Click on any photo for a larger view.

1/3/2010
I started unloading the electronics cabinet and some parts of the mill like the motor and head. The air assisted engine lift came in handy.

1/8/2010
As a little aside, my brother Terry, also acquired a mill "for his son". Since my mill was on his trailer and had not been unloaded yet (all I did was start taking parts off it), we had to strap it back down and head off to get his mill. Went back to the car wash and hosed 'em both down because his was nastier than mine.

1/16/2010
Then a little over a week later we took 'em both over to his house where we unloaded his and put it in his garage.

1/17/2010 Unloading my mill
Unloading Terry's mill seemed pretty straightforward and so the next day we decided to unload mine.....minus one person. Also my mill was next to the wheels of the trailer which made it a tad harder for the engine hoist to get to. We thought that we might build a gantry across the trailer using a large piece of 16" (3/8" wall) pipe for one side......

       
but decided that was a "not so safe" idea and we abandoned it.

We decided to put the mill on some 1" stainless pipe rollers I had and inch it toward the rear of the trailer where we could get the engine lift connected to it. With rollers in place and "come-a-longs" both in the front and rear (to keep control), we inched it toward the back of the trailer. And, yes, we chocked the tires and put jack stands under the back of the trailer. So far, the only dumb idea was the gantry and it was mine...so there, I said it.

So with all our stuff cinched, we moved it to the back of the trailer and hooked up the engine lift and lowered it onto the legs of the engine lift.

Now I apologize for the gap between the last photo above and the next one as it seems there was a "poof" and the heavy bastard was on the ground, free of the engine lift. But truth be told, we almost lost the table and ball screws. Since I was stopping us every few moments to take photos, Terry was left to hold the mill where it was. I forgot to lock the table down and when we got ready to "gently" lower the mill off the legs, the table slid off to the side, upsetting the balance. We would have lost the table (and the X ballscrew) had it not been for a sacrificial aluminum drain connection on the back of the table jamming into the column as the table tried to escape the mill. So the next photo shows the mill on the ground...all safe and sound....we were lucky.