New mill - WHAT DO I DO?

[markjaffa]

So you get a new mill, a HM-52G, direct from the manufacturer. Uncommisioned. What do you do with it/to it?

We will have to partially dismantle it to install it into its new home. Probably head/ram off the column, table/knee off the column and the column off the base.

Then reassemble it in its new home. So then what? Drain the oil? Clean off the packing grease? Dismantle it as much as I can to check for contaminants/grit/sand?

I will be checking all the wiring, I am a sparky and I plan to install a VSD on it fairly soon. It is a 415V 3 phase machine. I also have a 3-axis DRO to fit. :2tsup:

What would you do? :?

[Woodlee]

All of the above .
then level it and bolt it down.
tram the head to make sure the spindle is perpendicular with the table ,.
Check x,y and vertical adjustment gibs ,adjust if necessary
Check to make sure every thing works .
Set up a vice on the table. Take some test cuts .
Workout from there where to go next ,depending on your results.
Kev.

[matthew_g]

All of the above .
then level it and bolt it down.
tram the head to make sure the spindle is perpendicular with the table ,.
Check x,y and vertical adjustment gibs ,adjust if necessary
Check to make sure every thing works .
Set up a vice on the table. Take some test cuts .
Workout from there where to go next ,depending on your results.
Kev.


As above I say............:2tsup:

[Dave J]

You have pretty well covered it all. Did you order and have it shiped from China?
I would check it all over and run it before taking it apart in case there are any issues with it. I was amazed at what I found, sand, grit scratching the ways etc. So it is good you are taking it apart because you can clean it out. I found both the X and Y lead screw nuts needed shimming up over a mm to get them to run true.:? you can see one of the shims in the last picture. I also split the nuts to be able to adjust back lash.

I have had mine down to just the column and have pictures of it all the way through if you get stuck or need any help.
I went a bit over board on mine and cleaned up all the castings and repainted them, so ever thing was clean and ready for my CNC conversion.

If your thinking of putting the DRO scale on the front of the table this might give you some ideas, it saves loosing around 40mm or more travel.
http://www.woodworkforums.com/f65/installing-dro-scale-front-table-hm50-52-a-115786/
You are lucky your fitting your own, the holes for the scale reader head on the back of my saddle were drilled at 30degrees instead of 90.
I also moved the electrical box back to make room for the scale on the L/H side so it's away from the gib locks, the factory fit them on the gib side.

Dave

[eskimo]

I went a bit over board on mine

Pity you dont live in adelaide so I can pay you to do mine

When you say you split the nuts...what do you mean?

[Dave J]

Hi,
If you have a look in the picture you will see that I have cut the nut about 3/4 of the way through between a 3rd to a quarter or the way along the nut. Also looking a the picture the 2 top corners closest of the cut part have M4 grub screws in there. What they do is jack the nut threads apart which takes out the back lash.
Bridgeport mills and a lot of others use this idea (set up differently) so it's not new but works. I machined the outside of both nuts to clean them up, they only come rough cast.
I am not sure if you missed it in my first post, did you order your machine and have it shipped from China?

[eskimo]

did you order your machine and have it shipped from China?

you asking me or Mark


and thanks Dave for the explanation on the nuts

[Dave J]

Sorry got that post mixed up.
Dave

[markjaffa]

Thanks to all for their replies.

Woodlee - your plan sounds like a great idea. I will combine that with some of Dave Js suggestions.

Dave J - thanks for your suggestions as well. I had already seen and taken note of the way you re-installed your scale on the front of the table. Definitely the way to go.

I have also had a good look at this thread - Hafco Metal Master HM-52 CNC Conversion - CNCzone.com-The Largest Machinist Community on the net! (http://www.cnczone.com/forums/showthread.php?t=25895)

I am not going the CNC route yet, but I may try and scrape the mounting surfaces as chich2 did, if they need it.

Dave, I have imported this mill, and another 1000kg of gear :2tsup: direct from the manufacturer in China. I will be collecting this gear from the freight forwarder in Fremantle next week - then I will post photos of all the gear, and info on how much it all cost, in case someone else wants to have a go. Very cheap - how cheap will be confirmed in the next few days. I travelled to China and checked out the factory before I committed to buying any gear off them - it pays to know who you are dealing with!

Cheers everybody.

[Dave J]

Hope it all lands safe and undamaged for you.
Dave

[markjaffa]

Fully insured, so they will be fixing it if its damaged! :D

[RayG]

Hi Mark,

Don't bother scraping the column/base joint...

Dave will correct me if I have this wrong, but my recollection is that Chich scraped the column to base join because he was having problems with the z axis being inconsistent, he eventually traced it to flexing in the base to column joint, and made up a brace arrangement to stop the flexing. Either way I don't think scraping that joint is necessary.

Big difficult job for no reward.

This problem could be because he chose to z axis the knee, (rather than the quill, and lock the knee when machining), the reasons he went down the track of driving the knee instead of the quill, is covered in the cnczone thread.

The later model machine HM52B has extra ribs in the base casting to make it more rigid. Which might help minimize the problem anyway.

I'm hoping that for my HM52 CNC conversion driving the quill as the z-axis will help eliminate the problem.

Regards
Ray

[Dave J]

Rays right there, unless your CNCing the knee theres no need to touch that column/base joint. If you read that thread you will see it's only because the knee motor is pushing off the base to lift the knee, which in turn flexes the base letting the column move forward and backward and giving inaccurate readings. Because CNC uses the motors for the position any flexing anywhere gives a false reading to the computer.
When your manually machining you always lock the knee so you wont have that problem.
I would say the only scraping you will need to do is scraping excess paint and bog off the mating surfaces.
Dave.