What's new
What's new

Repairing severe wear on Blanchard grinder

ewlsey

Diamond
Joined
Jul 14, 2009
Location
Peoria, IL
I'm working on a Blanchard grinder. I was asked to replace the ring gear on the bottom of the chuck and scrape it in and rescrape the bearing in the saddle. I also rebuilt the bevel gear box that drives the chuck rotation. That's all done and worked fine. But, I found a much bigger issue when I went to put it back together.

The "saddle" as I call it, is the carrier for the magnetic chuck. It slide in and out on ways that are integral to the base casting of the machine. On the back side of the machine (away from the operator controls) is a single way that handles the side load of the saddle. The front side just floats. Someone must have tried to rebuild this way at one time and either botched the job, or didn't understand how the ways are supposed to work. They ended up with about a 1/4" gap around the way that is attached to the saddle, and they glued on a piece of Turcite and blocked the grease passages.

As a result, the saddle rocks back and forth when you move it in and out and only the very ends of the way are bearing. This has caused about .035-.05" of wear in the base casting in a sort of hour glass shape with the ends being more worn. The opposite side, the water cover, is also badly worn with a belly in the middle about .05" deep. Also, some the bolts have broken and the bolt holes have broken out, probably from the ways being so incredibly loose and allowing the hole saddle to bang around.

So, I need to fix it. We bought a replacement way for the saddle, so I can throw out the old one with the crappy Turcite. I can make a new shim that is the correct thickness. I think I can machine the wear out of the water cover and fix the broken bolt holes.

But, I'm not sure how to fix that step in the base casting. It really needs to be built back up to the nominal dimension because the saddle is driven by a rack and pinion and the engagement of the teeth is compromised by the wear in the ways.

The only thing I can think to do is build a form and try to fill the step with Moglace. This is a bearing surface and the saddle will slide on the Moglace. The only repairs I have done with Moglace were static surfaces.

The guys I am working for also mentioned a product called Belzona. They have used it to fix shafts and gear boxes for stamping presses and they say it works very well.

005.jpg006.jpg007.jpg008.jpg009.jpg
 
Stop being such a girlpants! Have it out with an angle grinder!! :D

Seriously tho how big is the uber worn surface? How much material would you have to remove to straighten it up? Is roughing out and using Turcite or similar an option? Is shimming the rack an option?

Just chucking them out there, cant quite visualise the situation yet tbh. If machining really isnt an option, an angle grinder can remove stock pretty dam quick when you get in the groove with it.
 
The rack is pinned, so it would have to be modified pretty extensively.

The worn area is 1" tall and about 55" long. I thought about gluing on Turcite, and I may still. The problem is how to bring the Turcite back to the same level as the rest of the casting. That's a lot of scraping.

I guess I should point out, the first two pictures are the water cover, the next two are the base casting. The wear is right above the side holes.
 
attachment.php


Is this the surface were talking about? If so setting a cutter up, a router / die grinder on a an angle plate riding the unworn sections (above and below the worn bit) could be an option :scratchchin:

Re the grinding:- It took me something like 3 - 4 hours to take 0.012" of even wear out a 75" by 2" vertical surface, think thats getting close to what youve to remove. The first few thou were the slowest in tippy tappy dont know what im doing style. Things got a lot quicker from then on.

Edit:- Now realise you meant the step is 30 - 50 thou.
 
Last edited:
Moglice works well for such things.
One thing to remember is that this way surface means nothing to the use of the machine.
One can have 0.100 wear here and you can still hold microns.
This was never a "tight" way surface like a mill of lathe and it likes some clearance. Do not confuse it with other machine tools.
Different machine and different design requirements.
Bow in the top surface is the bigge as it affects chuck stopping position vs. part size.
Do not try to make a zero fit, scraped and flaked way surface here, any sticktion will rock the assembly into not following the top surface leading to problems you do not want.
 
I would never use Belzona for anything. It's super expensive and IMHO is not worth it. I would never put it on anything. 30 years ago a Belzona Rep stopped buy the shop bragging about how great it was. Then I got a contract to repairs on a BIG G&L, to make a long story short I hired the Belzona rep to help repair some galling scores on the side of the bed. It failed after about 3 months of use and I ended up pulling the base out of the the plant and having it machined. Then put on Bronze wearstrips on the saddle to bring it back so the feed screws lined up.

On the Blanchard, the best way would be to dismantle if and set the base on a boring machine and mill the whole side to clean up. make a new gib (flat bar on top) and clearance bar.

2nd choice would be to hand grind, file and scrape the .015 out and make a thinker gib. I would never glue on Tucite on the exposed base. You could make up some sort of L shaped contraption to bolt on to the unworn bottom section and make a hand held plane like this contraption Hand Planing a Dovetail. In Iron. - YouTube

By the time you spend making a contraption you could scrape it. and make a thicker top gib. The rack pinion bracket can be re-pined as the clearance in the bracket holes have some clearance. I would send the gib cover brackets out and have them planed to clean up. Be sure the machine shop makes a good setup to hold them straight as they are a pain to machine.
 
Last edited:
Cash has said he and his Madison Grinder rebuilders have had terrible luck using Moglice on Grinders. I would never put turcite or moglice on the exposed side. The saddle is shorter then the bed and the tucite would be exposed and that would be a Fail sooner then later on a Blanchard where it has swarf penetrating all over.

See if you buddies can remember working on Devliegs as they used to epoxy glue a hardened steel strip on the gib side of the column I just looked a little while on the net and found this one, there are probably more out there that would make a hardened strip you could epoxy on the bed. But again you would need to make the base way straight and parallel before gluing it on, so you could just use iron on iron and save some work and expense.

Steel Edging, Strip Steel, Steel Coil: Blue Blade Steel
 
I hope I am not hijacking this thread that Westley is telling us, but again I like to add from my many years of experience rebuilding these machines. The biggest Blanchard I rebuilt was a 104" for Checker Machine in Minneapolis MN years ago. I have also rebuilt others and they all have the same traits of wear.
That machine was worn so bad and was so big we rebuild the machine in-house and used the method I described above, using angle grinders, hand held belt grinders and scrapers.

I may drop dead tomorrow and I want to get out the info from my 50+ years of info. I am not telling Westley he doesn't already know or the rebuilders he is working with. The class we just had at Bourne and Koch who now are the owners of the brand of machine. I am speaking to all the folks who read this information.

For years Blanchard used grease as a lubricant on the ways. Blanchard advised us the grease not only lubed the ways, it acted like a seal to keep out the swarf that was full of abrasive dressed off the stone (wheel, coolant, grit ground off the parts.

They told the operators to grease the machine before each use to clean out the grit and lube under the saddle. But lazy operators or poor maintenance and they greased it when they remembered and that grease turned into lapping compound and you saw so much wear when you got them apart. Look at the pictures Westley has above, look at the crud on the way covers, one the machine. That's the way the ways look on them. Plus the saddle didn't have way wipers and the gease would pile up on the ends of the ways and eventually the saddle would get high in the middle under there, so it rocked like a rocking chair in use and when it traversed back in forth. In like many machines the saddle is rapided under the wheel and does not feed. Like a lathe or mill. The feed on a Blanchard feeds straight down. I am sure Carbide Bob and Cash can tell you more about the operation and how to rebuild these machines.

So there is my piece of info today. I will watch and add more. Now B&K and rebuilders replace the grease with auto lube oil pumps, add way wipers, etc. This machine is a great candidate for installing the way wipers on a 20 degree angle so it pushes the swarf off the ways and not pushing it forward. Think about the wiper is like a snow plow or a road grader, as the saddle moves forward it cleans off the swarf and it falls off the ways. Thanks for starting this thread as it will teach so much. Rich
 
Instead of bothering to fix the surface with .050" of wear at all could you replace the piece in your drawing you call the "shim" with a thicker hard steel stepped piece that would form an entire new 55" long way surface? The water cover would move out the thickness of the new part, but it would all bolt together and you wouldn't dick with scraping, moglice or fixing the base casting at all.

You'd have to mill, heat treat and grind a 55" long part, or just make it in appropriate length segments.
 
Instead of bothering to fix the surface with .050" of wear at all could you replace the piece in your drawing you call the "shim" with a thicker hard steel stepped piece that would form an entire new 55" long way surface? The water cover would move out the thickness of the new part, but it would all bolt together and you wouldn't dick with scraping, moglice or fixing the base casting at all.

You'd have to mill, heat treat and grind a 55" long part, or just make it in appropriate length segments.

+!

IF that can work....

...the advantage to it is that at heart it is just a long, flat, rectangle, and once prepped for and dimensions were had it could be subbed-out to a specialist who had the grinders and experience to do it without warping it.

Love the idea of pumps, oil, and angled wipers instead of grease and wish-for as well.

Looks as if the original design was not the best. Why would a customer want to risk going through this exercise again, and sooner rather than later?
 
Most of the Blanchards I have worked on have Trabon auto grease pumps for the column, bottom spindle bearing, dresser, and elevating screw. The saddles have a Bijur way oil pump on a timer. IMO, this is a crap system. Those Trabon units are all junk. They require air pressure to operate, and most owners I have met don't know that, so they never hook them up. The machines have no interlocks on the lube system so they can run forever with the lube pumps not working. The oil pumps on the saddle also have issues. The copper lines get corroded quickly by the built up grinding sludge and pretty soon they leak out all of the oil before it makes it to the ways.

This machine has manual grease zerks for all of the lubrication needs. It's a pretty old machine. I would guess from the late 1950s.

The other saddle ways are worn, but not badly. These grinders can be severely worn and still make good parts. As long as the saddle stops in the same place consistently and doesn't move around during grinding, they can be adjusted to grind flat despite wear in the ways.
 
As long as the saddle stops in the same place consistently and doesn't move around during grinding, they can be adjusted to grind flat despite wear in the ways.

I'm sure that has saved a lot of ass-tissue over long years, but you just KNOW you'd like to improve on it anyway - if there's any budget at all for it.

Sadly, there seldom IS...

:(
 
Instead of bothering to fix the surface with .050" of wear at all could you replace the piece in your drawing you call the "shim" with a thicker hard steel stepped piece that would form an entire new 55" long way surface? The water cover would move out the thickness of the new part, but it would all bolt together and you wouldn't dick with scraping, moglice or fixing the base casting at all.

You'd have to mill, heat treat and grind a 55" long part, or just make it in appropriate length segments.

Most of the machines I worked on had 2 shims and they are ground right clearance, usually .002 or .001" per side for oil. The base needs to be scraped parallel or it will bind up as it is moved forward. He could make a stepped gib as ill states..I depends on how much $$ they want to put in it. If B&K are doing the rebuild I would bet they would do it the number 1 way, just to avoid liability in doing a 12 assed job. But if it is for Joe's Grinding who needs the machine done fast and Wes and his guys will do it a way that will work for 10 years to get it up and going. The Turcite would work, but I bet with-in 2 years it will be worn thru. (sitting in paris typing this at air france lounge) Rich
 
If im seeing things right its quite an easy repair. The water cover needs machining flat no matter what, the shim is a non wearing part and could go again, the way you have already bought new which im guessing will be supplied slightly undersized to the shim (but check ;)). That just leaves the worn surface on the base to correct, easy enough. And the 0.060" odd clearance from base to the way to attend to, again unless im missing something, a way liner glued to the way (not the base), Turcite or something more durable takes care of this clearance and maintains the original rack / pinion fit.

Im pretty surprised to hear about grease lubed ways tbh, but what do I know. Way wipers and oil lube sounds great, would like to see how they could be employed.

Not even seen a Blanchard grinder in the flesh as yet :o but if it were my machine id see this guide as kinda secondary next to the main surfaces, would at least want to work the saddle so its not rocking vertically.

I suppose it depends on what kinda size parts the owners wana run. Small parts that sit out at the edge of chuck wont mind a if the chuck isnt globally flat, but big parts that span the chuck would, id imagine ;)
 
Most of the Blanchards I have worked on have Trabon auto grease pumps for the column, bottom spindle bearing, dresser, and elevating screw. The saddles have a Bijur way oil pump on a timer. IMO, this is a crap system. Those Trabon units are all junk. They require air pressure to operate, and most owners I have met don't know that, so they never hook them up. The machines have no interlocks on the lube system so they can run forever with the lube pumps not working. The oil pumps on the saddle also have issues. The copper lines get corroded quickly by the built up grinding sludge and pretty soon they leak out all of the oil before it makes it to the ways.

This machine has manual grease zerks for all of the lubrication needs. It's a pretty old machine. I would guess from the late 1950s.

The other saddle ways are worn, but not badly. These grinders can be severely worn and still make good parts. As long as the saddle stops in the same place consistently and doesn't move around during grinding, they can be adjusted to grind flat despite wear in the ways.

I ran one in another life that was probably at least that old. It was a POS, like you said, lube pumps not maintained, not greased, dresser half broken, etc etc. BUT, as you mentioned, still possible to make good parts. We had a 48" chuck on ours and routinely (well, alot of times let me re-phrase ;)) ground rectangular plates as big as would fit on a 48" diameter to flat and parallel within .001"/
 
This looks like a little No. 18 grinder just like I grew up on. Lots of problems with this old design.......

Where you are seeing the wear on the base is just soft cast iron, yes, I know you know this. The newer Blanchards have hardened ways here. Your machine here could be 1960 or older.

First-I totally agree with Richard on the turcite here-DO NOT USE IT. This is a harsh environment and it will get torn up instantly. Moglice-I guess maybe you could fix it with this, I am really not sure.

The Blanchard lube system, yea, on this old machine would have been grease to the carriage and to the column ways. Wow, what a great idea to grease the carriage they had-this would allow all the swarf and grinding wheel grit to stick and act just like lapping compound. My guess was Blanchard back then was shipping so many machines that they could have cared less to improve anything and just make it down and dirty cheap. Richard explained the reason above for the grease, that may be what Blanchard was thinking, who knows.

How to fix your problem- I would send the base out to be machined and then you could do 2 things-put hardened ways on the base and then cast iron inserts on the carriage. Or, since you work at B&K, I think, why don't you put linear guides on it? I could do the machining for you if they are too busy. I can make the hardened ways if you like as well.

I had the EXACT problem with the No. 18 I grew up on. After many years the carriage would jockey in and out, side to side. I know it was the bad design of the base. I gave that machine to MSC about 20 years ago. I knew I did not even want to try and fix the old machine, it would have been tossing good money after bad.

I would have just scrapped this machine out and found another in better shape, there are some mint ones out there that you can get for a good price. I don't mean this in a bad way but there comes a point to where on some of these old machine it just does not pay. A guy asked me just yesterday about rebuilding an old humpback Mattison, I told him salvage the magnetic chucks and send the rest of it to the scrap yard. there are other fish in the sea.
 
These guys are just sharpening trim dies with this machine. I think if I can tighten it up a little bit it will work well enough for them for many years. I think I have a plan.

It's an 18, but it's a 36" chuck and 100 hp spindle, so it's sort of the deluxe model. Or as deluxe as those got. FWIW, I'd take one of these ancient 18s over a newer "HD" model. It seems like they really cheaped out on those. The columns were much narrower and taller to increase the capacity. The base castings are also less substantial.

I don't mind the design of the Blanchards, but I don't understand why they didn't put just a little effort into guarding and covering the ways. Every one I have worked on had severe wear in the bottom 6" of the vertical column ways. They have a little half-ass shield, but no wipers and a heavy coating of grease.

The bevel gear box for the chuck rotation is also a terrible design. They are supposed to be filled with oil, but 90% of the ones I have seen have a grease zerk on them and are full of watery goopy greasy crap. This one had to be rebuilt.
 








 
Back
Top