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Bridgeport Assembly


CSEMARTIN

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Thanks guys. That's what I thought, but I met a guy through work that told me the T-slots should go in the rear in order to finish installing my DRO.

You might want to guard it from chips that might fly that direction.

Point well taken. Thanks.

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  • 2 weeks later...
  • 11 months later...

Chris, I thought you were getting ready to move to IL? You going to have to take it all apart again?

Yes, that's right. This mill has been the gift that keeps on giving. Two months after I moved that Bridgeport into the basement, I resigned from my job. It's a long bitter story. I moved in late August to Illinois and had to disassemble everything. Taking it apart was the easy part. Getting it back up the stairs was interesting.

When I got it to my new house, I swore I'd never go through that again. So....I put her all back together in my garage. The only problem is the humidity in central Illinois. Within a month, the table started to brown out which really pissed me off. The pictures don't do the job I did justice. I spent an unusualy amount of time cleaning that mill. Anyway, now I've decided to move the mill down to my shop. The good news is I have a walk out basement now so there are no stairs to deal with.

I borrowed a hoist from a friend and disassembled everything tonight. It's lying in pieces on my garage floor ready for the move tomorrow night. I can't believe I'm going through this again. It's been 18 months since I first set everything up, and I still haven't used this mill for more than an hour. All I have done on it is cut a magwell and an ejector.

This time, just for Eric, I'm going to put a nice coat of pain on everything. I'm even going to paint the Bridgeport wrench. This machine is also going to get retrofitted with ball screws, and perhaps, a z-axis DRO. I'm also going to put on an el cheapo power feed for the x-axis. I might get one for the y-axis too, but haven't decided. In the future, I'd like to get a variable speed J-head, but that's going to have to wait.

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Hello: Just to make you feel good my Bridgeport is outside under a tarp :( I have been busy building a garage to put all my stuff in so it is waiting to go back inside. I am thinking of taking it all apart and painting it as well. It was last painted maybe 40 years ago. CRAP, more stuff to do :roflol: Thanks, Eric

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This time, just for Eric, I'm going to put a nice coat of pain on everything.

That was supposed to say "coat of paint". Freudian slip?

It looks like the weather is going to hold out so the move is on for tonight.

Bill, is this what you're talking about?

Good luck on your garage build Eric. I'll post some pictures..

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Kurt is a local company (Minneapolis) that sell products used on Bridgeports. We put them on the mills here at work and they run flawlessly.

We use their vices to and I believe mine opens to 7 inches or so. Anyway they make some good stuff that has held up great on our toolroom equipment.

http://www.kurtworkholding.com/powerlock-power-drawbars-c-36-l-en.html

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This time, just for Eric, I'm going to put a nice coat of pain on everything.

That was supposed to say "coat of paint". Freudian slip?

It looks like the weather is going to hold out so the move is on for tonight.

Bill, is this what you're talking about?

Good luck on your garage build Eric. I'll post some pictures..

FWIW, Eric's "garage" is bigger than my house. Only guy I know who had an interior decorator come in. :roflol: I'd give my left nut (1/4 x 20) :surprise: to have a "garage" as big as his.

CYa,

Pat

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I was all set to move the mill downstairs last wednesday, but it rained. So I decided to take advantage of the time I had and clean everything up and put on a fresh coat of paint. I still have a lot of work to do, but it's looking good. I wish I would have done this to begin with. It looks so much nicer!

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Chris

Its kinda funny when you announce that you have a mill, look at how many people come out of the woodwork to be your friend :) Looking good chris

Sean

Reminds me of when I bought a ski boat many years ago. I had friends I never knew I had. :surprise:

Cheers,

Pat

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I'll second the recommendation for a Kurt vice.

I found a good buy on eBay. I've got a Kurt Vice and only paid $125 for it.

What paint are you using?

I'm just using Rust-Oleum from Wal-Mart. It's the gloss finish in light gray. Before I painted anything, I used Naptha to get all the oils off. I took the rust off with a product from Sherwin Williams called Metal-Etch. With some fine steel wool, it did a really nice job of getting the rust out of the pitted areas. It has been a lot of work, but not unbearable.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Hello: Well day one of the Bridgeport tear down. I removed the table,power feed and leed screws. There was alot of old dried out grease under there. Tomorrow I will be removing the head and some of the other parts. I am thinking of taking the parts to a car wash to remove all the grease. My mill has the "M" head so it is a little smaller than the "J" head models. Everything so far looks to be in great condition. The ways look great. The scrapers are petrified :surprise: I will be adding a DRO on the "X","Y" and maybe the "Z" axis. I have to clean/rebuild the vice for the mill as well. It has seen alot of use in the last 50 years or so. Thanks, Eric

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There is a lot of good info on practicalmachinist.com regarding rebuilds on BPs. It is a most excellent machine when it is up and running, only bad part is keeping it fed with tooling and time. :lol:

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There is a lot of good info on practicalmachinist.com regarding rebuilds on BPs. It is a most excellent machine when it is up and running, only bad part is keeping it fed with tooling and time. :lol:

I like that forum a lot. Right now, I'm trying to decide how I'm going to level the machine. I'm tall and would like to get the whole mill a few inches off the floor. I'm thinking about having a concrete pad poured, or perhaps, making a stand out of 4X4 inch steel tubing. I figure it'll be a lot easier to do this with the machine in pieces. Plus, I'm still waiting on my new ball screws.

This is taking forever! I think it'll be worth the wait though.

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If you are putting ballscrews on it, the next evolutionary step is stepper motors - then build up a cheapie controller ( ~ $1K ), add Mach software ( $200) and you have a 3 -axis CNC.

I did this with a similar size mill, learned CNC, and never looked back. CNC lets you do things that are virtually impossible with a manual mill (like cutting a round hole or pocket with a smaller endmill). The CNCzone forum has lots of detail on this kind of thing.

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There is a lot of good info on practicalmachinist.com regarding rebuilds on BPs. It is a most excellent machine when it is up and running, only bad part is keeping it fed with tooling and time. :lol:

I like that forum a lot. Right now, I'm trying to decide how I'm going to level the machine. I'm tall and would like to get the whole mill a few inches off the floor. I'm thinking about having a concrete pad poured, or perhaps, making a stand out of 4X4 inch steel tubing. I figure it'll be a lot easier to do this with the machine in pieces. Plus, I'm still waiting on my new ball screws.

This is taking forever! I think it'll be worth the wait though.

Exactly what I did. 4x4 steel tubes bolted to the base, then use a friends pallet jack to move it to its corner of the shop. We put a bolt through each tube so we can adjust level, works like a charm.

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I just bought a series one with the 2j head and right now it's sitting at the shop waiting for me to pick it up. I think I may choose to disassemble it to move it because the riggers want $500 to do it for me. The questions I have are, can you tell me what the weight of the ram with turret would be? what is the weight of the head and motor? And finally, can you give me an approximate weight for the base? I was told the knee weighs 350 lbs, would that be accurate?

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