By "tunning", I meant things like scraping dovetails, gibs, redoing a quill lock, re boring bores, "creative tweaking", etc.
Perhaps I should have used the word "correcting". I use the word "adjustments for the thing you describe (English is my second language).
Not only do I expect to tune/adjust a new machine, I expect to do it every once in a while, after cleanup, etc.
So, what I meant was that I wouldn't mind having to do a bit of scraping, or doing more exotic/creative "corrections" with moglice, etc. IF the price is significantly lower. The ZAY7045 seems like the candidate mill for "user upgrades".
Of course "corrections" have their limit. A ZAY7045 will never "become" a Shaublin Bévillard 13 regardless of the work done to it !
My idea of an optimal price/quality tradeoff, is either "dirt cheap but clonky" or "high quality and expensive". Or stated inversly: with "mid price + average quality" you get the worst of both worlds.
In an ideal world, manufacturers would publish tolerances (for runout, straightness, squareness, etc), like for granite plates. Instead we have to interpret what vendors mean by "ultra precision".
Sorry to hijack just a little but you raise an implicit question there that has just popped into my head when reading another thread.
Are PM's Chinese mills (and lathes for that matter) significantly more plug 'n play than say the Grizzly equivalents?
Obviously there'll be adjustments to make, and tuning to do on any factory fresh machine tool that has been on a container ship for a few weeks and then in a haulier's truck and we're not talking the 7x14's or mini mills here (PM don't sell those anyway) but are PM's offerings of a notably higher fit and finish, out of the box, than say a Grizzly equivalent?
I know you won't know necessarily, but I expect someone should be able to give a reasonably confident reply.