Anybody from north Carolina?
Trying to go to school for computer integrated machining.

 

The “Zayer” haunts my dreams............... upside down 5” facemills, head is positionable vertically or horizontal, also will rotate 360 Degrees on the B axis.....

 

I'm no machinist but by trial and error I learned how to use the bridgeport at work to build my roof rack.

 

I recently ran into a bit of a grinding going on in the rear. Checked it out and discovered the massacre of a carrier bearing. Short on funds and time, I decided that a well planned fix would save me $ in the short term to get my DD back on the road before Monday. So spending a few hours in the shop one late Saturday night was well worth the hassle to fix the carrier on my d35. For how long, we will see, but it runs a hell of a lot smoother now and i am now preparing for an axle swap or beef up as soon as I get some time.

I found the bearings were trashed on one side of the carrier. So bad that my gear oil looked like espresso spiked with a bottle of anti seize. the bearing seat was trashed, more than an 1/8" total removed from the diameter.

I had to turn some bar stock to fit snug within the inner splines of the carrier that host the axle shafts. This was the best way I could think of to ensure that both of my bearing seats were running true. I then tapped a 1/2"-13 thread in the end to snug up a "cap" to hold the diff while I turned back the gnarly bearing seat to create a clean surface to apply my new sleeve for the OE bearing.

I only had to turn about .007 off the seat to get a good surface. I then made a sleeve out of some 4140 with .0015 press fit on ID, .001 PF on OD for the bearing. I kept it cool, and it pressed together better than I expected.

Cost me $25 for new bearings and cups, 3 hours of no beer drinking on a Saturday night but was totally worth it. I assembled it when i got home from the shop. A little RTV and a day of rest later I was filling the pig up with some new gear oil and on the road again. I expect it to last, but I do plan an axle swap or a serious beef up soon no matter what.

 

a few more pix

 

im a current machinist, dad owns a machine shop (HAAS CNC mill and lathe, manual mills, manual lathes) so i been around it my entire life. went through trade school and now im an apprentice at a die automotive stamping facility (Metrican) so if anyone have any questions in here i can try to chime in my thoughts and help out some.

 

What does your dads shop do mainly? My fathers shop is by warsaw indiana, alot of our work is medical instruments. But we fix/made tractor parts before too... So we do it all but mainly medical

 

Which shop? I live/work in warsaw.

 

thats pretty cool.

alot of our stuff is inhouse machining for small engine racing like racing go-karts, quater midgets, heck we even got into racing lawnmowers lol. during the winter we may bid on some jobs for factories around here.

ecdistributing.com is the business name if yall want to check out more on it.

 

Got a job in a shop in west Michigan, started on the water jet, now there having me run the laser, I've pushed go a few times for production runs on the cnc mill.

 

Production sucks. I'm currently stuck in it and it is getting old real quick.

 

We don't do huge part runs, but since I'm the new guy i get mindless work.

 

I used to run 5 horizontal mills (Mazak 6800s) with ~17 different fixtures at the same time with 1 other guy. The amount of tool changes needed were just ridiculous and any down time the owner came out and pitched a fit.

I only lasted like 6 months before I got a new job and walked out.

 

My shop is perfect for me, started in a garage 18 years ago.
Now has 3 hurcos, 2 water jets, 2 lasers with feeding tables, a slew of welders and manual machines.
Really cool people to work with, so happy i got this job.

 

Yea I like my new job too. I went from CNC mills to old school surface grinders lol. Our shops started off in a garage too. The owner was the founders neighbor and purchased the shop from him shortly after he started it. Now it's like 25 employees. We aren't huge but we do alright.