Welcome to the Workshop - a refuge from office life!   

The home page  The Propane Foundry Learning CNC Kart Roadster Photography Electronics

If you wish to contact me, please E-mail by clicking on the following link and then remove the "spamtrap" Email 

Go to the Champion Mill ( Just down the page a bit! )
Go to the Harrison Mill ( Down the page a bit further! )
Down to MMA/SMA Welding Equipment ( Stick ARC welding )

The lathe is a Herbert Flashcap Capstan Lathe. It has started to get the home workshop treatment in that the air chuck and fittings have been removed, now with options of a 4 jaw independent, 3 jaw self centring and manual collect chucks. Fitted with a Variable speed inverter drive.   This provides spindle speeds from a few rpm to 3000 rpm with its 3 HP motor.

The Top slide screw has been replaced, the one and a quarter pitch thread was hard to work with, so this is now an 8 TPI screw.

A similar treatment was done to the main carriage lead screw, again going for an 8 TPI thread.

Although originally meant for brass work, with the spindle speeds and HP, it is just at home with steel and Carbide Insert tooling.

This is my Champion Mill. Purchased at about 5 years old from another HSM, after he had decided to upgrade to a larger Knee mill.
It is in good condition. It has a MT 3 spindle and 1/2 Hp motor.  Speed range is in 4 steps from 400 to 1640 rpm. At a weight of 300lbs, it is not a heavy machine, that is until you have to move it?

The lack of a key way on the vertical column will mean loss of register if I have to move the head up and down, but in a similar way to the Dore Westbury mill, has full head rotation of 360 degrees around the column and 90 degrees tilt in relation to the table.  This can allow some very weird milling profiles with standard cutters.

This machine has now been modified to have CNC capabilities.
Take a look at http://www.tamarisktechnicals.com/pages/cnc.html
Or use the learning CNC link above.

This could still do with a lick of paint, but what the hell. If it removes metal paint will come a lot later.

I did find a problem when I got it home, the arbour was swinging 45 thou out of line. This turned out to be the 30 International taper in the spindle.
I first re-cut the taper and machined the face of the spindle to get it back to running true. Later the spindle was replaced.
A Vertical Head means that the Mill can do a few more "Standard operations".

A Horizontal spindle range from 40 to 1000 rpm and cutters ranging from 2 to 5 inch dia, 1/8 inch to 5 inch in length.

The 3 phase 2 HP motor is running from the 240 house hold supply by use of a rotary converter from the following web page, http://home.att.net/~waterfront-woods/Articles/phaseconverter.htm.

My thanks go to the author and the many members of the newsgroups for advice.

Welding MMA/SMA

Other equipment includes MIG and a MMA/SMA welding plants.

I purchased a Oxford 180 Amp welder off ebay. This needed a bit of TLC to get back into full operating condition with 12 out of the 15 internal contacts and the two Blade switches needing replacement.
A bit of sand-blasting and fresh coat of paint add to the overall effect if not its operation. Being made in 1972 I had expected something like this, but with the parts replaced it should now prove to be good for another 30 years!

I did have a few other welding boxes as in the picture such as a 110 Amp and 70 Amp but these have now gone.

Add a small MIG welder, a bit of Oxy/Propane cutting equipment and a band saw and you have most of the major items of the workshop!  Ideal for that bit of fabrication.