Milling Table

[redvan22]

Hello all,
I have a project that requires milling a flat across the length of a steel block .500 x .750 x 3.0 on a 30 degree angle to form a slope. After racking my head trying to figure how to set this up to get that angle and still be rigid enough to cut it on my mini mill, I decided to go to amazon and see if I could find anything to suit my needs. I found this Not too bad considering the money. Of course it looked better in the images than in reality but...

Anyway, when I received it, I took my caliper to it and discovered that the slots were just a little narrower than the t-nuts I have so I can't use them. This led me to check the hold down lugs and they too would not fit my hardware.

The slots are .575 deep top to bottom, .707 at the widest point, .380 wide slot at the top and the height of the channel is .300 - these are the working measurements I would need due to the less than accurate slot machining. One slot is clearly wider in all aspects than the other two and wider at one end than the other. Again, for $65 it's doable. I just don't like making tooling for one purpose.

Knowing this now, I'm halfway to sending it back and finding another way. So, the table looks ok for the money but do I go through the time and trouble of making t-nuts just to fit it or do you all have better ideas?

Michael.

 

[epanzella]

You have a mill. Indicate the angle gizmo in and true up the slots. Even if your T-nutz did fit you would still want the slots square going forward. Yeah you may have to buy or grind a T-slot cutter to get to the wide part of the slot but it's money well spent.

 

[redvan22]

You have a mill. Indicate the angle gizmo in and true up the slots. Even if your T-nutz did fit you would still want the slots square going forward. Yeah you may have to buy or grind a T-slot cutter to get to the wide part of the slot but it's money well spent.

It didn't cross my mind to true up the table to fit my t-nuts, that's a great idea, except for the expense of the cutter.

 

[epanzella]

It didn't cross my mind to true up the table to fit my t-nuts, that's a great idea, except for the expense of the cutter.

If you have drawers of tag sale end mills you can take one slightly smaller than the size of the T-slotter cutter you would need to cut the bottom of the T-slot and grind a relief in it so it clears the top part of the slot. Instant T-slot cutter.

 

[ChazzC]

5x7 is a bit large for a mini-mill so I got a 4x5; although I liked the idea of a crank to adjust the angle, I realized that for the amount of use manual adjustment would be fine. I did make T-Slot nuts for it and did some “tuning.”

 

[redvan22]

If you have drawers of tag sale end mills you can take one slightly smaller than the size of the T-slotter cutter you would need to cut the bottom of the T-slot and grind a relief in it so it clears the top part of the slot. Instant T-slot cutter.

I checked the fit and all I need to do is widen the slot at the top, and bring the top into square.

 

[epanzella]

I checked the fit and all I need to do is widen the slot at the top, and bring the top into square.

Purrrfekt!!!