I have read this thread with some interest.
I have an old harrison milling machine, the slideways are fine but the screws/nuts are worn. I have just fitted a ballscrew to the X axis and reduced the backlash from 0.5-0.8 mm down to 0.03 m, just about the limit of my dial gauges.
Now having spent many hours reading about driving the ball screw it would appear that the way to go is with a NEMA stepper. I would like to retain the hand wheel control, so I am thinking about a rotary encoder.
Is there somewhere/someone on here who has done this who can guide me through the process?