What's new
What's new

Old Bridgeport with adjustable head positioning

Damien W

Stainless
Joined
Aug 3, 2006
Location
Brisbane, Queensland
A friend of mine was telling me in a telephone conversation today that he attended an auction yesterday where one of the two old Bridgeport style machines offered had a machined TEE slot clamping plate set up horizontal to the table on the ram to allow the turret head to be positioned along its surface.

The machine was manually operated. No power feeds.

Does all that sound correct? Belatedly he realised it might have been adaptable to take the slotting attachment he has yet to mount on his BP but at $500 we both agreed too expensive for the application.
 
it was formerly a tracer or duplicator. I have seen them, never used one. I had a then customer want to sell me one for " more than it was worth to me " once, I declined and have not seen one since.
 
There was a two head and a three head machine listed on ebay a couple of days ago. The auction may have ended by now, but if not, you can look at them for reference. They've been listed a few times and ended with no bids. The "buy it now" price has been dropped each time so they must not be very sought after.

Duane
 
I do not think they were particularly accurate machines,but could be remembering wrong. Maybe that's why they aren't too sought after. I mean the tracer part wasn't too accurate. Nothing wrong with the rest.
 
Thank you to all contributors. And thanks for the link Macona. I have attempted to Email the contents to my friend.

One thing is certain, there is no shortage of good information on BP mills and their clones on this forum. See how quickly an answer came on the useless "tit" question, "My R-8 arbor spun in the spindle of my mill, what now?" (gulp for breath) by Muleworks.

In the early days of my lurking here it was immediately obvious that BP's were very popular in hobby and more serious machine shops in the US.

And in a forward reply to Milacron's observation, the more you see of machine tools the easier it is to see the logical evolution that occurred. I think a lot of the developments never returned the expected financial rewards that the inventor hoped for. Technology swiftly obsolesced? overtook the innovations in their m/c's. This advance and the shortage of cast iron in the days of Sir Joseph Whitworth meant that there are not many examples of his machines left to display in industrial museums. They were melted down to form the newer machines.
 
I do not think they were particularly accurate machines,but could be remembering wrong. Maybe that's why they aren't too sought after. I mean the tracer part wasn't too accurate. Nothing wrong with the rest.
They aren't too sought after because CNC has made them obsolete. Nothing to do with accuracy. I used a Bridgeport tracer for years and was amazed at how accurate it was.
 








 
Back
Top