Getting the mill add on just right

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bogstandard:
I just wish I could have got onto this a lot sooner, but anyway, I managed to squeeze in a couple of hours this evening to try to get this project on the road again.

Continuing on from the last post about machining the blocks, I got the second one made, just like the first. As you can see, the blocks self support because they lock into the dovetail system, so there will be no need for me to fix these to the main casting to keep them in a working position.
I have already mounted the casting onto the table, and clocked all over the two top faces, and it is perfect for alignment, except for the front corner of the RH face, for some reason, that area has a slight dip in it, not a lot, but enough to cause me a little concern.

I need to lock the new gibs in position so that they can be machined, so a little bit of 6mm threaded rod, a nut and a bit of bar with a 6mm hole drilled half way down it. The ends of the rod and bar had a rough 90 degree angle filed onto the end of them. These bits took no longer than 10 mins to make.

The next two pics show just how this jacking piece works, and work it certainly did. The two gibs were locked in solid.

I flycut the gibs down and the final operation was to take a couple of thou skim off the top faces of the casting and the gibs together.

The finished result. In fact the surface finish on the casting is better than the original.
You can just see the problem area on the right. It turned out to be a chilled area on the casting, and so much harder than the rest, but on rechecking, everything was now level, just that area has a slightly different surface finish. I could have mounted it onto the surface grinder, then the whole lot would have a regular finish, but I decided that what I had was perfectly good enough.

The gibs were now set up for final finishing.
The flycutter with a round nose does a great job of mass material removal, and still leaves a very acceptable surface finish behind. This was taking off 2.5mm (0.100") in one cut.

A little bit more trimming up.

The gibs are now finished except for having the angled face machined on. This will require a slick bit of measuring on my part, so I have decided to leave it until tomorrow (later today).

It is now time for me to settle down with an a**e ripping takeaway curry, and a good sci-fi flim.

See you tomorrow later.

Bogs

Darren:
Very informative as ever John..

And looks good .... :clap:

dsquire:
Very nice John. Like the way you made and used the jack. :ddb: :ddb:

Cheers :beer:

Don

bogstandard:
This, at last, is the final part. I got into the shop today and finished off what I should have done last night.

The gib sides at this time are still parallel, so I did some fine measuring up on both the machine and gibs, and found out how much metal needed to be removed.
Because there were 5 degrees difference between the machine and the arbor casting dovetails, the gibs were set up at 5 degrees.

After a few minutes work, the metal was gone. The other gib had the same done to it, and then they were both cleaned up and deburred.
Time to see if I had got things right.

This side seems to have matched up Ok.

And so does this one.
In fact this one looks rather odd. That is because this one side contains a moveable clamp (the big round bit in the middle of the end) and the gib doesn't actually rest on the main casting but a dovetail on the end of the clamp. I cut the jibs to a thickness to allow a 1/8" movement on the clamp before everything locked up solid, hence the 1/8" gap you see between the casting and new gib.

The full Monty.
I am really pleased that everything worked out as planned and the unit is very rigid and well supported.
The bottom small casting will be removed and stored in the box with the right angled head, the main bit of this casting will stay in position on the machine, it will not come to any harm and isn't in the way of anything, plus I won't have to find somewhere safe to store it away.

So now for a change.

For the last few months, I haven't had my better half to help me clean out my shop, which she used to do regularly every week for me.

I am absolutely disgusted at the state of the floor in my shop, even Stew offered to clean it out for me when he called today. But being as I am, I politely refused.

So starting tomorrow, I am having a good dig out and clean up, if the body can take it. It might have to be done over a couple of days.

Only then will I decide what the next project will be.

Bogs

Bernd:
Bog's

Nice job as always. But am I missing something here. Those plates look awful thick. It looks like the distance on the dove tails on the arbor are further apart than the dove tails on the machine. Am I making any sense here? Do you understand what I'm asking?

Also how come you ued an end mill to cut on that last cut instead of a flycutter? To much material to remove?

Regards,
Bernd

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