[Bob La Londe]

Somebody told me the only time they have seen a quill stick is when its been run without oil.

~~

My oiler fires every fifteen minutes via a little electromechanical timer. There has always been some oil on the quill when I have bothered to check, but rarely a puddle on the table. Just a few drips. Regardless of whether or not I try to save the quill at this point I'll take it out of the machine so I'll get a good look. If I don't use it I'll want it out of the way, and the hole in the nose plugged up. I have not disconnected the quill from the drive carriage yet. I have some slim hope that the carriage is the problem, but I highly doubt it. Not much there, but 4 roller bearings, and I already loosened them up.

~~

Well, I spent a little time this morning getting the quill out. I removed the clamp bolt from the carriage and the snap ring from the quill. Then I slid a long bar through the carriage across the cross pieces in the head. A heavy tool holder went in the spindle, and I raised the table until I could clamp it in a vise. Then I lowered the table, and it drew the quill right out. This is what I found.

~~

At some point it must have been run hard without oil. There is nasty scoring on the quill. Almost to the point of gouging. Its a chrome plated and ground quill as near as I can tell, and not stingy on the chrome either. Its toast.

The Z has always had lower speed and acceleration before faulting than the other two axis (which doesn't make sense since its lighter), so its had problems since I got it. Its just gotten worse since I really started working it hard lately. I just assumed because it was getting oil when I fired it up that it was fine. Oops.

I would like to have it as a heavy mill for when I need to make big heavy and steel parts, but the simple fact is it will cost more to fix than I want to spend on it. I will be converting it over to a high speed only machine over the next couple days. I have a 2.2Kw spindle on hand that was slated for the Z^2 high speed axis on this machine anyway. Now it will be the primary spindle.

I suppose I'll be looking at a heavy hobby mill in my future for the work I would have done on this machine. Most of the heavy hobbies are bed mills rather than knee mills anyway. I always knew this was a possibility with a 30 year old used driven quill knee mill. Still, its made enough parts to pay for itself and then some already. In fact it was paid for with parts made on my baby Taig. LOL.

To add insult to injury... In order to get the quill and spindle all the way out I have to remove my splash enclosure.

[timmyb199]

i like the companion spindle, Hang in there once you get the z fixed you will be sailing i am sure. keep us posted with pics.

Also what about powering the knee, IF it is just the quil that is stuck and the spindle sounds good maybe u could go that route. Just ideas of course

Tim

[Bob La Londe]

The knee is awfully heavy, and its just gravity held against the nut. Its not a bad idea, but probably not for this machine. I had thought about motorizing it just for easier manual movement at some point. Getting in there to check what kind of screw it has, and maybe upgrading it is a bit more than I can handle. I think I would need to pull it apart, and I just don't have the lifting equipment for that.

Yeah, I liked the companion spindle too. I even bragged about it saying I thought it look professional. That little 0.8Kw spindle is going back on my little mill, and I am building the new Z using a 2.2Kw spindle. I am not going to fix the stock Z. I am going to eliminate it and build my own Z.

[Scrambled1]

Bob-

Do you have any more info on the 1 hp secondary spindle? Where did you mount the VFD?

Steve

[Bob La Londe]

It was a temporary installation, so I just screwed the VFD to the back of the control cabinet and plugged it into my power strip. Its actually a 110V 0.8kw spindle and VFD I bought from solar.jean on Ebay for my Taig mill. The Taig had lost X axis control so I made the mount and setup the Hurco to use it so I could finish a job... and mid job the quill on the Hurco stuck.

Anyway, it just worked. It was set to spin up at about 19-20 seconds to full speed. I never setup Mach speed control for it. I just set the speed on the front panel of the VFD. I did set it for trigger input to start though so it would idle at speed when a job finished.

Here:
110V 0 8KW Water Cooled Motor Spindle and Drive Inverter VFD Top Quality 5 | eBay

[Bob La Londe]

Here is the new Z-Axis for Metal Nibbler 3. Its going to be a temporary stop gap Z. The spindle I'll keep, but the linear actuator has some things I don't like. The problem is its hard to make it the way I would without an actual working machine. (The Taig is down due to controller issues on one axis.)

This one was cheap and I got it fairly quickly. There are parts on it from 4 (5 when I get the servo mounted) different manufacturers to allow me to assemble it quickly.

[FannBlade]

Thinking of you when I ran across this today.

Air Turbine - ITC :: Industrial Tooling Corporation Ltd.

[Bob La Londe]

I've looked at air turbine spindles before. Have some neat specs on a lot of them, but boy howdy they do cost don't they.

[FannBlade]

I couldn't afford to ask!!

[Bob La Londe]

The best price I have found on a new one with good enough specs and speed to consider was $2.7K. It was only 1/4HP. Most I have really been interested in have been in the $5-8K range. All of a sudden those Chinese spindles start to look awfully good don't they. LOL.

[Bob La Londe]

Making parts to fix the machines that make the parts.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oZXM_DjIFMQ

I sometimes forget that Wood Ripper 1 started life in my shop as Metal Nibbler 4. My big mill stuck the quill a couple weeks ago, and my little mill suffered a controller failure leaving me trying to make precision parts on my manual mill. Then it came to me that I could cut aluminum with light cuts on my CNC router too. This is nearly dry machining. I rubbed a bit of cutting oil all over the surface of this 6061 aluminum bar stock and let her rip. Its cutting at about 100 inches per minute, but its only taking about .005 depth of cut and 40% step over int he pockets. The math says I could be more aggressive than that, but this is working so far. Besides this machine has the rigidity of an aldente noodle.

Special thanks to Dragonfly in the CamBam Forum for suggesting I make this plate to fix a problem on the Hurco. I had mounted and trammed the new spindle and Z, but the flex was horrible. He suggested that making a longer face plate would sacrifice travel, but might increase rigidity. I'm trying it.

[Bob La Londe]

Now to figure out how to get it out of that epoxy bed in that MDF jig. LOL.

Attachment 234646 Attachment 234648

[Bob La Londe]

I know my approach isn't always orthodox, but I am always trying to learn something.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dri1oPVpDZU

This is going to be the main high speed aluminum mold cutter for CNC Molds N Stuff (We don't make "cheap" molds, but we try to do a good job for you.) sometime in the next couple days. *Here I am being silly and testing at 500 IPM (inches per minute) and acceleration of 40 i/s/s (inches per second per second) *When I tested at 600 and 50 it faulted the drive. *I might be able to go faster with the acceleration of 40, but it will certainly run for a long time at my goal of 200IPM *and 20i/s/s to match the other axis of the machine. *I may run the acceleration faster than 20 to speed up rapid Z movement and decrease job time for 3D milling.

I feel a little silly testing like that since this really is a temporary Z axis.

I am so glad I ordered a new drive with that new servo motor because the old drive was bad. Its funny because it was still working right up until the quill just wouldn't move anymore.

[Bob La Londe]

Now I need to figure out how I want to cap off those two oil lines. The ones that went to the quill, and the original ball screw. The new linear rails, and ballscrew are grease lubricated.

[Bob La Londe]

I never thoroughly cleaned off the base of the machine, so I never noticed the drain. When I tested the oiler and everything was getting adequate oil I never pulled the back plate. If I had I might have discovered the tank inside the base of the machine and that big ass 3 phase pump in there. This thing has a built in coolant system? You know when I removed the pre-existing coolant nozzle you would have thought I'ld have followed the hose back to the pump, but I never did. Heck, if I hadn't needed to cap off the old oil line going to the old z-axis when I changed it I might never have known there was a sump, and a pump, and several inches of oily sludge in there.

I'm not sure I'll use any part of it anyway, but it blows me away that I never realized it was there. I run so much coolant flooding aluminum I doubt that little drain could keep up, and with the tank built into the base of the machine I don't see how I could clean it out very effectively from fine aluminum chips that would build up in there.

Well, at the very least I need to slime the shop vac and suck that sludge out of there.

[FannBlade]

Glad to hear you finally found the drain! I have pulled my pump unit and have it ready to mount a 1ph motor I have here with same HP and RPM. That way there is no need for VFD....although it would be nice to control RPM. I know exactly what you mean about SLUDGE!!! Took awhile to get mine all cleaned out.

[Bob La Londe]

I got in there this afternoon with a Shop Vac and sucked out several gallons of gunk. It looked like the top inch of it was all way oil. There was a brown sludge in the bottom half that looked that nasty brown color motor oil gets when you crack a head or blow a gasket and pump water into it. When I got down to the last of it I could suck up it finally looked like there was water or remnants of water based coolant in the bottom.

I cut a lot of aluminum, and the chips do build up in my coolant tank. I can't see using this internal tank. I'ld have to open up the back of the machine and pump it all out every day or two if I was running a lot of jobs. I have been using a 3 gallon pickle bucket, and just swapping buckets so I can clean them out, but the bucket is a little small. I need about 3 times that much coolant to keep up on hard cuts with blasting streams.

I think I am going to eventually weld up a custom coolant tank out of aluminum to go around the foot of the machine in the front.

I am still searching for the fitting I need to terminate the oil line I will no longer be using. The oil lines are all either 5/32 or 4mm. I either need a coupling to eliminate a T or I need an NPT adaptor so I can cap the end of the line.

[Bob La Londe]

D**N!!! D**N!!! D**N!!! D**N!!! D**N!!! D**N!!! D**N!!! D**N!!! D**N!!! D**N!!!

*AM*!!

I think I may have unfairly accused a previous owner for the damage to the quill. As I have been desperately trying to get things working again I found that the air valve providing air to the oiler was leaking. It may not have been putting out enough oil to properly oil the quill. Hopefully the similar valve that provided air to the spindle brake is still good, and I can repurpose it.

[Bob La Londe]

Well, the other valve works... and while I was testing the timer failed. SIGH.

[Bob La Londe]

Got the timer fixed. Got a pump installed to cool the spindle. Got the spindled tied into the VFD. Got the VFD tied into the breakout board. Spent some time figuring out the VFD programming, and finally got the spindle under Mach Control for start and speed. I may do some test cuts or even some work cuts with it as early as tomorrow.

I am reinstalling my flood coolant system, and my splash enclosure yet this afternoon.

Monday I am getting in a new Charter Oak CNC Mill (maybe - its already going to be 8 days later than the expediter said, and 6 days later than the trucking company said, and four days later than they said when I asked when it was really going to arrive). I'm also supposed to be getting a new Tennsmith 48" brake on Monday. That I believe is likely. Anyway, since I'll be bending metal for an enclosure on the new mill I think I'll remake the one for this mill as well.

I need to get this enclosure back in place though atleast temporarily. I have jobs that are behind schedule.