Scrap Yard Save! 1930's - 40's Burke B-100-4 Horizontal Mill!

That is pretty cool. Great find!

Good find! How are the slides?

Everything cleaned up and moves free from one limit to the other with very little noticeable wear or looseness through the midpoints of travel.

More than accurate enough for the types of work I will ever do with it.

The biggest issue with it was getting everything apart and going after it with a wire brush and wheel to get the surface rust off which with this old cast iron they used back then unless it buried in the dirt for a long time it doesn't develop the deep pitting or heavy scale that so much of today's metals do.

Also, despite having taken a ride from where ever it came from to the scrap yard in the back of a scrap iron truck nothing is banged up or bent out of shape.

You could also invite some friends over grilled meats and slice open the bun for sausages.

..Or make a file to file with your fine filing files.

..The possibilities are endless!

Nice stand too. New lumber would kill it.

Since your updating your woodwork skills try this one.. toss a pinch of steel wool into a loose lid jar with filled with a cup or two of vinegar.. after a couple days use or dilute as a rag or brush on way to quickly age some types of wood. .A cedar fence repair that suddenly matches is a neat trick.

Great find!

Nice!

0n of the more interesting things I fond about collecting old equipment is seeing just how much better the overall design fit and finish was back then compared to similar marketed equipment.

From what I can find for information on these old Burke machines they were considered light duty machines mostly geared towards small component manufacturing and small jobber shop or personal hobby use yet everything about them is so much heavier built than any similar market machines of today.

Stuff was built to take a beating and last to say the least!

Good chance that when I am long since dead this old machine will still be in someone's shed doing odd jobs. (Probably converted to voice command CNC by then though but the original base machine will still be there!)

Sweet save. Nice job!

Very nice find! I'm soooo envious!

Nicely done.

TCMTECH: So what is the spindle taper that you now need to procure tooling for? I believe these use a Brown and Sharp taper. But there are various, depending on the size of your mill. They made mill sizes from 0 to 4. I can't tell from the photos if the outboard overarm support for holding the end of a mill cutter arbor is still with the machine. But you'll need to fabricate one if you get a milling arbor. You can do much work with out this using end mill holders and such. If you have a real good lathe you can fabricate your own tooling. For reference, my first milling machine, a No2 Rockford Miller. Uses B&S#9 tooling. It was overhead line belt powered originally, and previous owner put a LIMA conversion kit (3phase 3HP motor with 4 speed transmission). Pre WWII conversion. If your use is keyway cutting, then you can procure a minimal amount of endmill holders for the various key sizes. So now you have a new job of tooling up. Do you have T-nuts and clamps, machine vise, as minimal set up tooling? I'm assuming this is your first mill outside of the all in one I think I recall you having at your brothers. I think you were needing a tie bar for some heavy equipment. Did you ever make a replacement?

It has the support arm.

I have not gotten to making the necessary tooling adapters yet but I did get a part of a driveshaft that was attached to the spindle that has the correct taper on the end so I will use that for a reference when making whatever tooling adapter parts I need.

I plan to use the machinists vice from my Smithy for now on this being it doesn't get used much otherwise.

Yes I got the suspension parts for the old dozer undercarriage rebuild made up too. unfortunately to get things to fit I have to take the left side track assy apart to get that side hooked up due to clearance issues with existing parts not allowing things to go together.

I might just leave it unhooked for now being when I drove it the half mile from my dads place to mine last time two of the left side rollers were so hot that they were smoking which pretty much says they are worn out and need replacing like the 6 on the right side needed.

Before with all 6 rollers out on the right side it never moved much over 2nd gear but with all new rollers on the one side it was able to run down the road in high gear and heat up the bad parts on the left side.

Nice little machine.

The first place I worked after the Navy had one set up to mill square heads on cone point bearing screws.

Ya got lucky.

I also picked up a Baykal MGS2550 100" table sheers too. (1993 model)

Plus a bunch of other goodies.

The sheers needs a good cleaning and paint job being it came out of a manufacturing facility fire salvage job. The upper plastic parts on the controls and wiring got melted but the primary and important parts are all in good order.

The fire burned hot but fast so the heavy metal components didn't have time to get heated up and damaged making almost everything superficial and cosmetic damage.

Wooo cool finds.
I ain't jellyous 'cos I don't have room for all that sheeet.
Del

I admit the sheers was a bit bigger than I need. Anything that could do up to 60" x 3/16" would have been good enough but now I can do 100" x 3/16" or 60" x 1/4"

Downside is it weighs ~ 3.5 tons and needs a perimeter of about three feet on each side and five on the back which means I have to do a lot of shop cleaning and rearranging to make a place for it.

I hate cleaning and rearranging my shop because way too much stuff seems to disappear even though very little ever gets thrown out.

You could do a nice little pop up panel in the floor so that it can drop down out of sight when you're not using it. might also make a nice steampunk entertainment center in the living room when you're not using it. It would go really nice with a Burke horizontal end table.

I'm not that ambitious even if the under floor pop up sheer concept is within my range of skills and resources to do.

Besides in order to 'pop up' that area of the floor would need to stay clear and I know full well that would never happen.

I may be many things but OCD about work area organization and cleanliness is not one of them!

Who says it needs to be neat? When down, the floor is flat. When you press the eject button, all the crap on top blows out to the periphery of the shop, nicely out of the way for the moment. When dropped again, you just shovel the crap back.

You need to go back and evaluate the feasibility of the "shear delight breakfast bar" in the open concept kitchen. Nice little sheared stainless place mats along the table. Nothing says you can't be shearing between meals as long as you have a good foundation under it.