The Framers Forum

Just had "Wee Kev" Ashworth and Thomson's engineer up servicing our equipment today.. where he discovered our morso had not been maintained as well as it should have...

apparantly there is a little joint that can seize up (and cause serious damage to your morso), just below the cutting head that should be oiled weekly... unfortunately, this part of our morso hasn't seen a can of 3 in 1 oil in the 16 years it has been in our possesion.

so needless to say Wee Kev had some excellent fun today trying to release it, mole grips, heat gun, blow torches, we even went round to one of our employees house to borrow a vice, it was well and truly siezed up, again, Kev applied some heat and tried to free the movement with the vice, but the forces were so strong it just disintegrated the rod... he didn't have a spare, and it would take a few days to get one sent up from Nottingham...

cue a major panic over the workload awaiting us and the posibility of being morsoless for days and having an ever increasing backlog.

then some quick thinking on our part... this was 4:30pm.... Ashworth have a depot in Edinburgh ... we could race down there and dismantle their morso and borrow the parts.... so we did, driving through rush hour traffic to get down there and back before 5... we made it.., and with time to spare, and have a fully operational morso once more, at the expense of Ashworths demo machine...

also a top tip for everyone with a system 4000 - NEVER use WD40 on your machine, as it causes the bearings to swell, and can damage the slideways. kev recommends that back to black stuff you can get in Halfords and garages

the moral of the story? make sure your machinery is properly looked after... a morso will last a lifetime, but if you want it to keep performing you need to keep it in top shape.

Another moral of the story: "if it's still working, don't fix it!"

OR

"If it jams - force it. If it breaks, it needed replacing anyway" - courtesy, Mr Murphy!

*rushes off to get a tin of 3-in-1 out of the garage*

osgood wrote:Another moral of the story: "if it's still working, don't fix it!"

Similar goes for PC's, where one should always apply the "Erection Theory of Computing", which states:

"If a system is up, and you want it to stay up, then don't f%ck with it!"



On a more serious note, does anyone know a bod who services machinery in Ireland? My kit got landed into the workshop, full stop. Apart from usual calibration requirements, it has been fine, but I'd like to have some port of call for healthchecks, problems etc.

Wee Kev does get around a bit. He was down here in deepest gloucestershire last week doing some fine adjustments to my underpinner. He cant help himself - if he sees a morso out comes the can of oil. I cant think of a better reason for using a company like A&T to purchase machinery from - They give you proper service - They install - make sure it works properly and after much use service it. 10 out of 10.

I once saw a very old Morso in a secondhand place. Not sure of it's vintage, but it was certainly pre-war, if not pre WWI. It had a cast iron frame with scrolly legs, no safety guards but basically the same design as a new one. The blades were ground down almost to the mounting holes.
Still worked.

Moglet wrote:on a more serious note, does anyone know a bod who services machinery in Ireland?

do A&T have a rep for Ireland? if so, get in contact with them, they may be able to band together a few of their customers into one week and charge you "Local Rate" for servicing.

Good post Grahame. Any chance of a photo of this joint so we can all get our oil cans out and soak the sucker?

yup, shall get one tomorrow when in at the shop