Re: How hard to rotate should preloaded ballnuts be, anyway? - UPDATE

Thanks for all the help/advice guys:
I'll do all the individual replies in one message to avoid spamming the
group:

Jon: Thanks for the advice regarding the grit - I did as you said, and
it seemed to help a little. The grease coming out was pretty clean
though, but had some few very tiny sparkling flakes.Not much really
though, and rather clean. It feels like it's about over a kilogram to
turn the ballnut when rotating the 50mm block - though in some places
it'll go up to about 2-3. This is all guessed really, as I don't have
any tools for checking this. Is this about norm? I suppose the machine
was never meant to move like lightning..

Ballendo: I've added the pics of the ballscrew to the page now
(http://www.silverkatt.co.uk/Lathe/Default.aspx?Page=2), I think it may
only be a single ballnut, but I could be wrong.. I sprayed a little WD40
on the end-bearing support block and that turns OK now. It is becoming
tempting to just open this thing up and clean all the balls. I know for
a fact that this machine was never used to cut metal in it's lifetime -
it only ever cut machinists wax by college students, so my guess is that
the grease is all baked and crusty inside. When you actually roll it
along you hear this slick-sucking-greasy sound, and at times there are
moments where the torque needed to turn it is more.

Mark: Thanks for the advice, am tempted to pull the ballnut open now..

Regards,
Abby