Beaverpal Mill strip for moving/disposal? Advice please

[pete hammondParticipant @petehammond94283]

Any advice and guidance please. I am retired so time rich, no need to rush.

It’s a Beaverpal vertical Mill (like a Bridgeport but slightly shorter)

Like many of us there comes a time when the really big and heavy items should carefully be recycled one way or another. The mill will have to be fully stripped to, motor, head, ram, bed, etc after removing the modern DRO. I think, well hope, the elephant foot base alone will pry bar onto bars as rollers- by then hopefully the challenges of other parts removal will be memories and no lasting scars on me.

Starting out- Do I remove the motor ( I fitted single phase motor well over  twenty years ago – hope I made it easy to remove) and drive casings and then rotate the head, raise the bed .create support so head comes onto table then lower to transfer to sturdy trolley?  I have seen a youtube video of Bridgeport head coming of vertically BUT the they have fork lift to pick it up by- that’s cheating!

Hope the Ram comes off forward as mill is tight in a corner, use table plus a frame -as above to support?

The raise and lower platform beneath the bed looks heavy and likely to be tricky to lay down safely-any ideas.

No room for engine crane and no roof beams to winch off.

Yes when the dross that’s parked all over the mill is removed and mill is coming apart I will update, try to do photos.

Now any  ideas/suggestions how to proceed are very welcome.

Anyone near Aylesbury Bucks is welcome to come and drink coffee/HELP. I think a good sense of humour is going to be needed.

YES I WILL WEAR SAGFETY SHOES AND TAKE GREAT CARE – old bones if they heal they do it slowly I’m told

Pete

[Nigel Graham 2Participant @nigelgraham2]

When I re-erected my machine tools in my present (and probably last!) home I constructed sheer-legs, ramps and the like using some scaffolding tubes and clamps, and heavy timber.

Rope block-and-tackle, a small trailer-winch, a puller (for horizontal moves only), crowbars, rollers and jacks were the moving parts. This was all a few years before I built my overhead crane.

I also took the precaution of buying a few, proper lifting-slings and shackles. They are not very expensive, are stocked by builders’ and mechanics’ tool-shops; but you do need know their “Dos and Don’ts” , such as never tie knots in slings. It is just not worth risking using any old rope or chain for heavy machine parts unless you literally “know the ropes” and are competent with knots and splices.

Oh – and indeed I wore my safety-boots.

 

If at all possible, ask for help from someone you can trust in a hazardous operation, especially trustworthy enough to do exactly as you instruct if he or she is not very mechanically-minded. I rebuilt my workshop alone, but that is not ideal. (Yes, I had asked if anyone in my model-engineering club would be so kind…)

 

The one other thing to use, you cannot buy: brains!

Plan all the moves, think carefully where things need move, how they will move, and how they might want to defy you.  Think how removing one unit (such as a motor) will affect the balance of the adjoining parts. Test each lift, too: raise the load just enough to ensure balance and security before completing the lift. Plan whatever temporary installations you need make, so they are as efficient and safe as possible.

Never put yourself below or in the path of the load or a potential topple, where either can trap you. If something costly starts to fall our instinct is to try to save it… no – get out of its way! So always ensure your escape route.

Never grasp rollers to move them under the load: roll them by the palm or better, a stick. Similarly when pushing something into place, to ensure it does not eat your fingers.

 

(A toppling load does not need be ever so heavy to be fatal, if it pins you across the chest. When my employer moved to a new site, a young lad working for the removals company died when he tried to move something in the van, and it fell over onto him…)

 

 

…..

 

 

[Nigel Graham 2Participant @nigelgraham2]

An afterthought… you say no roof beams to hoist from.

Others may have, so I would add, never forget that if you use a simple pulley on the beam, with a rope passing over the sheave between you and the load, the force on the block and the beam is up to TWICE that imposed by the load alone. This happens of course because you have to exert the same force to hold the load, as it is imposing.

Also, since you cannot usually pull on the rope with both sides parallel, there will be a horizontal component trying to move the beam sideways.

[BazyleParticipant @bazyle]

Hopefully the ‘disposal’ is a turn of phrase for passing on to a new owner.
Borrow an engine hoist? Probably not to lift the whole but can lift one end to get the rollers underneath. Or a trolley jack but remember not to fully trust hydraulics.
Using itself ie the knee as part of the lift/lower is a useful technique.
A ladder can support a grown man with safety margin. A beam can be rigged between two stepladders or ladder leaning against wall can be used to remove sections to lower to ground.

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