# Crazy a$$ Bridgeport



## Charley Davidson (Jun 16, 2012)

Anybody ever see a Bridgeport like this one? Head moves side to side 38" It's on CL in Ohio around Akron


----------



## DMS (Jun 17, 2012)

I think it's a setup for gang milling. You would have another head (or two) on that top piece, and the same number of stations on the table at the same offset. 

Course, I could be totally off base...


----------



## Tony Wells (Jun 17, 2012)

I may be mistaken, but it seems to me I recall seeing one built something like that one with a tracer attachment on it. I don't remember it having the normal cranks and handwheels, though.


----------



## Charley Davidson (Jun 17, 2012)

$1200.00 OBO  not a bad price if not wore out plus the unique factor.  Gang milling seems reasonable/logical


----------



## pineyfolks (Jun 17, 2012)

The one they had at work had a True-Trace unit on it. It still had hand feeds but no tilt or nod on the head or heads.


----------



## Hawkeye (Jun 17, 2012)

There was one for sale up the road with that head track on it. It had a second, smaller head on one end and had been converted to CNC. They were asking $6500, so it was listed for a long time.


----------



## Charley Davidson (Jun 17, 2012)

Got this from another link in another thread in anothe.... Oh never mind


----------



## brucer (Jul 10, 2012)

we had a couple at work many moons ago, it was considered a duplicator mill, a tleast thats what we called it..  wood or aluminum model and stylus tracer on one side, milling head on the other side, cnc machines were its demise.   soon as we had digitizing capabilities and cad/cam system they were gone..


----------



## Badams215236 (Jul 10, 2012)

Charley,

That is a picture of a T-ram mill. The ones I have seen usually have a True-Trace type setup. The top "table" is a complete casting with the ram and is made to mount more than 1 head.


This is a picture of one I looked at 3 months ago. Most of the T-ram mills I have seen have a True-Trace and are run hydraulicly. With monster tables, 56" and bigger. Like these 




These can be converted to manual opperation with ball screws. however the one in your picture deffinately started life as a manual machine. If you look at the castings in the pictures i posted you can see the difference. They are cool machines, the only real draw back if you will is that while the head will rotate right to left they can not tip front to back.

Good Luck,
Ben


----------



## twowheelinjim (Aug 28, 2012)

The old Rchard Petty racing garage has one painted Petty blue. They have been trying to sell it for a long time. I think nobody knows how to use it or they are scared of it, either way it's still sitting aound and they got tired of advertising it. I wouln't mind stopping by sometime to look at it.


----------



## Big_John (Oct 23, 2012)

There were several of those at a shop I used to work at in the early seventies. 

They were two and three axis NC milling machines using paper tape. There were two or three heads bolted to the ram depending on what they were making. 

The two axis machines were slow, having to stop to have the knee cranked up manually to whatever depth was needed. The quills was brought up and down with an air over hydraulic ram. One had a very unreliable rotary stop system on the quill that served as the third axis. Another had a stepper motor on the knee for the third axis.

The NC machines back then were pretty crude in comparison to today's technology. Paper tape with mechanical readers were a recipe for disaster. Every machine had it's scars on the tooling and clamps from when the machine decided to take an abrupt and unplanned left turn and the operator wasn't close by to catch it. I remember the first big upgrade was from plain paper tape to paper tape with a layer of mylar so it wouldn't tear or wear out as fast.


----------



## cathead (Jun 14, 2013)

There is one of these ganged Bridgeports with a hydraulic CNC tracer unit at scrapyard in Bemidji, Minnesota.  The head is a 1hp
step pulley unit 3 phase.  It's a shame to see it go for scrap so maybe someone will be interested in it hopefully.  I have a 9x42
mill already  and don't need 2 mills......


----------



## jamie76x (Jun 23, 2013)

That is a machine some one threw together with "Spare Parts".  That ram is for gang milling and is on the tru-trace  or other duplicator mills for multiple heads.

Here is my best guess.... looks like a newer style base that may have had a variable drive.. Some one took the ram and variable drive head and pit it on a machine with large table and duplicator on it and threw the ram and a step pully head on the small table machine.


----------

