I've learned a lot from many people here at CNCZone. First off I want to say, "Thanks" to the many that take the time to share their experiences.

Over the last few years I've read much regarding the decision to, or not to CNC an old Bridgeport. Some say the old Series 1 machines are junk, too much resonance, too much flexing, cost too much to retrofit, just wait for a better machine like an old BOSS to come along. I waited a long time for an old BOSS to come along reasonably priced, it never showed up.

You can make a decent little CNC machine from an old Bridgeport. There is no right or wrong answer here. Will you be able to make Orbiter parts for NASA? Perhaps not. But you can make many precision parts with one. You can make many precision parts, repeatable and quickly with one. Think of the arcs, and circles that you can do on a CNC that would require a lot of setup time on a manual mill. Anyone want to discuss how to cut an ellipse with a manual mill. This can easily be done with the CNC. What about script? I believe the value is much more than, just perhaps what it would cost to retro it. For me, the value is, 'What I can get out of it', and 'How much time can it save me over other methods'. In the end we all have to make our own call; we have to decide, 'How much is this old machine worth?

My conversion cost a little more than $6K, and I believe it would be difficult to do one for less than 5K. Just too much stuff to buy, motor plates to build, cabling, boxes for the electronics, servos, a controller, and so on...

A partial list of my expenses:
3 Axis Precision ground ball screw set, Winters Engineering, CA $1,200
3 Teknic Clearpath servo motors with integrated controllers, 1 power supply, cabling, $2,700
1 Hicon Integra Breakout board/Controller combo, $600
Bearings and miscellaneous repair parts, H&W machine, $600
plate aluminum, belts, pulleys, misc hardware, $500
Dedicated stand alone computer, used with Windows 7, Mach3, $300

The listed expenses total $5,900. But, you can easily use a Rockford Rolled Ball Screw Kit for about half that amount I paid for my ground ball screws. And you can find a less expensive and durable controller instead of the Hicon. You might be able to do it under 5K.

One final note. I used three Teknic Clearpath servo motors, model CPM-SDSK-3441D-ELN. They are awesome servos. When I looked at other servo systems the ClearPath servos saved me a minimum of $1,500. I know the amount does not sound like much, proportionally however, the savings is a little less than 25%.

So this is the start of my build thread. Since I have X,Y, and Z under CNC control, I am happy. I will share with you next what I've learned along the way.