Thanks for that. I will try playing with the brass adjuster when the machine is idle; it is set up for a job at the moment. I don't see a staked nut on either end of the leadscrew - the handwheel on one end and fitting for a handwheel on the other.
The milling cutter does not seem to fit well...
One of the milling tools that came with the machine was this one. Odd thing is that unlike all the others it appears to have no means of stopping it spinning. The others all have the taper, drawbar and two locating lugs.
Am I missing something?
DA sounds a better idea. I can't help thinking that a lathe tool might 'hook the paint off' as it finishes each interrupted cut leaving a chipped edge. Sorry if this is as clear as mud!
We had the LWB Ford version for a few years and generally a good vehicle. The 2.7 TD goes well and it is a nice compromise between family wagon and off road vehicle. The manual gearboxes are notably weak so best to avoid a lot of towing.
There is a lot of backlash on the X axis, about half a turn. I see on the leadscrew this large brass nut with adjustment slots. Is this likely to be for backlash adjustment?
One of the handwheels was in pieces when the mill arrived and I had been planning to make another one but inspired by the BBC's Repair Shop I had a go and repairing the old one.
I used 5 minute epoxy and masking tape to get the whole thing back into one piece, then ground out the cracks and...
Another item that came with the mill was a chuck for holding round things. It was a rusty POS and I almost scrapped it but instead I stripped it down, cleaned and de-rusted and it came out nicely!
Gosh, I'm surprised. It never occured to me that it might be BSW but the dimensions do make sense. The set just doesn't look old enough to be BSW; I don't see anyone selling parts for this now so I'll probably concentrate on the UNC set which seems quite common.
Edit: And to prove me wrong -...
A couple of clamping sets came with the mill and I'm trying to identify the threads.
One is 0.481" thread OD and 13 TPI so I'm fairly happy that this is 1/2" UNC.
The other has me puzzled - 0.492"/12.5mm thread OD and a 2mm pitch. The nut is 21mm AF. So not M12, not M14 and not 1/2" UNC. Any...
Surely if you moved the two air bleeds down near the bottom and only filled the vessel about half full there would be no need for an additional expansion tank?