Found a 1980s manual at a pawn shop that fixed my spindle drift

I was in Reno last month killing time between jobs and walked into this dusty pawn shop near downtown. Found a 1982 operating manual for a Deckel milling machine tucked behind some stereo equipment for 5 bucks. Read through it and there was a whole section on adjusting the gibs in the Y-axis that my modern digital setup never mentioned. Took that advice home and my spindle drift dropped by 0.002 inches on the first try. Anyone else pick up old reference material from random places?

2 comments

2 Comments

lily39415d ago

Hold on... five bucks for that Deckel manual? That's insane, those things go for way more online even all beat up. You basically stole a goldmine of old-school precision knowledge from that dusty shelf.

barbarahill15d ago

Ain't it funny how old junk teaches you more than new stuff? I picked up a worn-out 1977 South Bend lathe manual from a garage sale once, and it had a trick for setting carriage play that my newer machine just doesn't cover. Still not sure if I'm more proud of fixing that drift or the fact I only paid five bucks for the fix.