Looking at buying a mill machine, and believe that I have found one in my budget that will do the intended purpose. But am wondering about a vise. Is there any specific type of vise I need to look for, because I am fairly sure that this machine doesnt come with one.
A milling machine vise, of course. Enco has an imported one for around $100 that works pretty good. You will also need a clamping kit which is a rack full of T bolts and nuts, clamps, etc. You need this for irregualr or circular pieces you can't clamp in a vise.
kernelkrink is 100% correct. A milling machine vise is designed quite differently than a drill press vise, and has to be. The forces generated by millling are much different than those from drilling. A drill press vise isn't strong enough to hold parts in a milling machine.
Well, what I am looking for is an entry level machine. Nothing to turn out thousands of parts, just something to learn on and start me off. I found this maching.
Well, what I am looking for is an entry level machine. Nothing to turn out thousands of parts, just something to learn on and start me off. I found this maching.
I'm no expert but the manual shows it doesn't use a draw bar to secure the #2mt. I would be scared that the drill chuck would come out in the middle of a cut.
Well, what I am looking for is an entry level machine. Nothing to turn out thousands of parts, just something to learn on and start me off. I found this maching.
The vise Kernalkrink suggested is the one I'm using on my HF round column mill, it is great.
The mill you are looking at isn't too bad. You'll need some mt2 collets and it does use a draw bar from what my former boss told me. He has one of these and has been happy with it. He got it for less than $300 instore as well. One modification you will want to make is adding a finefeed to it. There are plans out there to add a finefeed to it to make it as easy to use as a larger mill. I was making gears for it and selling them on ebay (for the finefeed), due to the cost, I only make smaller bronze worm gears now, and they aren't the best for it. If you get it, pm me and I can set you up with the last 160:1 bronze gear I have for a nice finefeed, the price will be $60 though but I can tell you how to make your own also. If you have a lathe, you may want to make your own, but mine are cda 632 high strength bronze and a true bitch to machine.
Another option is to get on harbor freights mailing list and hope they start sending you 20% off coupons. When the larger mill/drill like mine goes on sale for $799 you could walk out of the store with it for $640 plus tax.
If its within your budget, go with the bigger mill/drill!
at my local HF. It didn't scan but they ran it through manually without a second thought. Worth a shot, worst they can do is make you pay full price!
BTW, the only "complaint" I have about the Enco vise I linked to above is the swivel base is not very well marked. Resetting to zero will require some setup time.
Well, what I am looking for is an entry level machine. Nothing to turn out thousands of parts, just something to learn on and start me off. I found this maching.
This machine will work fine for a learning rig. But what you may be learning is bad habits due to the weaknesses of the rig. If you are OK with torching the $400.00 in a year or less, then this is your machine!
I did this by the way.....a 3in 1 model. Worked great for about 8 Months.....Then came all of the limitations. Torched $1100.00.
Ended up buying this rig, Much Better....Not as good a seperate machines, but no real loss in quality of finished product. Just lots of set-up time. That does not hurt me, it makes me think about what I am doing. I tend to plan a lot better now.
A buddy of mine got his there, and he is happy with his purchase.
The combined wisdom of folks a lot more experienced than we are is that you should buy seperate machines that are designed for the task. They are right.....
BTW: Whatever you spend on the rig, expect to spend 3x on the gear to go with it. The Vise for the Mill should be BIG, Ugly, HEAVY, and last a lifetime. I have gone through three of the lightweight ones before I got one from a GOV. auction....It weighs 72 Lb!!! No identification at all....just some holes where I suspect the ID plate used to be attached. Probably sat out in the Kalifornia desert for several years rusting away before I plunked down my $55.00 for that a a buch of other "treasures"....Marines, ya gotta love em...Just don't give them tools.
I preffer to watch for older American made shop tools for cheap. I bought this Atlas horizontal mill for a couple hundred dollars with a bunch of tooling. I did not realize how cool a horizontal mill was until i brought this home to play with.
You can use end mills in a holder or horizontal milling cutters on the arbor
Look at craigs list in your area for older machinery, the biggest dissappoint I've had was hearing from a friend that someone he met at a yard sale had a nice old large lathe for sale cheap. Well as my luck would have it, my buddy couldn't remember his name or anything else. Why even tell somebody something like that, just stick a knife in me.
All I have is a chinese 9x20 lathe, and a chinese mill/drill, if you can get something american made for the same money get it, if not get what ever you can. I got what I did because I got tired of looking and I have a gun safe full of the products of my effort. With my meager tools I've made a flat bending jig and made several ak's (my friends have made many more on it), I've machined the internals to 4 semi 1919's, and I finished my semi Soumi M31 this summer. My point is you need your own machine tools more than you think.
My $.02 is that unless it's got an R-8 spindle taper and is a knee type mill, don't bother.
Most of the inexepensive mills require that you raise or lower the head/quill to make depth of cut adjustments. Extending the quill compromises rigidity and accuracy, meaning that you'll be taking a lot of light cuts as well as re-indicating the part every time you move the quill.
Having to move the head up/down also compromises accuracy and will prove to be quite inconvienient. You'll likely have to re tram the head every time you move it as well.
R-8 tooling is cheap and very plentiful, but I have yet to see anyone with a large assortment of Morse Taper tooling for endmills and such. Having said that, I wouldn't turn down a machine with a cat 40 or cat 50 spindle taper as both are easy to find, though the 50 taper stuff is fairly expensive.
Whatever you do, stay away from the oddball stuff like Jarno tapers or brown and sharpe tapers. Finding tooling for those won't be fun(or cheap) at all....
My $.02 is that unless it's got an R-8 spindle taper and is a knee type mill, don't bother.
Most of the inexepensive mills require that you raise or lower the head/quill to make depth of cut adjustments. Extending the quill compromises rigidity and accuracy, meaning that you'll be taking a lot of light cuts as well as re-indicating the part every time you move the quill.
Having to move the head up/down also compromises accuracy and will prove to be quite inconvienient. You'll likely have to re tram the head every time you move it as well.
R-8 tooling is cheap and very plentiful, but I have yet to see anyone with a large assortment of Morse Taper tooling for endmills and such. Having said that, I wouldn't turn down a machine with a cat 40 or cat 50 spindle taper as both are easy to find, though the 50 taper stuff is fairly expensive.
Whatever you do, stay away from the oddball stuff like Jarno tapers or brown and sharpe tapers. Finding tooling for those won't be fun(or cheap) at all....
If someone told me that I never would have bought anything, its a little discouraging, keep in mind we are talking about a hobby machine not mass production, ruling out everything but a knee mill is kinda silly, and by the way, you don't have to reindicate everytime you move the quill on something like a larger mill/drill, the head yes. I keep most parts within .001-.002 to make things easy, so what kind of accuracy are you talking about? I don't want to sound sharp, but my foreman has a HF drill/mill and he has made .22 cal. gatling gun with it and his little 7x10 lathe, if you've been around awhile, you know guys trained on knee mills that couldn't make one to save their life. It is smart to know the limitations of the machine you get however. Most machines are limited by the user.
I didn't get a lathe until 2003 when my foreman recommended a HF lathe, I got the mill/drill a year later and I've made a lot with the two of them, adding 9 guns to my collection (not counting 3 ak's made using homemade weldpacks). Not bad for teaching myself how to use them both. 15 years ago however I ruled out anything but american made machines do to some advice someone gave me. Since then I've learned you must work with what you've got and something is better than nothing.
No kidding! there's guys in this hobby who can do more with a Dremel, than some can do on a Bridgeport! Just take a look at the incredible work Panacea Beachbum has done on a mini mill and small HF lathe. There seem to be quite a few machinist who frown on the home builder doing more with less.
Here is a link to a good site. www.cnczone.com Some people over there have made cnc mills out of HF mills with servo motors. One thing that is suggested is to replace the lead screws with new ones that have tighter tolerance's.
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