Ball screws and nuts

This week I'm in the possession of the Cintimatic's ground ballscrew
assys! They appear to be in excellent condition; 1.25" dia, with 0.200"
lead. They've got preloaded tapered roller bearings on one end in a
substantial steel mount. The ball nut is about 3.25" overall length,
with 2.115" hubs on either end. In the center is a larger ring of about
3.050" dia. This ring was the mounting location for the nuts, and has 8
concentric holes around it, as well as a small (1/8") lube hole. (Grease
was used in these, it that standard practice, or is way lube used?)
Anyway, for those of you have done Bridgeport ballscrew conversions,
is there any chance the 3" diameter of these nuts will package in the
yoke area of the B'port? I don't think there is anything functional in
that dia, but have hesitated to disassemble the nut. Should I be
concerned with nut dissassembly? If I run the nut off of the screw, will
the balls fall out, or are they constrained? The nuts have no markings
on them, so I assume the are Cincinatti mfd nuts. I looked at Roland's
series on ballscrew conversion in HSM last night to refresh myself on
the process. Roland, you recommend retaining the existing yoke, which I
understand. Jon, you made a new yoke from scratch, and commented it was
too stiff. Would you please expand on how the stiffness affected your
machine? I've yet to remove the table of the old B'port to evaluate the
package, so I'm just soliciting opinions...

Brad Heuver
Mechanical Sub-Systems fax 734-523-6052
734-52-33480 bheuver@...