- Joined
- Mar 21, 2013
- Messages
- 4,064
I actually prefer this style bed mill to a knee mill and the Y travel on most knee mills is around 9 inches vs 12 for this mill. I have looked at some used industrial bed mills which dwarf the CO but like you I'm not really looking for a 4000 pound beast. I can lift the CO with my tractor front end loader, its not so heavy that I can't put in on wheels so I can shove it out of the way when I need to. I have a Grizzly G4003G 12-36 lathe and it seems every time I turn around I need a mill for some operation.
Oh yea, a 4000G? That's on my short list for my next lathe. The other is the Eisen 12x36. Taiwan made but a bit pricier. Money no object is the PM1340GT.
Are you going to counter weight the head? I counter weighted my old Rong Fu and will do the same with the CO if I purchase one especially since the spindle sticks out 12 inches from the column, those gear heads plus the motor is a lot of weight pitching forward.
This mill design begs for a counterweight. My friend's big CNCs are counterweighted, so why not these? Cost, probably. Once I get the mill I will look at my options in this regard. I won't power the head, as I like to use the Z axis for precision placement using a 3-axis DRO as opposed to using the quill. Unless I'm doing a plunge cut. This is where I miss having a knee mill: when I can move the part into the cutter on Z. But then...if I counterweight such that the Z axis screw is always preloaded the other way, i.e., the counterweight is heavier than the head (opposite of the loading on a knee), I could do pocket cuts without having to use the quill. I'll have to think about this. Probably will depend upon how robust the column is.
I thought the price of the CO was quite reasonable compared with Grizzly and others. Shipping to me on the west coast is brutal, the quote is about $560 ouch!
Yea, shipping to me was $529. Eisen quoted me about $450 to ship a 12x36. Guess these guys don't get the volume discount like Grizzly does...
Bill