Re: [CAD_CAM_EDM_DRO] Re: long ball screws

In a message dated 23-Sep-00 04:49:19 Central Daylight Time,
dougrasmussen@... writes:

<< The original cost had to be well into
the thousand$, but who needs a ball screw that large? >>

Doug: Only a quasi-relevant reply to this "question", but I can tell you
that I had BSA roll me NEW 1.5" x 12' preloaded-ball-screws for a large
woodworking X-Y Router-Table I built for an English firm in '86. Also had
one 1.5" x 5' screw (same) for "Y". Project ate my lunch, but it worked, and
per-contract, I flew over and put it together and tested it, when one of the
English shop-boys who was listening to a UK radio as he worked hollered over
to me, "Hey, Yank! Your rocket-thing just blew out of the sky!" "I don't
have any rocket-things! What do you mean?" "Oh, that shuttle thing you
Yanks are flyin' around; what they callin' it, 'Challenger?'". That was
late-afternoon of same day.
If "ground", yes, they would have cost some $change. But "rolled, only", the
two (parallel-running, down both sides of 12' table) and the like 5'er, with
double- (preload) nuts came to nearly $4K, as I recall, now. Gittin olde, ya
know, so, not too sure, now! Learned a lesson: "Never contract to build
something "on your own" larger than a breadbox, having parts longer than 2
yards, if that, and weighing over 300 lb., total. It'll GETCHA!" In other
words, when you retire, DO so!!!

Jan Rowland