New mill Wells-Index 745

Now that the casting was all ready I got started on the paint/filler process.

I put several layers of automotive masking tape over all the ways and machined surfaces. Once that was done I started with a catilyized expoy primer (automotive grade), 2 coats. Applied with my HVLP gun. As I mentioned before I have a supplied air system so I don't have to breath any hazardous fumes.

I waited about an hour for the epoxy primer to flash then applied 2 coats of 2K high build primer and let it dry over night.

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Once the high build primer had dried for a day I sanded it as smooth as possible but the casting is fairly rough so I then applied some body filler. After it had dried it was sanded and more high build primer was applied then sanded again...

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I did several rounds of filler, sand, high build primer, sand etc...

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It took a few weeks to conplete the filler and primer process...

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Finally I had the casting smooth enough for top coat painting. I could have maybe saved time by doing one thick coat of filler to start with and sanding it smooth. However my goal was not to add anymore material than necessary because I think filler is more likely to chip and get oil soaked so I wanted as little as possible for a smooth finish.

For a top coat I used a 2 part cateliyzed urethane single stage paint. I used this same kind of paint on the suspension part of my corvette and it has held up very well over the last few years.

I choose to just do single stage rather than base clear because I think it will be easier to touch up and chips and scrathes. I find an air bush works well for minor touch-ups.

I did 2 coats of the color/top coat:
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I'm quite happy with the way the paint turned out and i belive it should hold up well.

More updates to come.
 
Thanks rtorres, it was a lot of work but i'm happy with the results :)
 
Before I went any further with the work on the milling machine I figured I needed to make a rolling stand for it as I may need the ability to shuffle stuff around from time to time.

So I made a low slung rolling stand, each wheel is rated for 750+ lbs. so it should handle the weight no problem.

Unfortunatley part way through the project my 20year old little lincon welder packed it in... That's ok it gave me a good excuse to get a better welder... I found a very lightly used Miller 211 with cart and tank of craigslist. the guy selling it said he used it just a few times and it was still on its first spool of wire, I tried it out and it worked great, so I bought it.

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For some reason the cart didn't have a handle so I made a nice sturdy handle with some brackets to hang the welding gun and ground wire on. I also picked up a few accessories for it since most of my old welding stuff was worn out.

Miller 211 Welder with cart handle installed and a few accessories.

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Anyway back to the mill:

So I was able to then finish up the rolling cart and painted it with the same epoxy primer and 2 part single stage paint as the Mill.


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The stand is designed to keep the Mill less than an inch off the ground, I also put some home made leveling feet at all 4 corners so I can set it in place and not worry about it moving while I'm milling. It was a fair bit of work but should be worth it in the long run.

I recruited my father to help me move the mill from the pallet jack to the rolling stand...
We used the same engine hoise we had used to lift the mill before. Once we had it off the pallet jack I pushed the cart underneath the mill. At this point the engine hoist suddenly decided to tip over forward!

We both jumped out of the way and to our amazement the mill dropped about 10 inches down and landed perfectly into place on the rolling cart!

That certainly got the heart pumping.

Anyway it wasn't how I planned to do things but the mill is on the cart safe and sound.

Rolls around very easily.

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More updates to come.
 
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I sure hope you and Shane can do something to the ways, or guidance from the people here we can walk you through it, Shane has all the equipment you could use. He has 2 way grinders, straight-edges, Biax Power Scrapers and the know how. It would be a shame to let those crappy ways to not shine like your beautiful paint job.
 
Hi Richard, I just wanted to say I have great respect for your skills and really do appreciate the time you've taken to give me advise in the thread. I haven't had a chance to talk Shane just yet but I will be giving him a call for sure. Here's my thoughts/plans for the ways. I'm just a hobbist and won't be making a living with this Mill and I don't plan on doing any really high percision work with it. But I do want it to be functional for my uses.

When I inspected the Mill before disassembally quill/Z axis seemed really good (smooth top to bottom with equal effort). The Y axis as far as I could tell seemed similarly smooth front to back. The X axis was mostly smooth but it did notice it got a little tighter near each end (maybe last 4 inches of travel on each end) But it wasn't terrible.

Of course visually the saddle has some wear...

So having said all of that my plan is to talk to Shane and see what he says and the costs involved. Assuming It is at a price I can justify/ afford I am planning to take the saddle and maybe the table into him and maybe have him grind or scrape the X axis and re-flake as he sees fit given my budget and intended uses.

I do want a functional machine NOT just a good looking one, but at the same time I just need it to fuction for my intended uses it doesn't have to absoutley perfect.
 
If you only want visual...a"Cut & Flake" would give it better lubrication and it would look better. That's what many used machinery dealers do after they give it a pretty paint job.
 
Yes, that sounds like it might be a really good option. If the cost is within my budget ideally it would be really great to get the ways on the X axis redone so the table moved smoothly along its whole travel. I'll have to see what Shane says then decide which option I will take. Thanks again for the suggestions Richard its apprecited.
 
So my shop was feeling a bit cluttered with the parts from the Mill scattered about so I figured its time to start putting stuff back together.

When I took the knee off it wanted to tip forward quite a bit as it seems to be 'front heavy'. So I knew I needed to come up with something that would help.me keep it rigged up level when I put it back on the base/ coloum.

I spent a bit of time and made some brackets that would allow me to keep the knee very secure and on a level plane when installing it. It will also be nice to have these brackets around in the future as it will make taking the knee off pretty easy.

Here's the install of the knee.

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Once the knee was in place I put some way oil on the ways and installed and adjusted the Gib I also oiled the screw and gears.

The knee seems to go up and down very smoothly along its whole travel so I think its good to go and if I ever want to take it off again the brackets make it pretty easy.

Knee in place...
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I also spent a bit of time polishing up the way lock for the knee. Here's what I started with: 20180505_130536.jpg
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Installed on the knee:

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I also cleaned up the way wiper brackets... here's what they looked like to start with:

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I did my best to polish them up but, the casting seem to be very porious so This was about the best I could do...
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Its proabbly vanity but I figured while I was at it might as well take a couple min and polish all the little screws that hold them on to.

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Well guys I have actually caught up with where I am on the Mill so the pace of updates is going to slow way down. I have a young family and work full time so I only get a small amount of time each week in the workshop and I have some other projects on the go also. But if you all can bear with me little by little I'll get this thing up and running again.

More updates to come.
 
It looks like you have the same style of way wipers I have. I bought new rubber strips from W-I. I got 3 feet of it and it was about $35.

Here's a suggestion regarding lubrication. I have one of these little oil guns and it is great for pushing oil into those zerks.

https://www.machinerypartsdepot.com/product/12PB20

My routine is to put one pump into each zerk, except for the back zerk on the left side of the saddle, which gets two pumps. (It supplies a larger area than the others)
 
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