Horizontal vs vertical mill

[janvanruth]

Hi Chris
I have a combination machine and I can tell you it's almost the ideal hobby machine. I never owned a mill until a couple of years ago. I now have a Jet mill/drill and a Cincinnati vertical, but I found the Elliott combo a perfect addition to the lathe and shaper. I won't part with this one any time soon.

View attachment 92836

hard to believe you are actually working the machine, it looks like it just left the showroom yesterday

 

[ecdez]

Re: Horizontal vs vertical mill, the rare HORIZONTAL preferance and why.

My first machine shop job was in '55, I was 16. Luckily for me, it had 3 new J-head Bridgeports, a couple of Cincinati horizontals and a vertical, a large shaper and many more machines that were common in 50's-60's shops.

My first opportunity was on the big shaper and second was running both the shaper and a Cinci #2 horizontal at the same time. Didn't get to touch the slick new Bridgeports, (they'd only been introduced 2 years earlier in '53) for a long time. Long enough to have come to admire the advantages of a horizontal and there are many.

The shop had a contract, (that the boss was sorry that he'd bid on, even though he bid it high so that he wouldn't get it) thousands of small hinge-halves from 1/2" X 1/2" steel barstock for the military, a perfect job for a modern, low feature CNC, but we'd have had to wait 3 or 4 decades to get one............

The Bridgeports were running 2 shifts and falling behind and the owner was upset. Dumb little me, (I had a pickup truck and was the delivery boy but wanted desperately to get my hands on the machines) with great trepidation, suggested to the owner that the big Cinci shaper would take the majority of the metal off in a gang fixture, a bunch at a time. He kind of exploded at me, "right, and who will run the shaper?" I could see in his face before he'd even finished that question, that he was sorry that he'd asked it and then left no doubt by following up with, "right, the delivery boy thinks he's a machinist".

By the time I'd gotten back from that mornings delivery, a 50 mile round trip, he'd built a fixture for 20 parts for the shaper and gave me a little instruction and a lot of dire outcomes for screwing it up.

I had time to let my youthful mind wander as the shaper efficiently but slowly removed the majority of the metal, leaving a much nicer finish than an endmill ever could and at twenty per crack, the shaper was whuppin' the Bridgeports on that particular phase of the job, while it left a lot less to remove on the Bridgeports.

The parts were shaped like a comma with a straight leg, the 1/2" rounded end had 2 configurations, one a slot cut in the center half of that head and the other configuration, an equal number of parts with the outer ends, a quarter each of that round head removed, so that when the rounds were drilled, nested together and pinned, they formed a hinge, which some sheet metal contractor spot welded to a box and it's lid. No, the gov didn't do cast pot metal and rivets!

I was working with the swingshift and going to school in the day time. I'll just let you imagine how the Bridgies went about rounding the ends and for thousands of parts, it was slow! I'd load 20 parts in the shaper then with plenty of time to let my mind wander, imagined another fixture for twenty parts, all standing on end like little soldiers, with a 1/4" radius concave cutter cleanly rounding their little heads and sizing them to length in a single pass on the big Cinci horizontal mill right beside me.

That idea was met with less resistance from Pat, as he was pleased that I was staying ahead of 3 Bridgeports on the shaper, so he built the mill fixture. The Cinci could take a single pass accross the 20 parts, leaving them sized to length and a nice half round (required 3/4, and the Bridgies managed that last 1/4) head, in less time than they took to load and cut, than the shaper spent thining 20 parts. In other words, the shaper op was just as fast as it was before I started doing the milling too.

We easily completed that contract in the alloted time, Pat was very pleased and showed it by giving me a lot of his time with other projects but none on the Bridgeports for a long time.

When I finally was allowed to run a Bridgeport, I was thrilled, then disappointed. I had already gotten a lot of hours on the #3 Cinci vertical, which was considered kid-proof by my boss. The Bridgeports were a whole different, fussy animal that refused to leave a nice shiney end milled surface or cut a keyway in 4 times the time it took on the horizontal. It let me know when it was being pushed, where the Cinci's and shaper never noticed, though they'd spit out a fixture full of parts, without noticing when pushed at something like 5 times the metal removal rate of the Bridgies.

I suspect that most vertical aficionados really never learned to use a horizontal. If I were buying my first mill, I'd see to it that it could do horizontal and vertical, with emphasis on the horizontal. My by far favorite mill is my K & T 2H universal, that can turn a 36" diameter part, like a full-sized train car wheel on a faceplate, mimicing a "T-Lathe", with a wide array of power driven speeds on all three 3 axes plus rapids for each. My index Vertical has only power to the X, very limited speeds, (compared to the K & T) and that, unlike on the K & T, is not sync'd to the spindle speed, so forget anything sophisticated, like milling a helical gear.

Pocket work on the horizontal? For my money, I have a better view of the pocket on the horizontal, BECAUSE THE CHIPS FALL OUT OF IT in plain, quite comfortable view*, (I do shift the light, duh) While on my vertical, the steenking pocket stays full of chips, swirling around messing up the finish and totally hiding the work being done.
*I suspect that people who have never tried it, aren't aware that a 50 NMTB spindle will very ridgidly support a 2" roughing endmill, extended well out from the column face, leaving more viewing room than most ever get between the quill and table on their verticals and think that the *****-footing they do when milling an 1/8" keyway with a fragile little endmill is just something they think can't be helped. It's easy to form a lopsided opinion when one choice is still a mystery.

No, I don't wan't to get rid of my vertical, especially when doing work on one of my rotary tables but I'd die holding on to the K & T if someone tried to take it! I've built a 3-1/4HP plunge router fixture, attaching to the quill of the vertical, that gobbles aluminum, leaving the high finish of high speed and will rotate to any position from the center of a spherical envelope. Nope, keeping the Index!

For the OP's needs, my 3,800 pound K & T would be out of the question but that was just to illustrate some of the "mysteries" of horizontals, 'ave a look here at a very nice shop-built vertical head for a "small" horizontal and my post to that thread:

http://www.hobby-machinist.com/show...d-for-1-Burke-Horizontal-Mill-By-Mike-Rauchle

I got that mill for less than a meal for 2 at MacDonalds* and while those sort of bargains are rare nowdays, it could easily be had for far less than a new, dramatically less rugged Asian import. While the import is much better than sitting cross legged with a bar in one hand and a file in the other, if you ever get your hands on a truly good mill, that import will feel a lot like a file, with the all the rigidity of your lap!:jester:
*I may some day give the tip that finds those sort of bargains but this is already far too wordy!

There, now I've gored some folks cows, which the new guy should never do. I hope they'll forgive me and hope even more, that they'll re-think some of their possibly unwarrented biases against horizontals, 'specially when it's possible to get both for less! A case where less is DEFINITELY more!

Bob)

Good story Bob. I've got two horizontals and there's always a stack of parts waiting to go in them. I'm picking up a third one this weekend. I have one vertical and I almost never use it. That being said, it really depends on the work you do. If my vertical had a power feed, I just might use it more.