- Joined
- Jul 31, 2020
- Messages
- 765
Fear of inventory shrinkage and panic won in the wee hours of the morning. I had been struggling with trying to find a new or used mill for the past few weeks. My local Used market is brutally bad, with decent Mills gone in hours, and what mills are left being in very bad condition. With the Covid slowdowns, NEW inventory has been rapidly diminishing with long restocking periods for vendors.
The Criteria was basic, and it follows.
1. Available power was limited to 120 Volts A.C. However, a minimum of 1 Horsepower.
2. Space is at a Premium, it is essentially a one car garage, which must have room for a car too. The ceiling is not super high.
3. Must be square column, I didn't want to fuss with tram every time I adjusted the Z axis, nor did I want to build a gizmo to make it less of a problem.
4. Stiff enough to do *Light Cuts* in steel with precision. I realize light is subjective, but I used to operate a Bridgeport and know that can't be matched.
5. Heavy enough to achieve the number 4 goal, but not so heavy it will require an act of God to move. A purely arbitrary weight of 340 to 420 was contrived. (Cheap engine hoist moveable)
6. Must have a DRO, I worked as a machinist Decades ago, yes, I can count rotations of the dial and an offset value, but a DRO just makes it easier.
7. An existing Stand available, I really don't want to have to make a bench rated for 500 pounds, and work it to be maximally flat and level.
8. Ground, and preferably scraped Dovetail surfaces.
9. Quiet variable speed Belt Drive, so nobody in the house has reason to complain about the noise.
10. Available X-axis feed, for smoother finishes.
For those who have been looking recently, you realize there are some candidates that match these criteria. However, by the time funds were in place, everything that matched all of those goals was in part, or in whole OUT of STOCK.
It rapidly turned into an exercise of "what can you do without, or, what can you build/assemble yourself". The top pick on the short list, ran out of all of the models which had a factory DRO, and then ran out of pedestal bases (Criteria 6 and 7). Another contender had a DRO, but there was no ETA for a base, it was also at a higher price.
In the End, I decided that either of my top choices would require me to make a table, so that was not a deciding point. The question was whether installing a DRO would be a critical factor. As another poster said in this forum "If you cannot install a DRO, you may not be cut out to be a Machinist". It seemed apparent that installing a DRO, (although a pain in the butt, and usually requiring the installer to make custom brackets), was not going to be a deal breaker.
A Precision Matthews PM-728-VT was ordered, which with the (inventory) limitations of Items 6 and 7 above, met all of the other requirements.
A cheap "throw away" DRO was ordered, which was sized to fit the Mill. A word of caution to people selecting DRO units, keep in mind the length of the Linear Scales are LONGER than the total length they can measure; plan accordingly. Those who buy a 400mm LONG scale, will discover it measures a shorter distance than 400mm (some vendors sell based upon the physical length of the scale, and others sell based upon the length it can measure). Be sure to get linear scales long enough to measure the distance you need, but also, be aware the extra length has to (somehow) bolt up to your mill. Sometimes things are in the way of the latter goal. The Cheap kit I found (less than 200 bucks) already had the correct length linear scales for the PM-728-VT, and if I ran into problems, the kit could be recycled and tossed on my lathe (so little overall risk here).
Pictures:
The Mill, The DRO. Both are Website Pictures.
The Criteria was basic, and it follows.
1. Available power was limited to 120 Volts A.C. However, a minimum of 1 Horsepower.
2. Space is at a Premium, it is essentially a one car garage, which must have room for a car too. The ceiling is not super high.
3. Must be square column, I didn't want to fuss with tram every time I adjusted the Z axis, nor did I want to build a gizmo to make it less of a problem.
4. Stiff enough to do *Light Cuts* in steel with precision. I realize light is subjective, but I used to operate a Bridgeport and know that can't be matched.
5. Heavy enough to achieve the number 4 goal, but not so heavy it will require an act of God to move. A purely arbitrary weight of 340 to 420 was contrived. (Cheap engine hoist moveable)
6. Must have a DRO, I worked as a machinist Decades ago, yes, I can count rotations of the dial and an offset value, but a DRO just makes it easier.
7. An existing Stand available, I really don't want to have to make a bench rated for 500 pounds, and work it to be maximally flat and level.
8. Ground, and preferably scraped Dovetail surfaces.
9. Quiet variable speed Belt Drive, so nobody in the house has reason to complain about the noise.
10. Available X-axis feed, for smoother finishes.
For those who have been looking recently, you realize there are some candidates that match these criteria. However, by the time funds were in place, everything that matched all of those goals was in part, or in whole OUT of STOCK.
It rapidly turned into an exercise of "what can you do without, or, what can you build/assemble yourself". The top pick on the short list, ran out of all of the models which had a factory DRO, and then ran out of pedestal bases (Criteria 6 and 7). Another contender had a DRO, but there was no ETA for a base, it was also at a higher price.
In the End, I decided that either of my top choices would require me to make a table, so that was not a deciding point. The question was whether installing a DRO would be a critical factor. As another poster said in this forum "If you cannot install a DRO, you may not be cut out to be a Machinist". It seemed apparent that installing a DRO, (although a pain in the butt, and usually requiring the installer to make custom brackets), was not going to be a deal breaker.
A Precision Matthews PM-728-VT was ordered, which with the (inventory) limitations of Items 6 and 7 above, met all of the other requirements.
A cheap "throw away" DRO was ordered, which was sized to fit the Mill. A word of caution to people selecting DRO units, keep in mind the length of the Linear Scales are LONGER than the total length they can measure; plan accordingly. Those who buy a 400mm LONG scale, will discover it measures a shorter distance than 400mm (some vendors sell based upon the physical length of the scale, and others sell based upon the length it can measure). Be sure to get linear scales long enough to measure the distance you need, but also, be aware the extra length has to (somehow) bolt up to your mill. Sometimes things are in the way of the latter goal. The Cheap kit I found (less than 200 bucks) already had the correct length linear scales for the PM-728-VT, and if I ran into problems, the kit could be recycled and tossed on my lathe (so little overall risk here).
Pictures:
The Mill, The DRO. Both are Website Pictures.
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