What Bridgeport is this??

Hi all,

Looking to purchase my first mill for the farm workshop and have no experience in buying mills other than what I have gleaned from PM.
I have found this Bridgeport in South Africa for sale and am very interested in it as seems to be priced well and comes with a bit of tooling. However the X and Y axis powerfeed are not working, but the Z does work. I assume the fault is an electrical problem or servo motors? Any other ideas? What else should I be looking for in this department. Is it an easy fix or are there possibly other gremlins at work? I don't have the option to fly down to see it but will be sending someone there tomorrow to look at it for me whilst we do video chat.

Any idea on what the model number is? They haven't been able to locate that information, only the SN# on the head AS854F which google hasn't been able to cross reference.

The motor is 3 phase and was rewound couple years ago. At the moment it is located in a home garage/ workshop.

Any insights would be a great help.

Cheers,
Greg

Certainly not a Bridgeport expert, but... The "Bridgeport by Adcock - Shipley" shows it to be one of the machines built under licence in England. Same with the ASxxx number on the head. Looking at it, it looks like the standard Bridgeport, what became the "series one" when Bridgeport came out with the heavier CNC series two. The Head is the 2J varispeed, looks like mine, likely is a 1.5 HP motor. If the lead screw nuts aren't worn out, should be a decent machine. New nuts and other parts are available in the US from several vendors; can't comment if they also fit the Adcock-Shipley machines. Maybe one of our British members will chime in.

Dennis

Yup British built version.

Date it was made can be worked out from the Adcock Shipley plate on the side. Last four digits give you the month and year it was made , 0676 on mine for June 1976.

Feeds are probably 6F or 8F. DC motors driven by an electronic controller in the base of the electronics box on the side. Usually Erskine built. Simple straight forward design and generally repairable. Circuit and data set in the files on the Bridgeport_mill yahoo group.

Clive

Morning,

Thanks for the input. I have now purchased this machine and super excited in getting it up here. It has to undergo a 1500km journey. Have a read a couple posts on people moving them and hopefully my x border runner (transporter) knows how to dismantle the turret part. Any additional advice or tips I should be aware of?

The mill was purchased for R40000 and comes with some some tooling. Pictures attached. Can't make out what is on the lower right of the trolley next to the rotary table. Any idea chaps?

The X and Y seem to move easily by hand and very little backlash. The guy had written "backlash 0.5" on the handwheel so assume it's a metric machine being english. Will most likely keep it as a manual machine till I figure out and teach myself how to use it safely and minimise crashes.

Having no experience on mills, I have not figured out what the taper in the quill is and what tool holders I need. I assume CAT30 or plain morse taper? Is there any other tooling that you can suggest I will need as my step kid will be coming out next month and have 20 kilos of suitcase space to fill.

Thanks again,
Greg

Most BP mills have R8 spindles. Some were built with NMTB 30 or ISO 30 tapers. You had better hope you have R8, as 30 taper tooling is uncommon and more expensive. The only difference between NMTB and ISO is the drawbar threads, inch/metric.

The 6F powerfeed on it is simple, yet time consuming, to work on. I was in Cape Town in June for work, wasn't on a Bridgeport though. I have contacted the customer out there I was working with to see if they can get parts for a BP for ya.

The second picture wont let me expand it to see what is on it. Maybe its my browser...

I fix the power feeds for a living, so if you have any questions, you can always ask and I will try to help walk you through it.

Jon
H&W Machine Repair

Down the page is a discussion of the Adcock Shipley version of the BP.

http://www.lathes.co.uk/bridgeport/

Manuals are free at the Hardinge web page. Click the one like yours:

https://www.shophardinge.com/kneemillparts.aspx

Most BP mills have R8 spindles. Some were built with NMTB 30 or ISO 30 tapers. You had better hope you have R8, as 30 taper tooling is uncommon and more expensive. The only difference between NMTB and ISO is the drawbar threads, inch/metric.

Click to expand...

This is more or less true.
You would think that since both R8 & NMBT30 tapers are 1-1/4" at gage line, that they would be "equal".

However, I find 30T more rigid, better centering, and it gives the option of bolting heavy tooling right to the spindle face. BP bearings are perhaps not heavy duty enough to fully exploit such an option, but a 30T will easily run a 4" or larger face mill. Tight up in the spindle with the quill retracted and locked, the overhang is so short that it is pretty much a breeze even in relatively "heavy" (for a turret mill) cuts.

OTOH, I have a boring head fetish, and have had to make the 30T arbors for every one ever acquired (Tree, Wohly, Universal, etc) except the simple styles. 30T solid sockets & some ER collet chucks for mills are about the same overhang or shorter than BP up to 1/2". But in 5/8" & 3/4" shank they won't suck as much of the tool up in the spindle as R8 will; so the projection is longer. At 1" and above (if you even need to run them) the extension is about the same. Asian 30T tooling as well as old higher end stuff is readily available and cheap on eBay. I've found most of it adequate or better.

smt

In the first pic it looks like a line of R8 collets in the tool caddy, in front of the line of shell mill arbors that I assume have straight shanks.

Dennis