Thread: Bridgeport Clone Ram Clamp

My Kondia FV-1 has an extra clamp on the side of the ram.

Kondia's term for the Bridgeport Ram is a "Bridge", and the extra clamp in the manual is labelled a "Bridge Clamp".

Anyone else seen anything like this ?
The identical mill at the local TAFE does not have this adornment.
Do I need it ?

I ask the question because the casting has failed.
The material appears to be a die casting, and it shows advanced stages of the cancer this material is subject to.

John.

Hi John,
Does your mill have gib locks to stop the ram moving forward and back?
I was just thinking it might be to lock the ram from moving.
A new could easily be welded up and machined out of steel, which would be stronger.

Dave

Just read your other post that said you have locks.
I could have been a track to set up stops for moving the ram back and forth on a particular jobs in a production environment.
Since you have locks I don't think you have to worry about it.

Dave

Dave,
The mill has the standard gib clamps, you can see the ends of them in the photo.

I agree, I will make something up out of steel to replace it.

I am not sure how the Bridge Clamp is supposed to work.
The ram is already pushed over to that side of the dovetail by the gib clamps before the Bridge Clamp is applied.
The Bridge Clamp is trying to pull it further sideways, possibly across an air gap due to build tolerances.
The build tolerance stress factor possibly aided the casting cancer failure mechanism.

The clamp must only be there to increase stiffness, but which way ?
Transverse or longitudinally ?
What do you, or the other forum members think ?

Depending on the consensus, I can design and build a bracket.

John.

I vote for it being a stop...

.RC. and Dave,
The manual has a perspective sketch without any stops, and the parts list does not show any stops.
The same sketch labels the two gib locks, and the Bridge Brake, as 'Screws for locking longitudinal movement of ram'.

The term 'Ram' appears in a few other locations as well.
One section drawing labels the gib locks as 'Ram Brake'.

This mill does not have any gibs in the dovetails, only large cotters with a dovetail shape to them.
Perhaps the lack of a gib explains the extra Bridge Clamp.

John.