I've been slowly working on converting my old CNC mill back to manual.
Bought a set of new lead screws on ebay to replace the ball screws, but
they weren't an exact match for this old Millport. To get the Y screw to
line up, I had to machine shims for the knuckle to bring it up to the
right height. Y axis is SWEET, about .003 backlash. That was the easy one.

On the X axis, needless to say, I have a similar situation, however the
end bearing supports can't just be shimmed. After much consideration,
I've decided to drill out and tap the 3/8-16 holes to 3/4-16 and fill
with short lengths of all-thread. These will be Loctited and pinned.
Went this large, as it allows me to drill out existing holes on center,
but the new holes will remain entirely within the plugs.
I'll then align the bearing supports, transfer punch, and drill/tap new
holes. With this repair, it'll be good as new, and anyone down the road
can fit a power feed to the X axis with no hassles.

Thing holding me up was drilling these out. I have a customer that was
willing to loan me a mag base drill, but this project is one that goes
in starts and stops, and I didn't want to have his drill tied up.
A Cole drill seemed the obvious answer. Last year when money was tight,
they seemed to be all over eBay, sometimes 2-3 listed at the same time.
Now that I've got the coin to spare, not one to be found on my search.
Well, dawned on me last week that I was only looking in Business and
Industrial. Opened that search up to all ebay, and there was one listed,
under collectibles! It's now sitting on the bench here being cleaned up.
Not as pristine as I would have liked, but more than serviceable and now
I can move on with getting the Millport ready to sell.


Jon

Jon Anderson wrote:
... eBay, ...
Well, dawned on me last week that I was only looking in Business and
Industrial. Opened that search up to all ebay, and there was one listed,
...

I never search under any category, always "all eBay". There are too
many jerk-off sellers who list under inappropriate categories.

Bob

On 7/14/2011 1:36 PM, Bob Engelhardt wrote:

I never search under any category, always "all eBay". There are too many
jerk-off sellers who list under inappropriate categories.

Well, often what I'm trying to search for, searching all of ebay returns
tons of unrelated crap in other categories. I've gotten pretty good at
finding what I want. I do sometimes search all, especially as some
things can legitimately wind up in widely different categories. But
generally, restricting categories is the easiest way to narrow things down.

Now, if sellers would just stop listing universal items as specific to
anything and everything it'll fit. Like 55mm polarizer filter for
Minolta, for Sony, for Nikon, for Canon, etc etc etc. The same seller
will have dozens of 55mm filters listing every damned camera and lens
they can think of with a 55mm thread.
Or worse, the twits that intentionally include misleading keywords. Like
searching for a Kurt vise. Often in the description/title, you'll see
'Not Kurt'. It's there so anyone searching for Kurt will still end up
seeing their listing.

When an item appears rare, I will expand to all just in case it's been
mis-categorized by someone that doesn't know better. Just that sometimes
I get stuck in a rut and forget that little trick...


Jon