Fritz Werner 3.230

I read Fritz Werner's could be discussed here even though they're not specifically listed. I've got a FW 3.230 vertical mill that I've been working on getting up and running. Mostly it involved getting power for it and some cleanup. Once I got power to it, I've found that it works well. Mostly running it is pretty obvious but I have a question about the spindle downfeed. It appears to have a powered downfeed but I can't get it to work consistently.

Here's a couple pics of the machine.




Here's a closer pic of the knob on the machine which may or may not help.


Here's my understanding of how the spindle movement operates so far. Turning the knob all the way in (CW) disengages the lever and engages the handwheel for moving the spindle. Unscrewing it all the way out (CCW) disengages the handwheel and engages the lever for moving the spindle. Sometimes when I pull down on the lever the spindle will lower as expected. Other times it will only move down a little bit and a power downfeed is engaged. When the power downfeed is engaged I hear something inside the headstock spinning, the spindle slowly lowers, and the lever slowly falls down. If not for the noise I'd think it was just the spindle slowly moving down. If I grab the lever while the power downfeed is running the sound won't change but the spindle will stop moving. If I then release the lever, it will drop the spindle a bit and pick back up with the power downfeed.

I don't have any idea how the power down feed is supposed to work. There's not much info out there. The lathes.co.uk website says it doesn't have a powered downfeed. So, I'm not 100% sure what to think. I'm hoping someone here may be able to shine some light on the subject.

Thanks,
David