yippeeee.......

I finally got my Bridgeport mill working...well sorta, the X and Y axis work perfect, I sent a command to the Z (moves the spindle up and down) and nothing happened, it turns out that the stepper motor had some rust...huh??, yep, when I had the machine transported, it was raining, the machine looked wrapped up fine enough, but some water found it's way into the motor...

I called around and found that a 100% replacement motor was $375 and it was 20 years old....hmmm, next place had a new motor for $600...damn, I only paid $1200 for the entire machine...finally salvation when I found a company selling NEMA 42 stepper motors for $320 each, brand new and with all the specs I need.

hopefully in a few hours, I'll be turning perfectly good chunks of aluminum into little chips to cover the floor of my shop so I can track them into the house and get yelled at by my wife, hahahhaha