Milling machine questions.

[RobertHaas]

Instrumentation, and tooling will exceed the value of almost all bare machines.

If you are going to use it as a glorified drill press then forget what I am about to say.

My first mill was a steal. I then spent over 10 grand over the first year alone just on tooling, work holding and instrumentation.

A quality surface plate, height gauge and and set of gauge blocks costs half as much as what I spent on the mill itself. Calipers, dial indicators, test instruments. tramming tools, sine plates, holders, and lighting add up so fast it is terrifying.

Then it comes to the tooling itself. End mills, and simple fly cutters lead to ball mills and then your first index-able face mills. This of course will be followed by boring bars and larger face mills.

Honestly the concept of an affordable mill is something to laugh about.

 

[Splat]

Fwiw, from G0704 owners' accounts it's a good machine for the price. Besides here there are quite a few places, like Yahoo groups, with forums for it or Grizzly machines. Mill size depends how big your intended workpieces will be. With machines you'll be advised to get the biggest you can afford and fit in the shop.

 

[vocatexas]

I was at an auction this weekend and saw a fairly decent Bridgeport go for $1300. It even came with a fair amount of tooling. If I had the spare cash I'd have bid on it myself. You're up in the Metromess, so don't get in a big hurry. I see nice vertical and horizontal mills come up on Craigslist pretty often in your area.

 

[ThinWoodsman]

Used mills of the Bridgeport type are more machine but you are buying a pig in a poke unless you have the ability to do a critical pre-purchase evaluation. Most will come from industrial environments and likely have thousands of hours of use and may have some serious wear issues. These machines can be brought back to nearly new condition but it is not a job for a novice machinist.

This was probably the case for a decade or so after the big CNC switch. What I've been seeing now are machines from small shops that are closing down. Some are the same worn-out production machines, of course, but many of them are single-owner and generally low-usage. The one I picked up, oddly, was owned originally by a jeweler.

So while it is important to be able to evaluate a machine, the odds are slightly more in the purchaser's favor than ten or so years ago when every piece of used machinery was from a production line or, worse, a high school shop.

 

[682bear]

To Ted's point, I bought a Jet JVM-830 mill for $1200. Then added a 4" vise, collets, 4-axis DRO, parallels, center/edge finders, drill chucks, clamping kit, etc. for close to what the mill cost.

Bought a BP for $4K that came with a 6" Kurt vise and a clamping kit. I've added an ER32 collet chuck, Z-axis DRO (had X and Y), power feed on the Z, drill chucks, R-8 collets, QuillMaster, right angle head (last two are esoteric) for an additional ~$1000.

Bruce

Sorry for the quick hijack... Bruce, do you have the QRA for your quillmaster?

-Bear

 

[RJSakowski]

This was probably the case for a decade or so after the big CNC switch. What I've been seeing now are machines from small shops that are closing down. Some are the same worn-out production machines, of course, but many of them are single-owner and generally low-usage. The one I picked up, oddly, was owned originally by a jeweler.

So while it is important to be able to evaluate a machine, the odds are slightly more in the purchaser's favor than ten or so years ago when every piece of used machinery was from a production line or, worse, a high school shop.

I'm sure that there are used Bridgeports out there with little wear. The problem is one of evaluating a machine from a 100 miles away based on a sellers word and a few poor photographs. Add to that, a newbie with little experience as to what can be problematic with a used machine and the results can be disappointing. For a newbie, I would suggest taking an experienced freind along and evaluating a machine before committing to buying. Unless, of course, the machine is so cheap that it would be impossible to lose on the deal.

In this neck of the woods, anyway, used machines are few and far between. If one does come up on CL, chances are by the time you see the add, it has been snatched up or it isn't worth the bother. Might be a different story if I lived closer to a manufacturing area.

 

[BGHansen]

Sorry for the quick hijack... Bruce, do you have the QRA for your quillmaster?

-Bear

Hi Bear,

I do. Here are some related threads when I picked up the QM ($200 shipped), the QRA ($95 shipped) and making a special wrench for the QRA. I haven't used any of them yet though did run a job the other day with an 1/8" end mill where the QM would have given me more clearance. I think the collet in my QM is a 3/16", will make an 1/8" for it one of these days (have a lot of 1/8" shank end mills).

If you are after a QRA, just be patient if shopping on eBay. I had "Quillmaster QRA" as one of my searches for around 6 months after buying the QM. Sellers can ask whatever they want as looking at them on a search today I still see the same guys asking the same $550 - $650 for a QRA. Those same units have been on eBay for over a year. I snagged mine on a Buy It Now auction for $85 plus shipping. I put the power to both the QM and QRA and they work fine.

If you're after a QM alone, this eBay auction (333142914685) has a decent looking one with the collet for $183.05 including shipping. No affiliation with the seller.

Bruce


Quillmaster
https://www.hobby-machinist.com/threads/what-did-you-buy-today.55645/page-64#post-625420

Quillmaster QRA
https://www.hobby-machinist.com/threads/what-did-you-buy-today.55645/page-72#post-648786

Making a wrench for the QRA
https://www.hobby-machinist.com/thr...-in-your-shop-today.67833/page-46#post-649385

 

[ThinWoodsman]

I'm sure that there are used Bridgeports out there with little wear. The problem is one of evaluating a machine from a 100 miles away based on a sellers word and a few poor photographs. Add to that, a newbie with little experience as to what can be problematic with a used machine and the results can be disappointing.

Totally agree - I wouldn't even consider buying a used machine without seeing it in person. Didn't even occur to me as a possibility

 

[Firstgear]

A quality surface plate, height gauge and and set of gauge blocks costs half as much as what I spent on the mill itself. Calipers, dial indicators, test instruments. tramming tools, sine plates, holders, and lighting add up so fast it is terrifying.

Then it comes to the tooling itself. End mills, and simple fly cutters lead to ball mills and then your first index-able face mills. This of course will be followed by boring bars and larger face mills.

Honestly the concept of an affordable mill is something to laugh about.

This is so true!

 

[ezduzit]

Look for a quality, heavy duty, used machine with comprehensive tooling package. Be prepared to immediately jump on a fair deal when it presents itself. And also be prepared to have a professional rigger deliver it.