moparmuscl
Aluminum
- Joined
- Mar 27, 2011
- Location
- Spring Branch, TX
I decided to start a thread detailing my 'rebuild' of my 1991 Haas VF-1. I have never owned a mill, CNC mill or even messed with one in my life. I love to fabricate anything, and I'm looking to take my projects to the next level. One of the things I hope to accomplish with this thread is having people giving me pointers about my rebuild along the way. So with that said, don't hesitate to give me tips along the way.
So I have been wanting a CNC machine for ever. I stumbled on this '91 Haas VF-1 on Craigslist a couple months ago. It was listed for $10,000 and I thought it was a great deal. I went to look at it and decided I wanted it. I asked him how much he was asking and he said $7,000. I didn't question the difference in price, but I asked if he'd throw in some tooling to sweeten the deal; he agreed. The only issue mentioned with the machine was the it dropped tool...very regularly. He said that he would have his repair guy come fix it before I picked it up. Over a month passed an his guy never made it. I know he was trying to get him down because his other VF-1 had a new power supply sitting there that was waiting to be installed. He finally called a couple weeks ago and said the he had about given up hope and just wanted to get it out of there. If I came and got it as is he would only charge $6,000 and I'd still get the tooling. I happily agreed to the deal and that weekend I was going to get it.
To save money, I moved the machine myself (I had a co-workers help). I used a 8,000 lb capacity forklift (it weighed 13,300 lbs!) from work to do most of the moving. I also borrowed on of the hotshot drivers 35' gooseneck trailers and went and rented a 20' bumper pull trailer for the forklift. It took all day, but I got the machine moved the 15 miles to my house. To get it in the garage (I have a 7' door) I had to remove the service loop and lay it down and remove the Z-axis servo motor. With a smaller 4,800 lb capacity forklift and a pallet jack I moved the Haas to it's final resting spot in the 3rd stall of my 3 car garage. To allow the service loop full travel I had to cut a hole in the ceiling of the garage, but it's well worth it.
I'm running the machine off a 20 hp American Rotary phase converter that I have semi-hard wired into the garage. All 3-phase lines were run inside the grey pvc-like electrical conduit. I'm running the Haas, a Wilton 7040 horizontal bandsaw, and a 20" disc sander from the phase converter. After I got the machine plugged in and running, it started overheating VERY quickly. I read that the voltage was most likely too high. I measure my 3 phase and I had two poles at 242V and one at 252V. The machine came with a couple transformers that he used to step up the voltage. I re-wired that to set down the voltage. I how have two lines of 225V and one line of 235V going into the machine.
Next came fixing the issues with the tool holder. This was already documented in the thread below. The tool holder is now adjusted and works great. There is a slight upward pull on the carousel when the draw bar grabs the tool holder, but I think I can live with that.
http://www.practicalmachinist.com/vb/haas/91-haas-vf-1-drops-tools-atc-issues-234568/
After I had it machine tore down to fix the tool changer I figured 'why stop there'? So in my true nature of doing everything overboard, I found myself ripping my new-to-me machine apart and cleaning everything. I've found that Simple Green and Brillo pads work pretty good. Today I took the way covers and all the plastics up to work and power washed everything since they had some heavy build up. The power washer up there is heated and pumps in some heavy duty 'rig cleaner' soap. The way covers are in great shape except for the way wipers (I'm getting all this terminology from A&A website since them manufactured the covers). I noticed on their website the rebuild them as well as offer rebuild kits. I plan on calling them tomorrow to get pricing on both. I will probably get the kit because I don't want to have too much money wrapped in a machine that repair parts will probably be hard to come by.
http://www.gortite.com/telescopic-covers/telaflex-telescopic-steel-covers/telaflex-repair
http://www.gortite.com/telescopic-covers/telaflex-telescopic-steel-covers/telescopic-repair-parts
So that's were I'm left at the moment....cleaning a lot of way and aluminum cuttings from every nook and cranny in the machine. All covers are off and everything is exposed. I don't need to eat off every surface, but if I can easily get to it I will make an effort to clean it. As best I can tell, the ball screws are tight and the linear slides are in pretty decent shape (at least for what I want to do on a 20 year old machine). I have a list of parts that I need to order from Haas, so I'll probably do that tomorrow. Here some pics:
So I have been wanting a CNC machine for ever. I stumbled on this '91 Haas VF-1 on Craigslist a couple months ago. It was listed for $10,000 and I thought it was a great deal. I went to look at it and decided I wanted it. I asked him how much he was asking and he said $7,000. I didn't question the difference in price, but I asked if he'd throw in some tooling to sweeten the deal; he agreed. The only issue mentioned with the machine was the it dropped tool...very regularly. He said that he would have his repair guy come fix it before I picked it up. Over a month passed an his guy never made it. I know he was trying to get him down because his other VF-1 had a new power supply sitting there that was waiting to be installed. He finally called a couple weeks ago and said the he had about given up hope and just wanted to get it out of there. If I came and got it as is he would only charge $6,000 and I'd still get the tooling. I happily agreed to the deal and that weekend I was going to get it.
To save money, I moved the machine myself (I had a co-workers help). I used a 8,000 lb capacity forklift (it weighed 13,300 lbs!) from work to do most of the moving. I also borrowed on of the hotshot drivers 35' gooseneck trailers and went and rented a 20' bumper pull trailer for the forklift. It took all day, but I got the machine moved the 15 miles to my house. To get it in the garage (I have a 7' door) I had to remove the service loop and lay it down and remove the Z-axis servo motor. With a smaller 4,800 lb capacity forklift and a pallet jack I moved the Haas to it's final resting spot in the 3rd stall of my 3 car garage. To allow the service loop full travel I had to cut a hole in the ceiling of the garage, but it's well worth it.
I'm running the machine off a 20 hp American Rotary phase converter that I have semi-hard wired into the garage. All 3-phase lines were run inside the grey pvc-like electrical conduit. I'm running the Haas, a Wilton 7040 horizontal bandsaw, and a 20" disc sander from the phase converter. After I got the machine plugged in and running, it started overheating VERY quickly. I read that the voltage was most likely too high. I measure my 3 phase and I had two poles at 242V and one at 252V. The machine came with a couple transformers that he used to step up the voltage. I re-wired that to set down the voltage. I how have two lines of 225V and one line of 235V going into the machine.
Next came fixing the issues with the tool holder. This was already documented in the thread below. The tool holder is now adjusted and works great. There is a slight upward pull on the carousel when the draw bar grabs the tool holder, but I think I can live with that.
http://www.practicalmachinist.com/vb/haas/91-haas-vf-1-drops-tools-atc-issues-234568/
After I had it machine tore down to fix the tool changer I figured 'why stop there'? So in my true nature of doing everything overboard, I found myself ripping my new-to-me machine apart and cleaning everything. I've found that Simple Green and Brillo pads work pretty good. Today I took the way covers and all the plastics up to work and power washed everything since they had some heavy build up. The power washer up there is heated and pumps in some heavy duty 'rig cleaner' soap. The way covers are in great shape except for the way wipers (I'm getting all this terminology from A&A website since them manufactured the covers). I noticed on their website the rebuild them as well as offer rebuild kits. I plan on calling them tomorrow to get pricing on both. I will probably get the kit because I don't want to have too much money wrapped in a machine that repair parts will probably be hard to come by.
http://www.gortite.com/telescopic-covers/telaflex-telescopic-steel-covers/telaflex-repair
http://www.gortite.com/telescopic-covers/telaflex-telescopic-steel-covers/telescopic-repair-parts
So that's were I'm left at the moment....cleaning a lot of way and aluminum cuttings from every nook and cranny in the machine. All covers are off and everything is exposed. I don't need to eat off every surface, but if I can easily get to it I will make an effort to clean it. As best I can tell, the ball screws are tight and the linear slides are in pretty decent shape (at least for what I want to do on a 20 year old machine). I have a list of parts that I need to order from Haas, so I'll probably do that tomorrow. Here some pics: