B-port clone rebuild

The softer jaws should save the tool bits if I happen to run into it one day, good idea.
In the goodies box it looks like this vise may have had a few pairs of jaws...
I don't understand the condition of this vise. Never in my life have I ever thought it reasonable to just drill right into a vise or whatever material laying below. Just goes to show the calibre of people who were running this machine in its past life.

I didn't look at this machine as being clapped out or in horrible condition to think I paid too much when I first started. It just was what it was. but looking back, it really is all of those things. This machine was in bad shape, it had been used very heavily and wrecklesly. At least the main moving parts of the machine still worked, I suppose...
 
Well you have the machine now and it looks like you are ready to cut chips. It looks like the vise still will do the job, it is just looking like it was treated... badly. It still will be functional until you can get a more modern (and unravished) vise.
 
I was able to power it up last night. It's really quite quiet. But in that quietness I could hear just a little bit of noise coming from the spindle bearings. Undesirable noise... I flooded it with oil, ran it again at top speed, could still hear it. So I left it. I really hope the oil will permeate and it'll be okay..........
 
My friend Bert has been running his BP on noisy bearings for about 3 years now, and he uses cheaper bearings. He still gets great finish and accurate work out of it. He is trying to see just how far he can go with this set. Anyway, what I'm trying to say is that a little noise shouldn't give you many problems, assuming proper installation, etc...
 
So, last night when I ran the mill, I flooded the spindle with oil. In the gits cup and down the top of the spindle from up above. Tonight I come out and most of that oil has leaked out, which I expected... What I didn't expect it was to be black with shavings...
*Queue record scratch...*

Now, i cleaned this head, spotless... So it's not old dirt.
I had the mill running, on and off several times over the course of about 10 mins listening to the little noises of the bearings, trying to pin point where it was coming from.
So, I'm panicking thinking I've ground the bearings into dust somehow...
I pull the spindle out, all the grease has leeched out of the new top bearing, fine, I plan on oiling regularly anyways, it was bound to happen, but the spindle and bearings are clean. Oily, by clean. So where the heck did all the shavings come from...?!

Note, I used the brake numerous times last night.
So begs the question, can the brake dust and fibers mix with the oil squirted down through the top of the mill (as per the instructions printed right on the head, oil weekly from the top...)15090761326495508790693740962355.jpg

Is it possible the brake dust mixed with the oil and poured out the bottom? Has anyone had that happen?
 
You would be surprised at what can leech out of a bearing that you thought you got cleaned and put back together. The oil you are using, I assume is the ISO 46 oil, will help extract hidden debris that you though got cleaned out earlier. I doubt any dust from the brake would be getting down into the bearing this early in life after rebuilding. Ken
 
Bit of an update.
The mill is fully assembled, and running. I added igaging DRO's, I wasn't going to use igaging and look for a glass scale unit, but, i caved as i ran out of money and couldn't find something affordable. I left all the quill power feed guts out to slowly rebuild it all. I have been having a dilemma over a dividing head/rotary table/spin indexer to make the gears i need.
I borrowed a friends 8" rotary table to give it a shot. With the bolt circle calculator from LMS, i was able to use the degrees to hog out a gear. The first of many hopefully.

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This gear is part of the clutch assembly. My goal right now is to have a functioning fine feed knob, and worry about all the clutch and power feed down the road. So, the worm gear and face gear (I'm sure all my terminology will be all wrong...) seem to have been fixed by a hammer and chisel mechanic years ago, but it seems intact and complete. So i made the connecting clutch gear, my plan is to put a key way in it, use a valve spring to compress the two together, and have some kind of release mechanism to allow me to run the fine feed knob when i want and disengage it when I want to use the handle on the other size. But its a start...
 
I'm a little confused- is this a Bridgeport product or some type of hybrid? Or is the whole thing a clone?
I've never seen one quite like it
Mark S.
ps Oh I see it is a clone- never mind. Kinda cool machine actually. Rare.
 
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