Alba 1A Restoration

[aarggh]

Sensational work James!

And as an added bonus, I think I've nutted out a few details on my new shaper's mechanical config from looking at your pics!

cheers, Ian

 

[joco-nz]

A little update as I keep chipping away at this. Tool head and clapper installed as well as the table crossslide and vertical screw.

 

[peterfalm]

I restored an Alba 2B years ago. The only part which was really worn was the bottom pivot support pin.
I replaced the 2” diameter pin but hadn’t the facilities to do anything about the bushes. Worked fine after.
wish I still had it.

 

[DickG]

I have a 1A which I bought from a dealer for scrap value as it was minus the pitman arm. It cost me me 10 GBP plus the diesel to collect from 125 miles away.
I fabricated a new pitman arm and modified the bottom bearing to allow the arm to slide on a bronze block. This followed a mod that a fellow model engineer in the village had done to his. I did initially change the motor for a single phase one but quickly reverted back to the 3-phase original. The 3-phase supply is by a home made rotary converter which also supplies the grinders. The mill and lathes all have 3-phase motors each with its own VFD inverter.

 

[joco-nz]

The next real challenge I have to solve is making a new horizontal leadscrew nut. The original has been munched at some point as you can see from the photos. This will entail making a suitable ACME threading tool, shaping this part, dilling and threading it so that things are correctly aligned and centred.

The attached photo show its had a dang good bashing at some point. You can also see that there is some special shape to this part that is needed to achieve needed clearance. The circular "pin" section that actually drives the box table horizontally needs to be a very close/smooth fit to minimise backlash.

While I have done a reasonable amount of metric threading I have never done any ACME threads. On that basis I think I will do some practice threads on some simple round first.

But with the xmas holiday season I'm not going to get much traction until early Jan.

Cheers - J.

 

[joco-nz]

A little proof after reassembly of the gears, clutch, pulley, motor and ram linkage. Definitely feel like progress is being made.

 

[aarggh]

What a beautiful sight!

 

[joco-nz]

After some measuring up did some plans for the leadscrew nut that needs remaking. I still need to finalise some of the dimensions but this covers the bulk of things.

 

[joco-nz]

I managed to get some time to prove to myself that I could make a HSS ACME threading tool for 6tpi threads and use said tool to internal thread a nut such that it would get a good fit on the Shapers horizontal leadscrew. Overall I think I can call this a success. The boring bar is a bit hacky but seems to be working and so long as a I take things slowly and accept that I need to do 3-4 spring passes for a final depth it looks like things have come out pretty reasonably.

It is worth noting that this test part was already metric threaded so I cleaned out enough to get approx the hole needed. You can see the remains of the original threads in the 3rd pic. However this is really only cosmetic and for testing purposes not relevant.

Cheers - J.

 

[joco-nz]

Update on the acme threading - I had another look at the pics and thought I should clarify the topslide (compounds) position that can be seen. It is CLEARLY not set at the proper angle and that is for a reason, it wasn't used. I treated this more as a forming operation and just controlled the depth of cut via the cross slide. I took things very slowly with 0.1mm depth of cuts and cutting oil. While this is not what you would do in a job shop as it takes some time to get to 2.1mm depth that eventually lead to a nice screw engagement it did work with no noticable chatter on the sides of the thread and nothing I could hear.

Given this was a through hole I was able to use 130 rpm no problems and could probably have gone to ~200. The lathe manual states not to exceed 240rpm when threading to avoid excessive stresses on the leadscrew/half-nut.

Anyway, thought that clarification was probably in order.

Cheers - J.

 

[joco-nz]

More progress on constructing the replacement horizontal leadscrew nut.
Pics 1 and 2 show the prep work on the cast iron round into a rectangle of suitable size. I then drilled a couple of reference points to support setup in the mill.

Pic 3 shows setting up the offset using an alignment bar and DTI.

Pic 4 is after a LOT carefull threading. We have a finished 6tpi acme thread. It's perhaps not as good a fit as I might like but it doesn't seem to have much if any slope down the axis of travel.

Cheers,
J.

 

[joco-nz]

Finally finished the leadscrew nut today. After a test fit I discovered there was no value to be gained by rounding the end over like the original. I suspect that was done on the original casting to save material. It is not needed for clearance.

Pics attached ...

#1 to #4 show the initial machining results.
#5 shows the relief cut into the new nut
#6 installed and ready to have the table assembly begin. I have installed the table slide and tested things. It runs super smooth. Very happy.

Cheers - J.

 

[joco-nz]

Just a little video of the travel:

 

[joco-nz]

Finished. A a fully assemebled and working shaper. The only thing to complete now is some leveling feet. I'll keep a track of progress and design on those and post here. In the mean time here is my little youtube vid showing the fully functional shaper.

 

[petertha]

Congratulations, nice restoration.

 

[aarggh]

Beautiful!

Brilliant job James!

 

[joco-nz]

Right the leveling feet are done and installed. I have some photos and will describe the key dimensions and parts.

Pic 1: The main parts. We have
(a) an ice hockey puck. These are around 75mm OD and about 25mm thick. The hollow that has been bored out is 49.8mm diameter and 11.5mm deep. I used aluminium inserts on a boring bar to cut the rubber. Given these inserts of rather sharp they worked a treat. You could use a HSS tool as well, but you would want to make sure it has a super fine hone on its edge. This rubber liked very sharp tooling.
(b) M16 x 2mm all thread cut to a length of between 100-110mm
(c) the metal disk is 75mm OD and 17mm thick. The inner circle is 50mm and has been releaved around it so it has a height of 11.5mm. Therefore when looking side on to the part in its elevation you have two discs. One being 5.5mm thick with a diameter of 75mm and one being 11.5mm thick with a diameter of 50mm. The metal disk also has a through hole that is threaded M16 for the all thread rod. I did this on the lathe but if you have a tap that would be a convenient method. On the plus side having to do more single point threading did get me more acquanted with using the thread chasing dial on the lathe. By the time I fgot to the 3rd one I was getting quite proficient.

Pic 2 & 3: Show initial assembly

Pic 4: All the parts having been made, the threaded rod TIG welded into the metal bases from the under side. It's not going anywhere.

Pic 5: Feet installed and working a treat. With the gap between floor and casting I can get an oil drip tray under there. Given this is a loosely oiling system there is a lot of dripping if you are keeping key parts properly lubricated.

Cheers - J.

 

[olympic]

Very clever. Practical, too.

 

[joco-nz]

This should really be the last on this topic. Anything else will be net new content and I will post on a new thread.

This is a little video showing how I set the stroke length and ram position on the Alba. I then do what are probably my second ever set of cuts on this machine.


Cheers - James.

 

[aarggh]

Just beautiful!

How close to tolerances are you getting do you reckon?