JC Price
Aluminum
- Joined
- Oct 21, 2007
- Location
- Boulder, CO
I'm finally renovating my 1968 Hardinge HLV-H. Here is a photo of the bed plate and casting:
Bedplate Thickness
After removing the rack and cleaning away gunk I can measure the thickness of the bed plate along its front edge. I get 0.8805 just in front of the headstock and 0.8810 at the tail end. I think there has been very little wear at these locations and so these values should be close to the original thickness. The worst place is about 10 inches from the front of the headstock where it is worn to 0.8682, or about 12 mills thinner. On the rear 45-degree surface of the bed plate there is a very clear wear step because the saddle does not reach quite all the way to the bottom of the bed plate. This step is also worst about 10 inches from the headstock, where it is 6 mills high. So it looks like my bed plate is about 12 mills concave on the top surface and about 6 mills concave on the sides.
The next step would seem to be to remove the bed plate, make a crate for it, and ship it off somewhere for regrinding. Could anyone here recommend a shop in the US that can do this competently? I talked to Hardinge about this about a year ago and they told me they will not regrind bed plates that are worn by more than 5 mills, so that does not seem to be an option for me. I plan to ask them if they still have replacement bed plates and how much they cost.
Bedplate Thickness
After removing the rack and cleaning away gunk I can measure the thickness of the bed plate along its front edge. I get 0.8805 just in front of the headstock and 0.8810 at the tail end. I think there has been very little wear at these locations and so these values should be close to the original thickness. The worst place is about 10 inches from the front of the headstock where it is worn to 0.8682, or about 12 mills thinner. On the rear 45-degree surface of the bed plate there is a very clear wear step because the saddle does not reach quite all the way to the bottom of the bed plate. This step is also worst about 10 inches from the headstock, where it is 6 mills high. So it looks like my bed plate is about 12 mills concave on the top surface and about 6 mills concave on the sides.
The next step would seem to be to remove the bed plate, make a crate for it, and ship it off somewhere for regrinding. Could anyone here recommend a shop in the US that can do this competently? I talked to Hardinge about this about a year ago and they told me they will not regrind bed plates that are worn by more than 5 mills, so that does not seem to be an option for me. I plan to ask them if they still have replacement bed plates and how much they cost.
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