Milling machines

[michaels2s]

Looking great....

[Thuppu]

Awesome, you have a nice little machine shop growing there.
Now you will spend a few thousand euros on tooling
I can recommend WNT in Germany, they are not the finest quality but good value for light use and quick delivery

Yeah, tooling... have been looking for prices... Need to test out, but propably chinese carbide tools can be enough for most small jobs. Locally I can get quite good quality HSS mills, and not so badly priced. Ordered a china ER32 collet set, will see how it turn out.

Also got a big bounch of DIN 69871 tool holders from a fellow Audifinns member Kenax for a very friendly price. Thanks a lot if you read this. This mill uses DIN 2080 as default, but it's easy to convert to the other one. Needs only a little longer drawbar and the other notch in the spindle needs little material taken off (spindle had removable notches).



Drill chuck, Weldon 25mm, Weldon 25mm, Weldon 32mm, ER40, ER32 short, ER32, Unknown collet(8mm) type, 40mm face mill arbor, Morse 3 adapter, Morse 1 adapter, Morse 1 adapter.

[pasbogdan]

Here we have big problems with finding good condition tools at resonable prices.All tools from the machines went to scrap,and the ones still left are a bad option.For example for an old set of collet/collet holder(8 pcs) iso 40 they ask 100 eur.Collets are buned and decalibrated.Got a full set of 16 or 18 collets and iso 40 holder from aliexpress with those money or little more.

I am surfing the net for 3 years looking for a 100-150mm precision vise at resonable price.No luck.They ask 250 eur for a drill press scrap one and 400 eur for a drilled,milled,hamered,welded and rusted precision vise.

I wish i would have lived in the States.If you look on youtube machinist chanels like Abom79 or Keith Fenner they show up with sets of precision v blocks for 10 usd,300 mm 4 jaw chuck 100 usd from auctions,etc.All mint..

[Thuppu]

ER32 collets are much cheaper than ER40. My ER32 kit(9pcs) cost 30e with shipping. Need to buy a ER40 kit also, as I got the holder for them. Biggest problem for hobbyists are the tool costs, quality end mills and bits. A good quality 10-12mm carbide end mill can easily cost 50e. I will try out some cheaper china mills, but even they cost 15e or more.

I luckily got a basic vise with the machine, seems to do the job, but it will propably not be high precision. Looks quite old but there was a made in taiwan stamp on it. It has brand new hardened jaws though. An hydraulic vise can easily cost 1500e new.

[bambridge]

Totally agree with Alex, we use WNT for most of our tooling, they have some great offers for milling tool holders etc

Awesome, you have a nice little machine shop growing there.
Now you will spend a few thousand euros on tooling
I can recommend WNT in Germany, they are not the finest quality but good value for light use and quick delivery

[Thuppu]

One thing to do, which seems to be a must, is to fit a DRO. It will certainly make life easier when milling.

[Error404]

3x easier for sure

[Thuppu]

Made a small rack for the tool holders today. There is almost no table space in the garage so they will be good on the wall. Cutted also a couple of ER-spanners out of 5mm Hardox 450, for 32 and 40 size.

[pasbogdan]

ER32 collets are much cheaper than ER40. My ER32 kit(9pcs) cost 30e with shipping. Need to buy a ER40 kit also, as I got the holder for them. Biggest problem for hobbyists are the tool costs, quality end mills and bits. A good quality 10-12mm carbide end mill can easily cost 50e. I will try out some cheaper china mills, but even they cost 15e or more.

I luckily got a basic vise with the machine, seems to do the job, but it will propably not be high precision. Looks quite old but there was a made in taiwan stamp on it. It has brand new hardened jaws though. An hydraulic vise can easily cost 1500e new.

Carbide will be a total loss of money for home small machining.You need to run high sfm or rpm also fast feeds.Aslo interupted cuts or parts clamped not rigid etc will easy break the tool.The dro will be the best thing to do.But this will not keep your mind trained enough. I wonder how my dad and others in his age and field managed to get prototype toolings and parts using big drawings and written on paper 3 or 4 axis coordinates,vernier numbers,keeping in mind radius and backlash also for mill and rotary table.

[Thuppu]

Yea, have been study this, and yes, seems that HSS will be better in most cases with manual mills.