch travel check between the knob markings and readout. I was surprised when they came up dead on.

I mounted the Y axis in such a way I will not be able to use the extra gaurd with.



This is also the case with the Z axis. Not a bad thing, it just would have been better with it installed.

The nice thing provided for the Y and Z axis is a mounting plate with gib screws to help with working around the odd shapes of the casting you mount them to. There is a lot of taper and twist on the Z axis you have to deal with.

Once it is leveled and trued up you mount the scale to the base plate

_________________
Charlie Pipes
USMC Retired

Project:

2.5 Baldwin 2-4-4 Conversion
1.6 Southern Railway PS-4

Ninety percent done.

Mounted and adjusted the Z axis and pinned up the wiring. Still need to take the blue spacer pieces out.

Has anyone ever left these spacers in place while using the mill? What does it hurt if I do.

My home made mount for the Z traveler using scrap aluminum and parts from the universal kit.



some of the wiring pinned up and out of the way



Shop is a wreck between this and the fact that I am doing a Hunnydo requirement to wire in a back up generator and all the wiring has to pass thru the basement to the end of the house with the breaker pannel

_________________
Charlie Pipes
USMC Retired

Project:

2.5 Baldwin 2-4-4 Conversion
1.6 Southern Railway PS-4

Shop still a wreck as we are traveling work and new twin grandbabies.

I did manage to squeeze in a 40 hour Scraping and Machinery Rebuilding class held by Richard King.



Hard to believe how much information the group pushed into my head. We started on Cast Iron Billets and moved up to the real thing.

I was not brave enough to take part of the mill with me but did take a damaged compound slide off of a 14 inch Southbend for my project on the third day. It had been crashed at some point in its life and was warped by .005.



There is to be an advanced class in March or April of next year and I have been invited to bring the Bridgeport to make it into a class project.

_________________
Charlie Pipes
USMC Retired

Project:

2.5 Baldwin 2-4-4 Conversion
1.6 Southern Railway PS-4

Pipes, the scraping in those pics sure looks pretty and I'm sure under the watchful tutelage of Mr. King they are in fact as precise as beautiful.
I'm jealous of your recent enlightenment.

It looks like there will be an advanced class this next March at Tommy's shop again. It will be proceded by a weekend beginners class with the advanced class going for five days. I hve been invited to bring my mill parts as a class project.

Hoping to be able to attend.

The plan right now is to continue putting the tools together to pursue this while looking for another mill for an overhaul project from the ground up.

_________________
Charlie Pipes
USMC Retired

Project:

2.5 Baldwin 2-4-4 Conversion
1.6 Southern Railway PS-4