Here's the link to Barrychuck's essential TOM Z-axis upgrade. After finding the requisite brass tube at my local hobby store, then hunting around for half an hour trying to find a drill bit to use (and failing) it took me only another half hour of patient work to complete the mod.
In a word, it's fantastic. My Z-stage used to squeal like a pig when it got to the bottom end of it's travel, and made a lot of noise whenever I homed it. Now it's almost completely silent like the X and Y axes.
Not sure if anyone has pointed this out, but when you install the Z-stage and before you place the plastruder onto it, wind the stage off the threaded rod and position it so that the rod is just above the threaded nut, and then adjust the tension of the bolts holding the Z-stage stepper in place fractionally to steer the tip of the threaded rod so that it's lined up with the nut. This helped to reduce Z-stage noise for me, and Barry's mod went a step further and will now mean my machine is ready for a heavier motor (Lookin' at you Mk6 upgrade) and any other crap I choose to put on the Z-stage.
