Well everyone, I guess I should post an update. So much has happened and I regret leaving this thread behind as much of what is going on might be of some interest to some members of this forum.
First, I sold my property and moved to an acreage. This first meant I had to completely tear down the MC800H again to get it out of the shop it was in, because the door was too low to get the machine out. I had been dreading the day I would have to do it but honestly with everything being so clean and well prepared it came apart very fast and was no issue at all.
The new location has proved to have all manner of surprises that have shown me that I'm not actually capable of losing my my marbles because if it were possible it would have happened. Things peaked when rain was pouring down inside my shop when I was trying to repair the deck that is above part of my shop (Who puts a deck as the shop roof anyway?!?!) with MC800H castings below under plastic sheeting. You all know the hours put into that project... but luckily very little damage was done and things are going in the right direction again.
As far as CNC's go, after moving the first priority was the DMU50eVo. I had dealt with the cooling system at the old place but now I had to deal with the 18k spindle, I had to get the stator rewound and rebuild from there. The OEM setup had an encapsulation on the windings which improves cooling significantly (According to a paper on the subject that was sourced online) but for this application it was decided best to not do that again. A new spindle drive was installed and the machine constants adjusted heavily to lower the acceleration and deceleration rates of the spindle. The original settings produced very high currents and I'm very confident the way it runs now it will last for the rest of the life of the machine. Overall this machine is very fast and I love running it, the V500 Millplus is every bit as great to run as the prior versions with additional features like tool tip 5 axis programming, which made things easier for my Hypermill dealer to make a comprehensive post processor for it.
I picked up an old forklift now that I have more space to help with moving all this heavy stuff around. The tags were trashed so I couldn't be sure what exact model it was but it is a Gerlinger from the late 40's (estimated). Someone had at some point pulled the original engine and transmission and threw in a small block chev 350 with a hydramatic auto transmission.
I could write many pages just on everything that had to go into that machine alone before it was fully functional. After machining the drums and rebuilding the brakes... (Sandblasted & Recoated + New hardware for the drum and all hubs - The old rim "Budd" nuts and studs were in bad shape)
...replacing the main drive chains and rebuilding the hydraulic drive assembly and power steering assembly, as well as back flushing the copper rad with acid and replacing the water pump... and rebuilding the hubs/bearings, retrofitting modern seals and getting the rims powdercoated and proper spec tires fitted... it was good to go.
It picked up my Mori SL6B and my Daewoo Puma 12L no problem.
So now both of those lathes are back here too, all my machines finally at one location. I discovered pretty early that the infrared heater in the shop was nowhere NEAR capable of heating the shop so I found a Modulating/Condensing boiler for free locally and built a 6 loop hydronic heating system for the lines that were already in the floors. Of course it wasn't until everything was built and I was doing some pressure testing in the loops that it was discovered two loops, really the only two that matter, had major leaks in them: The shop and garage loops.
I picked up an infrared cam attachment for my phone, hooked each loop temporarily to my hot water tank to flow to drain (I have my own well and septic system here) and used that method to trace where the lines were.
It wasn't obvious where the leak was so I hooked up my screw compressor (Which I also just got and could have a thread to itself, because I bought that used too) and used air to help find the leak using sound. This worked really well as it helped get me close. Then I capped off one end of the loop and pushed 50psi hot water in the other end and watched where the heat stopped, and in this case bloomed out a bit as it leaked underneath.
This was so accurate that when I pulled out the masonary grinding wheel and SDS Hammer Drill (With the chisel on hammer only) and carved a rectangle in the floor - Not only was the line in the middle, but the leak was in the middle of the line! (The bright box is where I started chiseling)
After doing some testing to make sure it wouldn't compromise the strength of the PEX, I used my special heat gun that is intended for vinyl decking install (Remember that leaking roof?) to heat the pex until it would bend and flex easily, but not melt. After cutting out and replacing the damaged section the leak was gone in the shop and heating could finally commence in a much more comfortable fashion! My shop has a 14ft high roof so heat likes to go straight up and the floor gets chilly on -40deg (Celcius, much colder than my freezer) days.
The MC800H is still waiting to get setup again, I'm hoping to erect a large shop here so I can stop fighting with space for machines. Having said that I just won the bidding at an auction in Texas and now I have a Warner & Swasey SC-32 coming here which will take a bunch of space by itself! That machine weighs north of 45,000lb and has a 32" chuck on it. The listing said it has an 18in Spindle Bore, I think it's more likely closer to 12 but we'll see, I needed something with 12 or more so anything larger will be a bonus, if I can find a suitable chuck to fit. The Schunk Rota Pneumatic chuck on it now has a 12.2" bore.
I'll be sure to post photos when it arrives, it's too bad JRIowa isn't still around, I think he would have liked this machine. It has the longer bed, 110" between the chuck and tailstock when using the center attachment. With a normal sized 4 jaw it would be quite a bit more.
Dave @ Nerv