- Joined
- Nov 21, 2015
- Messages
- 56
A Happy New Year to All,
I have an Elliott Model 00 Mill that I am in the process of stripping down, cleaning and reassembling. This mill is probably older than I am (from its serial number 5720... I'm guessing it might be a 1957 vintage) and despite the expected coat of baked on grease & grime is in pretty good shape. The ways are pristine given its age and the X axis (longitudinal) feed screw and nut are in excellent shape. The Y axis on the other hand isn't so good. The feed screw, 3/4" x 8tpi ACME looks unworn. The cast iron nut it rides in has threads that look like a mixture of a 60 deg. thread that has been double threaded:
My thought on how to rectify this situation given the amount of slop (its far too loose to be called backlash!) is to single point a cylindrical nut from a piece of bronze rod (I have an offcut of 1" OD, 1/2" ID tube), then bore out the cast iron nut and loctite the new thread in. There isn't a huge amount of surplus material around the edge to support the new nut and aligning the above piece in the 4-jaw to bore it true will be a challenge - note the spring pins which are supposed to line it up, although the hole is tapered so those pins may not be in the right place.
So, my question is - am I going about this the right way, or does anyone have a better way of fixing it? A replacement part is not going to be available, of course.
Oh, and to satisfy curiosity, this is the mill, as delivered, before I started stripping it down:
Thanks, Rob
I have an Elliott Model 00 Mill that I am in the process of stripping down, cleaning and reassembling. This mill is probably older than I am (from its serial number 5720... I'm guessing it might be a 1957 vintage) and despite the expected coat of baked on grease & grime is in pretty good shape. The ways are pristine given its age and the X axis (longitudinal) feed screw and nut are in excellent shape. The Y axis on the other hand isn't so good. The feed screw, 3/4" x 8tpi ACME looks unworn. The cast iron nut it rides in has threads that look like a mixture of a 60 deg. thread that has been double threaded:
My thought on how to rectify this situation given the amount of slop (its far too loose to be called backlash!) is to single point a cylindrical nut from a piece of bronze rod (I have an offcut of 1" OD, 1/2" ID tube), then bore out the cast iron nut and loctite the new thread in. There isn't a huge amount of surplus material around the edge to support the new nut and aligning the above piece in the 4-jaw to bore it true will be a challenge - note the spring pins which are supposed to line it up, although the hole is tapered so those pins may not be in the right place.
So, my question is - am I going about this the right way, or does anyone have a better way of fixing it? A replacement part is not going to be available, of course.
Oh, and to satisfy curiosity, this is the mill, as delivered, before I started stripping it down:
Thanks, Rob