Tom Senior Light Vertical Milling Machine

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Tom Senior Light Vertical Milling Machine

This topic has 128 replies, 23 voices, and was last updated 11 March 2019 at 09:20 by David Bacon.

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13 August 2016 at 08:48 #18169
damian
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@damiannoble34800
Rebuild
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13 August 2016 at 08:48 #250575
damian
Participant
@damiannoble34800
Hi all,

I have managed to pick up after a little research a tom senior light vertical milling machine.

It looks to be in good condition with a slight milling mark on the main table. As you can see I think this has been over painted with grey hammerite.

My intention is to strip it down and give it an overhaul (mostly cosmetic) as many others have with these machine's. I intend fitting an inverter for the delta wired 3ph 0.5hp motor which is a more recent addition.

I'll add some photo's in the next post

Damian
13 August 2016 at 08:55 #250578
damian
Participant
@damiannoble34800
13 August 2016 at 08:56 #250579
damian
Participant
@damiannoble34800
13 August 2016 at 08:56 #250580
damian
Participant
@damiannoble34800
13 August 2016 at 08:56 #250581
damian
Participant
@damiannoble34800
13 August 2016 at 08:57 #250582
damian
Participant
@damiannoble34800
13 August 2016 at 08:57 #250583
damian
Participant
@damiannoble34800
13 August 2016 at 09:03 #250586
damian
Participant
@damiannoble34800
Any help and advice will be greatly appreciated especially on tooling and spares. This site seems to get mentioned a lot and has some great info on it which I've been checking out.

**LINK**

I am eventually wanting to get it to round about the same fettle as what Ian J did in this post and go the DRO route too so great that someone has already done it.

**LINK**

Thanks for reading and commenting guys

Damian
13 August 2016 at 09:59 #250599
Clive India
Participant
@cliveindia
Looks like a good project Damian. Hope it's all there. There are some nice restored ones around – keep us updated please.
14 August 2016 at 07:54 #250677
Nick T
Participant
@nickt
I finished rebuilding mine a year ago, Wonderful piece of kit that I have grown very fond of. It was originally covered in grey Hammerite but is now resplendent in Tom Senior green from Paragon paints. I brushed the smaller parts and rollered the two main lumps and the drip tray.

Nothing too demanding with respect to a rebuild but be very careful when taking the main spindle bearings apart. From memory there is a left handed thread locking device on there or something similar so proceed with caution.

There is a Yahoo Tom Senior Group (HERE) with some useful information and photos

Let me know if you need any help or information. Nick

Edited By Nick T on 14/08/2016 08:09:55
14 August 2016 at 16:47 #250743
damian
Participant
@damiannoble34800
Looks spot on that Nick. Just what I’m aiming for.
I’ll check out the yahoo group on the subject.
Thanks for the heads up with the spindle
Did you have the locking handles and knobs anodised again on it? Also the tom senior bagde at the top is very faded so I will have to find a new one.
14 August 2016 at 17:09 #250748
Nick T
Participant
@nickt
I didn't have the locking knobs anodised but they were in pretty good condition to start off with. Shame about the top Tom Senior Badge but it is good that the bottom one is OK.

Picture below of the old TS factory before it was demolished.
14 August 2016 at 18:48 #250765
ianj
Participant
@ians
Damian. I'm sure you will very pleased with your machine. There's something very satisfying about cleaning the grime off & giving a quality machine a new coat of paint.

As for tooling I bought an ER 25 collet chuck & a set of imperial collets from CTC tools. ( there's other cheaper sellers on ebay)

I also recently bought a set of metric ER20 collets for a drill grinding jig I built & at the same time bought a ER20 collet chuck for the mill for when the size of the ER25 collet nut is to large.

My mill uses a No 2 morse taper in the spindle.

Ian J

Edited By ian j on 14/08/2016 21:23:42
15 August 2016 at 09:14 #250825
damian
Participant
@damiannoble34800
Thanks Nick for posting the pics and a real shame the factory was demolished.

I’ll agree Ian that it is satisfying cleaning something up.
I have aready cleaned off the cast column which is quite rough in places. I will give it a grind to smooth the rough bits as much as I can, then re apply the body filler for the finish.
I have started to clean off the base but it’s slow going. Angle grinder and flap wheel is the best way.
Will post some more pics when I’m back at the pc.
I shall start looking around for similar tooling Ian cheers for listing it.
18 August 2016 at 19:55 #251389
damian
Participant
@damiannoble34800
Hi guys,

Four hours and the main column is stripped of all the paint and grunge from the outside. The inner off white paint is in decent nick so I will probably leave it.

The casting is in really good shape and has cleaned up well. I shall eventually smooth everything as much as I can using an angle grinder and finish off with filler as was originally there.

Next onto the base which is a much bigger paint removal job. The inside was filled with years of crud which has now been removed and I have also removed the Tom Senior badge from the front by just punching the retaining pins from behind.

Also removed the faded name plate from the S type head which I'm hoping a local firm can reproduce for me.

More soon thanks for reading

Damian
18 August 2016 at 19:57 #251390
damian
Participant
@damiannoble34800
Just to add here's the inside of the base unit. Lots to be going on with
18 August 2016 at 20:05 #251394
Muzzer
Participant
@muzzer
Presumably a lot of the gunge in the bottom is dried out (water soluble) suds, so putting a couple of gallons of boiling water in there will start to redissolve it, aided by a stiff brush.

The column looks pristine, almost shiny enough to be aluminium despite being cast iron. Nice, promising work!
18 August 2016 at 20:47 #251400
damian
Participant
@damiannoble34800
Thanks Muzzer

The bottom grunge I have managed to remove.

It mostly came out with scraper but the off white paint was shot,so I spent a couple of hours with the drill and wire wheel to clean the majority of it off.

I will eventually be repainting it with something that will be coolant proof. Unsure what though
19 August 2016 at 07:00 #251424
Nick T
Participant
@nickt
Looking good Damian! The joy of working on these is that they were so well made in the first place.

While I remember I did consider getting the bed reground but decided against it. I thought that if the regrinding was not done perfectly then I really would be up the creek. On the advice of Doubleboost (You Tube) I bought a good quality oil stone and stoned the bed which removed the odd dings that were on there.
19 August 2016 at 07:16 #251425
thaiguzzi
Participant
@thaiguzzi
I've got a 73 M1 with the S type vertical head. I've always liked the Light Vertical because of that round ram the vertical head attaches to, which presumably moves fore and aft. I presume the round bar is not keyed in location by the look of the photos and the head is swivelled as per normal Senior method at the front?

The things that put me off the LV compared to an M1 was the lack of power feed and coolant as std from the factory.
19 August 2016 at 21:30 #251554
damian
Participant
@damiannoble34800
Thanks for the comments guys.

Nick I was thinking of maybe getting a light regrind on the table as I do know someone with a grinder that would do it.
It only has a small milling mark on the table which isn’t really that bad.

The round bar isn’t keyed as you say thaiguzzi and has a degree scale on the boss that the s head is keyed onto.
This aligns with the small square zero datum fitted to the front carrier.
It can be seen in the first photo of the cleaned up column.

I have today done a lot more work on the base stripping off the paint.

I’ll add some photos next
19 August 2016 at 22:51 #251559
damian
Participant
@damiannoble34800
Heres the base as it looks now
19 August 2016 at 22:52 #251560
damian
Participant
@damiannoble34800
19 August 2016 at 22:52 #251561
damian
Participant
@damiannoble34800
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