VF-1 Spindle Refurbishment

I decided to look into the two problems that I have had since getting this machine running, spindle noise and poor finish on profiling cuts. I had put a rod down the transmission breather hole on top and it only came back wet on the very end. Lifetime lubrication - when it runs out of lube it runs out of life. I added some 80W gear oil and ATF to see if it made a difference. Not noticable.
I pulled the drawbar piston assembly (which is much different than the pictures in the manual - rectagular piston with rounded corners) and pulled the transmission forward to get the drive belt off. I ran the motor and the transmission was fairly quiet, no where near the noise it had before so I think almost all the noise must be from the spindle. The poor finish from side loaded tools would agree. I dropped the spindle out. The first task was taking the bearing nut off the top bearing. I bought an automotive axle nut wrench then made a driver block to weld on to it. I presumed the nut was torqued so I first tried a torque wrench so I could measure it. I was beyond the 150 ft-lb of the wrench. It took my 18" long 3/4" drive breaker bar with me standing on the end to loosen the nut. I have a steel tube that I use for pressing crankshafts and it came in handy to support the spindle housing whilst pressing the spindle out.
The spindle has two more bearing nuts locking the lower two bearings on the shaft. Now I am trying to decide whether to spend $50 on a hook spanner or make another.

I did not need the spanner to take off the two remaining bearing nuts. The top nut was Loctited and came off with some heat. The bottom nut turned right off. The reason for the bearing failure appears to be that someone left the O-ring out that seals the spindle to the face plate. The face plate to spindle housing O-ring was there.
The two angular contact bearings are 2MM9112WI Fafnir. Someone etched out the 2 and wrote 3. Fafnir makes 3MM9112WI bearings which are the next grade up (Abec 9). Perhaps they were being optimistic?

Whilst waiting for the spindle bearings I wanted to find out I could tighten the play in the Y axis. When tightening the vice on the table the dial indicator shows 0.004" of movement. I took off the servo and coupling. When I loosened the bearing collar it was not tight against the bearing. On this early version you were supposed to use a pnuematic piston to preload the bearings and then hand turn the nut until it just touches. I do not have one so I used the dial indicator to check the play. I got it down to 0.001" pushing both ways. Any tighter and the bearings started rumbling so I thought the bearings were bad. You are supposed to be able to push out the bearing housing by pushing the table back after removing the nut and bearing pack mounting bolts. That did not work so I tried a soft drift against the end. The drift was also hitting the outer race of the bearing. It moved about 1/2" then was stuck. I finally got the housing out when I used the drift just on the housing. These housings have a centre web with needle bearings on both sides and then ball bearings. Turns out the needle bearing nearest the ballscrew shoulder had desintigrated and was cutting into the shaft. The only way that I could get in there was to unbolt the servo mount and slide it back over the ballscrew. After knocking the spacer and ball bearing back against the shoulder of the ballscrew I was able to get in there with a jewlers file and remove the burr around the groove. I am going to replace the ball/needle bearing pack with a angular contact bearings.

I'm all for doing things yourself but with the Haas spindle replacement only $5000 why did you take it on your self to try to rebuild it? If you are like the rest of us working 10 hours a day to get 80% spindle utilization you have lost 40 hours of production since your first post. Now assuming your shop rate is $75.00 per hour then you have lost $3200 in revenue on a rebuild that may or may not be right. If you use the correct bearings then that about $1600 so now you are at $4800 and still have not completed the rebuild.

I am not knocking what or why your doing it yourself but the whole purpose of the Haas spindle cartridge is fast replacement. It is a given it will go out every 5 years like clockwork. When I blow a spindle I call before 5PM and a new one is installed before 12PM the next day (with a warranty). I see how it could be interesting to play around with a rebuild but a bit to risky for me.

Understood about the no backlog. As for the OEM bearings you need to be careful. You will find the numbers may match but but the class is off. When I used to do the spindle rebuilds on manual Knee mills in the 90's I would pay $900 for Torington gold series. I tried plain off the shelf bearings once but they shot after about two-three months.

I'm very interested in both the spindle rebuild and especially the thrust bearing. I was shocked to find a $10 pair of bearings with no means of lubricating without disassembly. I took a quick glance at what bearings were available and thought it possible but no time to fool with it.
I look forward to seeing how you did this.

Thanks for the details on the spindle. Being on a tight budget it may be an option on the old girl one day.

Yea getting the spindle back in is a bit of a trick. I used the vice unbolted to table and on a plastic bag [two layers]. Clamped the drive keys just tight so it would not fall over. S l o w ly lowered the head down while making lateral adjustments, once engaged I got within 1/8" to flange installed bolts and loosened vice.
Shimming square was a tedious task but she is square and true.

Did you install the big retaining nut, I left my just pushed with screwdriver tight.