First Machine- Northboys yet another JGRO variation

[Northboy]

Sorry about your mishap with the couplers.
When you do your screw upgrade, look into dumpstercnc couplers. I started with these and have not been sorry.

Already done Bob. I ordered Dumpster couplings and backlash nuts about a week back. They are already shipped, just waiting for them to clear customs and then for my ACME screw to come in at Fastenal.


Northboy

[BobF]

you're one step ahead, or I'm not paying attention :-)

[Northboy]

It turned into a hell of a nice day yesterday and I accidentally ended up digging out my Grandfathers homemade lawn roller and fiddling with an ancient Brigs and Stratten yesterday, with more TLC and (hopefully lawnrolling) today.

This beast was built by my Grandfather (who has been gone for 25 years now) in approximately 1975 when I was about 12 or so. Working on this is a great nostalgia experience, and I know where a lot of my love of building things came from. It has an ancient transmission (I could not find out where it was from by the numbers and google, it may be an Austin from my memory). A gear reduction on the Brigsy drives through to a manually engaged slip belt idler clutch (Pulled the other way is a brake of sorts)this drives through the trans (3 speeds forward, one back I think, I will know more today...)outputs to a chain drive to the front roller. It steers through articulating with a chain steer.

Quite a feat of garage engineering for the time and the money he did not have available as a hardworking guy.He was always building something out of almost nothing.

It has been in a shed at my dads for quite a while and comes out once in a while for a run.It was a little grouchy do to all the crap in needle and jet, but those ol carbs are pretty forgiving (and thirsty..)

Cheers and a cold Labatts Crystal Grandpa (That was always his brand way back then. I think it's been off the shelf for years now)


Northboy .... Out of the garage and into the yard

[BobF]

Thats quite the beast.
The steering wheel looks like an Olds from about 1972.

[Northboy]

Thats quite the beast.
The steering wheel looks like an Olds from about 1972.

I gotta bet it is closer to 1960 then seventy just because he built it (after checking with my mom after getting all nostalgic about this machine) in about 1972.

Northboy

[Northboy]

A great day for improving the yet unfinished machine if only time was available.

My ACME 10 2 start screw showed up at Fastenal . Not the least bit cheap, but the service was great and the screw seems to be straight and well cut. (I checked MANY supplier sin Ontario, and NONE had ACME 2 start stocked.

Then even better when I got home my Dumpster couplers and antibacklash nuts were in the mailbox, not at the post office duty owing....All the parts look great, and delivery was super quick, thanks Dumpster!
Unfortunately I am forced to spend my time working work for money instead of spending the time and money money on hobbies.

Hopefully I will get to get at it again in a day or three.

Northboy

[BobF]

Work always gets in the way. :-)
Looks good.
I love dumpsters parts.

[Northboy]

I had a day off today and it rained so I got to get out of the yard and back into the garage!

I got my Y axis upgrade pretty much done, it needs to be fine tuned and finished up a bit, but going from the 5/16 rod and homemade anti backlash nuts and bushings to acme 10 2 start 1/2 , dumpster coupling and anti backlash nuts and real bearings have made a HUGE difference.

I was testing it at 200 IPM and pretty fast acceleration with no problems, whip or stalling



Northboy

[Northboy]

Got to spend a few hours in the garage yesterday

I got my Y screw dialed in a bit better and my upgraded Dumpster nut mount fastened. Then I set to tearing apart my X-Z and got my Acme X screw installed. I may leave the Z alone with the threaded rod for now at least until I make a few cuts.The whipping on the short screw wasn't so bad.

I added some stiffeners in the back of the X carriage.Looking honestly and carefully at my X support pipes (ie with a dial) I found they like my Y are just flexing to damn much and will need support. Not sure what that is going to look like yet.

Sorry no more pics right now, I can't find where I left the camera.

Northboy

[Northboy]

I spent a bunch of time over the weekend working on Northmill (or Franken-machine as my lady calls it)

Got my Y (long axis) screw setup and fairly tight and straight. I checked my math as well as repeatability with a dial indicator. Seems to be pretty good!

[Northboy]

While the X-Z was on the bench I tightened and tuned everything, double nutted and locktighted it all as well. Hitting a nut or screw with a router bit is probably to be avoided.

I got my X axis acme bearings in and made another motor mount from 1/2 inch aluminum. I don't have to tell most people here how long it can take to make a nice mount with a hacksaw and drillpress.

The X and Y both run great and pretty fast, I will probably settle on a max speed of about 150 IPM, but I had it running faster than that. I decided to stick with the 5/16 18 on the Z for now, as redoing thatv pretty much means making the whole X-Z carriage again as it is all glued, and it seems to work okay enough until I get the machine running well to make more pieces.

Northboy

[Northboy]

I put the clamp table back on and dialed it in. It is withing .010 across the top which is accurate enough for now.

I slapped on a spoilboard of .mdf, I decided to just use screws and screw stuff to it for a while.

I drew some lines with a pen on jog, seems to be square. I used the Mach wizard to cut some pockets. I cut with a cheap router bit into chipboard, becauseit was there and cheap to screw around with.

They were square and accurate!!At first I was in a minor panic as a 5" pocket was over by just under 1/4 inch, then I realized it was almost exactly 2xR of toolcutter out. A good thing! I did some text with it, it looked like crap, but I ran the program several times and it always followed the exact lines.It is repeateable!

Now on to CAD and Cam learning then to make some parts to improve this thing. First up some stiffeners or the pipes on my X-axis.

Unfortunately I got so excited about cutting late Sunday night that I did not get any pictures of the cuts. Even worse for me, I probably will get no more time at this for a while because of that work thing.



Northboy