Thread: getting the grease out of a bridgeport-very neat trick

so i hate harbor fright as much as the next guy but still buy the occasional supplies there, went in the other day to use up a few mag base coupons that i had and glanced at this thing.
i figured i would be bringing it back the next day after surely wasting time trying to make it work, most likely making a huge mess in the process and frustrating myself that much more
as it happens i couldn't have been more wrong.
a little back story, like many many of you my bridgie came with grease plugged zircs, they had even been painted over and the paint wasn't touched on the nipple end which obviously means this thing got plugged full of grease and used for god knows how long like that.
Luckily it was in a very light use hobby environment when i got it and all was still ok with the world.
I didnt have much time to pull the table and do things right this week and thought this tool might help me get some way oil into the zircs and maybe force some of the grease out.
so, i filled the plunger, put it on the first zirc and pushed the plunger, got quite a bit of resistance so followed the instructions to use a hammer and hit the plunger, heard kind of crackling noise behind the knee, like a bunch of little bubbles popping...looked back there and there was grease coming out en masse!!!! i couldn't believe it!
did all the zircs once each and was amazed at how much grease was coming out and new oil staying in.
very nice!
looks like not everything at harbor fright is a POS after all as this looks quite possibly like the best $20 i have spent in quite some time.
thought some of you in similar situations would appreciate this..hope everyone had a great 4th
the tool in question:
item# 97455


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and after just one pump into the knee:


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Our maintenance guys use one of these:
GREASE FITTING REJUVENATOR, GREASE FITTING CLEANER, GREASE ZERK CLEANER
The Zerk Zapper Tool - The Zerk Zapper Tool

If you machine had grease in it, chances are the set screw in the middle of the table has not been oiled.
JR

Originally Posted by vanguard cycle

so i hate harbor fright as much as the next guy ...... so followed the instructions to use a hammer and hit the plunger, heard kind of crackling noise behind the knee, like a bunch of little bubbles popping...looked back there and there was grease coming out en masse!!!! i couldn't believe it!

Magic! Worth the ferry-boat trip to get to HF. Or perhaps an online order.

'Target' here is a 'Quartet' mill, and given its combined horizontal AND vertical nature, one with grease in more places than a BP even owns 'places'.

Thanks!

Bill

yeah Bill, as much as i try to not support the place they do have a few things that are seemingly worth the trip.
but don't go through the effort of a ferry ride, if you cant get an online order with them where you are let me know and i will gladly stick one in the post for you.
and thanks for the link JR, seems like a nicer sturdier version of the HF tool.

Originally Posted by vanguard cycle

yeah Bill, as much as i try to not support the place they do have a few things that are seemingly worth the trip.
but don't go through the effort of a ferry ride, if you cant get an online order with them where you are let me know and i will gladly stick one in the post for you.
and thanks for the link JR, seems like a nicer sturdier version of the HF tool.

The 'ferry ride' (White's Ferry) just avoids DC beltway and Sputnik traffic. Nearest HF is other side of the Potomac from me, but not far in either time or miles. Hate to GO there, as I always end up spending on things - mostly junk - that I hadn't meant to buy ...

I trust their lifting straps only for HALF their rated load, and even that only for first-use. But .. they are cheap enough, and there is no other handy source for 'em at all here in La-La Land, so...

BTW - Northern carries all the same 'Chunk' but arguably at a slightly higher grade - or at least in more than one grade, and packages decently, so I tend to online with them more often.

Bill

yeah im lucky here at the shop as i have Northern, HF, Airgas, Fastenall, Home Depot, Lowes, etc. all within a 5 min or less drive, Fastenall and another local place (metro tool) are both walking distance and happen to be the better (and of course more expensive) suppliers out of my convenient choices so that's a huge plus for my location.
Ironically though i get most of my supplies mail order from McMasterr..go figure.

Originally Posted by vanguard cycle

yeah im lucky here at the shop as i have Northern, HF, Airgas, Fastenall, Home Depot, Lowes, etc. all within a 5 min or less drive, Fastenall and another local place (metro tool) are both walking distance and happen to be the better (and of course more expensive) suppliers out of my convenient choices so that's a huge plus for my location.
Ironically though i get most of my supplies mail order from McMasterr..go figure.

ACK. You are in one of the premier industrial sites in the South. Seaports have retained repair capability even when shipbuilding proper has escaped.

I miss Pittsburgh - or Pittsburgh as it WAS when they still made steel and shaped it anyway.

Washington, DC metro area's major 'product' is Gummint verbal BS and the paper to wipe it with. A hundred thousand pages or more worth of legislation and its supporting fluff every year just for the Federal Register alone.

Even the high-tech 'Beltway Bandit' HQ send most of the metal-bending and PCB stuffing half a continent or more away for physical implementation. Raw metals that Adam can pick up 2 miles from his shop even in smallish Pensacola, FL need a run to Baltimore, Richmond, Norfolk, or farther yet to source from where I sit.

And we wonder why our 'Leaders' don't understand the importance of manufacturing? May as well be ante-diluvian Sumerian temple carving for all they've ever seen of it...

Wasteland in more ways than one... DC area is ...

Bill

Originally Posted by JRIowa

The Zerk Zapper Tool - The Zerk Zapper Tool

I have an old time version of one of these. I like the air hammer version, I'll try that someday.

I just remove zerks and drop them overnight in a can of either diesel or whatever carb cleaner I have at the moment (usually strong acid), then rinse and power wire brush if necessary after.

I would highly encourage the OP to pull the table and clean the oil galleries, ways, and knee properly before using the mill. Its not the grease you need to worry about trying to remove as much as what is trapped in the grease - chips and grit - which IME are tough enough to scrub out many times much less flush out. Pulling the table and saddle is about a 20 minute job, and cleaning the ways and oil galleries shouldnt take more than an hour or two. When you do this, make sure you trace the oil path and check flow throughout. Mine came with freshly replaced feed nuts, which were missing a critical oil feed hole and preventing oil from flowing to one of the feedscrews.

Originally Posted by vanguard cycle

yeah im lucky here at the shop as i have Northern, HF, Airgas, Fastenall, Home Depot, Lowes, etc. all within a 5 min or less.

M'town is only 20K. I live 9 miles outside of town. The Fastenal store here is about the size of my barn. Then there's a True Value, and Menards. Northern is about 70 miles away in DesMoines. The closest tool house is DECO in DSM, that's only 60 miles away. I'm so far out in the boonies that FedEx gets directions.
JR

This seems like a great tool for when the table, saddle are removed. To aid the pipe-cleaners, when clearing out the oil galleries.

The directions say to fill it with cutting oil to open them up. What does the forum say about this versus using way oil?

Originally Posted by Cadillac STS

The directions say to fill it with cutting oil to open them up. What does the forum say about this versus using way oil?

'cutting' oil is just too broad a description. Some of it has nasty additives. I'd think kerosene or a light mineral oil safer if need be, and the normal oil that is to be used the safest choice of all.

Also agree full tear-down for cleaning is still a good idea. Coarse cuttings are not all that likely to have back-fed into the galleries, even worn ways are usually tighter than that. But wear particles AKA 'fretting corrosion' will have done, and that black paste is a first-cousin to coarse jeweler's rouge as an abrasive.

Bill

Put a Zerk fitting on the end of this...



Also makes a great oil gun to lube Bridgeports with Zerk nipples.
It's 10,000 psi dude!
--Doozer