Mills for Gunsmiths

[MC]

A little background, I've been building 1911's, AR's and doing minor smithing on my own guns for several years now. Mostly filing, fitting and finishing. I'm getting the bug to buy a mill and just came into a substantial bonus check that has me even more motivated. The Precision Matthews models with the 3-axis DRO look particularly interesting but the reality is I have about zero real experience machining, just watching videos. In fact other than the recent smithing, drafting experience, and some seventh grade metalshop I have very little experience with metal. I am an experienced woodworker however.

My machine budget is ~3K and I realize there is substantial tooling that needs to be purchased as well. Any recommendations on the PM machines or others. I'm not inclined to buy a used Bridgeport, etc. because I really don't know what I'm looking at.

Thanks,

Mike

 

[TeaBagofHorror]

As far as I know some of their machines are made in Taiwan and some in China.
Don´t know about the quality, but I read you can call Matt (the owner of Precision Matthews) directly.
3k are very tight, especially when a machine vice has to be bought, too.

 

[tweinke]

I think you would be well served by PM mill. Matt has good customer service in my opinion and that means a lot to me.

 

[MC]

As far as I know some of their machines are made in Taiwan and some in China.
Don´t know about the quality, but I read you can call Matt (the owner of Precision Matthews) directly.
3k are very tight, especially when a machine vice has to be bought, too.

Thanks, I'm sort of pushing the the vise into the tooling category which helps a little bit on budget. I'm not intending to do anything production like. Just one-off jobs. My only concern is going too small but I haven't imagined anything so far that's involves very large parts. My understanding is that the bigger mills are more rigid and I'm hoping to get more repeatability and precision to drop the amount of file work required right now. I don't mind it but feel like I could do better with a mill.

 

[Downwindtracker2]

I just do the stocks ,I leave most of the metal work to Greydog, his web nomduplume. (sp). He is truly a great gunsmith. His mill is an Advance labeled Rong Fu- 45. He bought his new, they are now beyond your budget. But a PM version should work for you.

 

[MC]

I just do the stocks ,I leave most of the metal work to Greydog, his web nomduplume. (sp). He is truly a great gunsmith. His mill is an Advance labeled Rong Fu- 45. He bought his new, they are now beyond your budget. But a PM version should work for you.

So do you use the mill for the inletting? That's crossed my mind as an interesting application as well.

 

[Downwindtracker2]

I don't but Greydog does. I would try it on a piece of 2x4 first. The max of 1500 rpm is pretty slow on my machine, It's the same RF-45 as he has. I was thinking of using a big plunge router and jigs

 

[brav65]

I think the 833T would be great for pistol work and is made in Taiwan but it is $300 over your budget. Bill Miller does a list of 1911 work and I think he had a similar machine made by Charter Oak.

 

[BtoVin83]

Years ago I bought a HF round column mill and it has worked pretty well. I have built AR's and 1911's using it and the products have turned out rather well. To me a DRO is a option I cannot afford but I have a fair amount of experience running a mill. I recommend a knee mill though and as heavy as you can afford. Between work holding equipment and tooling you can burn through a pile of money. Nothing destroys tooling faster than a mill.

 

[MC]

I think the 833T would be great for pistol work and is made in Taiwan but it is $300 over your budget. Bill Miller does a list of 1911 work and I think he had a similar machine made by Charter Oak.

The 833T doesn't appear to have a 3-axis DRO option from PM at least from my early research. I'm inclined to get a mill with DRO and would prefer not to add it after the fact. All that said I appreciate all the inputs because I'm just rank beginner on all this.