Wtk What Is The Best Mill I Can Get For $2,500

I'd add in Deckel / Aciera / Schaublin and their clones (comprehensive list on www.lathes.co.uk under any of those three), not as big as a Bilgeportalike nor quite as heavy, but just as / more capable if you don't need the work envelope of a big turret mill, with creature comforts like power feeds on all the axes[1], lever or dial selection for spindle and feed speeds so no struggling with belts over your head (assuming you have Dachshund Syndrome like me) - I'm hoping I can bid on a clone in an auction this week, if I can and I'm successful I'll drop a few pics in as a tool gloat
They are, however, a LOT more complex than the average mill, worth paying extra for one in good shape (unless you enjoy rebuilding f'rinstance multi-speed-and-splitter truck transmissions)

Dave H. (the other one)

[1] Rugby and falling off motorbikes can do terrible things to rotator cuffs...

Now, if you want a real mill, get a Van Norman 22L (22LU would be even better) or 26, no quill but if you want to move metal these machines will do it. Scary fast

Be sure to check the government auctions down in Florida, in the past I've seen some really good looking machine tools for sale and they all seem to go cheap (at least cheap as compared with other areas of the country)

Mike

I have the G0755 and could not be happier with it. It will do most anything that I need to do. The power to lower/raise the head is a plus. As far as the power down quill for a mill, this is something that I didn't need, as I'm not boring cylinders or need the tapping feature. For your purpose (hobby machining and/or general gunsmithing) the G0755 is ideal. It is so much larger and rigid than any mini mill to be sure. The G0755 will make easy and accurate work of any 80% AR lower. Be sure to get the T10063 Grizzly milling vice. I got the 4" and find it large enough for most of what's needed. You will spend $'s saved buying this machine to use on tooling. One thing to remember, the machine is heavy.........Get the lift gate service to get it on the ground close to your garage door. I was really having trouble getting it into position by myself, so next day, I had a few friends help. This will make life easy on you. We used a 2 ton (minimum size) lift crane (engine hoist) from HF + several heavy lifting straps. We set it down onto a 1000 lb limit flat roller to move it into position. All this, and all our lifting and roller set up was still maxed out! It is set up to insert 1 inch OD by 4 foot long pipes into/through the base to help with final positioning too. Once again, I really like my G0755.

bob308 said:

well if it does not have a knee it is not a mill just a heavy duty drill press. for that money you could look at a clausing 8520 or a Rockwell 21-100. a friend of mine just got a Rockwell for $1000. now that would leave you with $1500 to buy tooling.

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Well compared to a bed mill , A knee mill is just a glorified drill press.

HGR in Cleveland has Bridgeport's from $700 and up, and about 300 to choose from. Your a good days drive away. A 3 day trip and a one way rental truck, or a trailer, and you can find something well within your budget, including freight.

I drove 1400 miles round trip in 2 days to get a machine. It's an option.

Jason

Buy a used bridgeport and cheep drill press for that kind of money. Tooling for both with the leftovers.

A little (or a lot) of way wear on a used bridgeport won't bother you for the items you're talking about making. You will soon dread changing it over to drill a hole, and lowering the knee a few inches, so the cheep drill press is good for that.

I put my entire shop together (Mill, big lathe, small lathe, and surface grinder) for $1400. You might even be able to put a DRO on the mill, too. Almost essential for milling pockets easily (like in an AR lower)

I looked for a while when I bought my mill. I looked at new imports that were like a drill press. I looked at Bridgeports (found that NAME seems to demand a premium on price) Ended up with a EXCELLO 604 which is bigger and beefier than a Bridgeport. I gave 1200 for it, and it's twice the mill a Bridgeport is in my opinion.

The other thing to watch with Bridgeports is there are TWO head designs. The M head and the J head. The M head uses R-8 collets which go up to 1 inch internal diameter or close. The J head uses a much smaller collet and have a much smaller capacity. That will limit you later on. While you are talking about doing AR lowers right now. that ain't gonna last. You will graduate to building lowers from a block of aluminum and then that will get old too. Then you will what to do REAL gunsmithing and build bolt guns. Don't short yourself with a small mill. There are good machines out there if you look.

Just be ready to move them. Car trailers are about a must, set it over the axles and you will be fine. When setting it off, move it to the back of the trailer then set your engine hoist on the ground and pick it up. Pull the trailer out from under it and set a couple beams across the legs of the engine hoist to set the mill down on. This will keep it from swinging. The other thing to have is a spud bar. You WILL need it to move the engine hoist around with the weight of a mill on it. It will not simply roll. Once you have it where you what it hoist it up and pull the beams and set it down. Never try moving an engine hoist around with it up in the air and a heavy mill or lathe hanging from it. It's a good way to create a big mess when the whole thing falls over.

My first Mill was a Taylor Fenn, never seen or heard of another one. Moved to a Bridgeport tracer, did some short production runs, the Taylor Fenn made the patterns. Bought a series II Bridgeport, power feed on the X Axis. Bought a Kearney Trecker 310 S15 (5 tons of vertical madness). Thought I'd probably sell the BP series II, but different machines and they do different things really well. I love the way the heavy iron (KT) can take off metal. I love the versatility of the BP. The tracer is still a great machine and makes repurposing existing things pretty easy with out reverse engineering. Enough about me. If I was limited by space, $ available, etc. I would shoot for versatility, A BP or clone, or a horizontal with a vertical head. Some of those old heavy machines go for scrap value, because of issues with moving and people don't really know what they are. Surf some of the Machine form website archives, for heavy iron and see what is out there. I once saw a early KT horizontal with a bunch of tooling sell for about 300 bucks. One other thing I might mention, most of us beginner machinist can wrap our minds around a Vertical Machine really easily, not so with Horizontal machines, but in some ways horizontal machines are more versatile.

Good luck Tim

The best value in any machine, but especially machine tools, is the one you are patient enough to wait for the right deal to come along and quick enough to jump on it when it does appear.
Of course, for this to work you need to know what is a good machine compared to "everything else" and what will work for your purposes. These days we are blessed with lots of different avenues for shopping machine tools- craigslist, ebay, online auction houses and local auctions, tool resellers, etc....

Keep to your budget and be patient and something will come up.

Bob

There are a number of milling machines on your local Craig's List, this one is in Tampa. If you are interested in a "Bridgeport style mill" there is a Tree that is on the market. Offer half of what he is asking to see if he will bite. If not, come back in a few weeks and make the offer again.
Usual disclaimers apply, no relationship with seller, don't know anything about the machine other than what seller posted, yada, yada, yada.

https://tampa.craigslist.org/hil/hvd/5512206936.html