smallfry Posted October 27, 2019 Share Posted October 27, 2019 I have always fancied having a milling machine. Handy sometimes I know, but I don't know if I will make enough use of it to justify the cost, the hassle of the logistics of it, and the space it will take up ! One has come up for a good price, bearing how much these things cost new, BUT, its a vertical machine (Harrison) that has no quill feed, and as I would mostly be doing boring jobs with it, I think its of limited use ? So, what do you guys think ? Is it still worth having ? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lo-fi Posted October 27, 2019 Share Posted October 27, 2019 A quill feed is a killer feature for a vertical mill, which I think is why Bridgeports are so popular for home shops. I literally just bought one myself as it came up locally at a steal of a price. What type of tinkering do you tend (or intend) to get up to? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
smallfry Posted October 27, 2019 Author Share Posted October 27, 2019 Bridgeports are great, but sadly wayyyyy to tall for anywhere I have, unless it lives outside ! Tinkering ? For a start, to bore out some bellhousings concentrically, refacing some cylinder heads, but after that dunno offhand, but I am sure there will be lots of things. But its like any tools really, once you have one, you cannot understand how you ever got by without it. As I am getting on a bit now, instead if wasting my time with vehicles, I am pondering the idea of building a scale live steam locomotive. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stellaghost Posted October 27, 2019 Share Posted October 27, 2019 Have just purchased a universal mill myself it is an AEW viceroy horizon sadly no quill feed but it was being used for skimming cylinder heads and the fly cutters for that came with the mill does the future work justify the cost who knows time will tell I was happy with the cost and after all you only live once and cannot take anything with you when you go so why not it was a pain to offload local farmer assisted with a telehandler his cost being " I might want a key way cutting sometime lad " regards Stephen Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vulcan bomber Posted October 27, 2019 Share Posted October 27, 2019 3 hours ago, smallfry said: Bridgeports are great, but sadly wayyyyy to tall for anywhere I have, unless it lives outside ! Tinkering ? For a start, to bore out some bellhousings concentrically, refacing some cylinder heads, but after that dunno offhand, but I am sure there will be lots of things. But its like any tools really, once you have one, you cannot understand how you ever got by without it. As I am getting on a bit now, instead if wasting my time with vehicles, I am pondering the idea of building a scale live steam locomotive. What sort of scale model you thinking of (I've been building a 5 inch gauge 9F for some years now) because you can get a long way with a lathe with a vertical slide. Another option is to build a quill feed contraption for the mill you speak of... do always remember that a lathe is far superior a mill for Boring. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ed Poore Posted October 27, 2019 Share Posted October 27, 2019 Do you have a lathe and decent pillar drill? Depends on what you want to do with it but for a general purpose tool I find the lathe invaluable (although I do now want/need a bigger one than my ML7). I've got a Bridgeport sat in a barn at my parents a few miles away waiting for my machine shop to be finished and with the pillar drill for the most stuff I don't notice not having a mill. On the other hand I'd really regret not having the lathe. Depending on what size scale you're talking about you know you can do milling on a lathe (albeit limited in area)? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
smallfry Posted October 27, 2019 Author Share Posted October 27, 2019 5 hours ago, vulcan bomber said: What sort of scale model you thinking of (I've been building a 5 inch gauge 9F for some years now) because you can get a long way with a lathe with a vertical slide. 😲 That's exactly what I have been looking at. I saw a 5 inch one at an auction some years ago and really liked it. How far have you got ? I guess interest comes and goes, what with available time etc etc Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
smallfry Posted October 27, 2019 Author Share Posted October 27, 2019 5 hours ago, Stellaghost said: Have just purchased a universal mill myself it is an AEW viceroy horizon sadly no quill feed but it was being used for skimming cylinder heads and the fly cutters for that came with the mill does the future work justify the cost who knows time will tell I was happy with the cost and after all you only live once and cannot take anything with you when you go so why not it was a pain to offload local farmer assisted with a telehandler his cost being " I might want a key way cutting sometime lad " regards Stephen I really like the AEW, and its got a really good table travel for its size too. Plus its very compact. I do have a Viceroy lathe, but its been in bits for about 6 years because the motor packed up. It was three phase, and I ran it with an inverter. I have not got round to fixing it yet, or buying another motor. IIRC on of the gib keys from the cross slide got lost too. Also got a Progress pillar drill 2S or G? It is a bench top model, or possibly for the vertically challenged. Also needs a new motor. Milwaukee angle grinder died today ………… I don't seem to have much luck with electric motors ☹️ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vulcan bomber Posted October 27, 2019 Share Posted October 27, 2019 1 hour ago, smallfry said: 😲 That's exactly what I have been looking at. I saw a 5 inch one at an auction some years ago and really liked it. How far have you got ? I guess interest comes and goes, what with available time etc etc I started mine about 8 or 9 years ago and still not close to having the frames together. I've made it difficult by making it as close to scale as I can from the works drawings, not the drawings Les Warnett produced. along with 2 young kids, and now setting up my own machining business and the 110 to look after, time for the 9f is sparce at the minute. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cynic-al Posted October 28, 2019 Share Posted October 28, 2019 Bear in mind it's not just the mill, you need collets, tooling, vice, rotary table, if it's 3ph you have to convert to 1ph etc then there is the huge learning curve to make it do what you want. I can snap a £15 cutter just be blinking, if your unlucky it damages the collet it's in. That said if you have space, you can move it and you can afford it then you won't lose money on it so why not have a go? This is my effort, bought it part built at an auction when I went to look for something for work, left a bid not knowing what it was then got an email saying come get it. It's an effing ugly thing but something to potter with. A 5" Sweet pea, I think once it's running I will sell it, maybe have a go at a steam lorry, can't see me going to a track to use it. Since starting it I've learn't that there are people who make much better stuff than me with much less equipment so the mill isn't the be all and end all. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FridgeFreezer Posted October 28, 2019 Share Posted October 28, 2019 Yeah the mill is the cheap part, it's all the other stuff that costs! My mill is tiny (it was used to cut keys!) and even that starts adding up when you muck up and blunt a £10 cutter or want a decent machine vice for it... sure there's cheap cutters but they just introduce other problems or wear out after one job. I've been eyeing up small mills that could do double duty in the space currently occupied by the pillar drill but even those require a fair bit of space around them for the bed. Oddly big mills/lathes/welders are cheaper as no-one wants to move them, find space for them, or feed them 3-phase. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ed Poore Posted October 28, 2019 Share Posted October 28, 2019 1 hour ago, FridgeFreezer said: Oddly big mills/lathes/welders are cheaper as no-one wants to move them, find space for them, or feed them 3-phase. Definitely noticed this. What's annoying is I bought a Bridgeport about 6 months ago with a load of tooling (included horizontal arbor, rotary indexers, collets, multiple vices, DRO and a bunch of other stuff I can't remember) but now I've moved down to Wales and I've got the space I could have (will go probably) much bigger given the opportunity. Don't have 3 phase but would be able to run a diesel generator no trouble at all. Not sure if my little tractor would be powerful enough off the PTO for biiig stuff but it claims 16hp at the PTO. Need to get some cash in the bank first before splashing out on more toys, would like a bigger lathe though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
smallfry Posted October 28, 2019 Author Share Posted October 28, 2019 I have noticed that the tooling will add up to more that the mill itself. Unfortunately. If the mill had a quill feed, I would sell the floor standing pillar drill and put it there instead. In the Brother in Laws shed here there is an ancient Colchester (I think) lathe with a 20 inch chuck and an 8 foot bed that still works well. It was made when God was a boy, so I don't know what its like for out and out accuracy, but its probably OK for anything I am likely to do. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lo-fi Posted October 29, 2019 Share Posted October 29, 2019 8 hours ago, FridgeFreezer said: Oddly big mills/lathes/welders are cheaper as no-one wants to move them, find space for them, or feed them 3-phase. 7 hours ago, Ed Poore said: Don't have 3 phase but would be able to run a diesel generator no trouble at all. I'm about to set my Bridgeport up with one of these: https://inverterdrive.com/group/AC-Inverter-Drives-400V/Eaton-DE1-345D0FN-N20N/ Essentially a simple 3 phase VFD and not bank breaking (but from a decent name manufacturer, not a chinese ebay job). You supply control knobs, it corrals the angry pixies into doing the 3 phase dance. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ed Poore Posted October 29, 2019 Share Posted October 29, 2019 Yeah only works up to a few hp though. I'm thinking bigger Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lo-fi Posted October 29, 2019 Share Posted October 29, 2019 That needs a big fat LIKE button 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mickeyw Posted October 29, 2019 Share Posted October 29, 2019 A Bridgeport only has a 2HP motor, so is easily within the scope of a phase converter. However as I understand things, depending the type of motor you have will have a bearing over whether you can use a VFD. I have a 3kw rotary converter that runs my Colchester Student (3HP) motor quite happily, and will also handle the Bridgeport, if I ever get it to my garage from my mum's house. I know an RPC isn't the most knowledgeable efficient tool, but it allows a simple operation of both machines with no electrical alterations. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ed Poore Posted October 29, 2019 Share Posted October 29, 2019 And that is why I had sourced a BridgePort initially, however now I'm thinking in the future more like >5kW machines... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David Sparkes Posted October 29, 2019 Share Posted October 29, 2019 Writing as an interested observer, some confustion is being generated here, by the apparently conjoined mentions of two different devices. One, the frequency converter, is intended to change single phase to three phase. The other, a Variable Frequency Device, is shown via the link to enable control of the speed of a three phase motor. As such it requires a 3 phase input. Quote https://inverterdrive.com/group/AC-Inverter-Drives-400V/Eaton-DE1-345D0FN-N20N/ Essentially a simple 3 phase VFD and not bank breaking (but from a decent name manufacturer, not a chinese ebay job). You supply control knobs, it corrals the angry pixies into doing the 3 phase dance. I do not know, but have no certainty that a Frequency Converter would supply the correct input to a VFD, IF that was what is being suggested. Quote A Bridgeport only has a 2HP motor, so is easily within the scope of a phase converter. However as I understand things, depending the type of motor you have will have a bearing over whether you can use a VFD. Writing just in case anyone else is having the same confusion. Regards 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lo-fi Posted October 29, 2019 Share Posted October 29, 2019 It's quite possible to buy a single phase input VFD that outputs three phase; there's one in that Eaton range. There are also versions - and actually more commonly - with 3 phase input, used heavily in industry for variable motor speed control. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ed Poore Posted October 29, 2019 Share Posted October 29, 2019 @David Sparkes whilst you are technically correct I think with the advent of solid state power electronics the two are typically lumped together in one unit and the terms are used more or less interchangeably now. The only practical way to do single phase to three phase conversion is to rectify the input mains (smoothing helps but modern techniques don't actually require this) and generate a DC bus. Once you've got the DC bus then you can feed that through multiple PWM stages to generate the three phase out. Given almost everything now is driven by a micro-controller to achieve as near unity power factor as is possible then changing output frequency is simply a case of changing a number in the software on the micro-controller. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cynic-al Posted October 29, 2019 Share Posted October 29, 2019 I have a drives direct digital inverter for my 3hp 3ph mill motor. Gives the advantage of unlimited speed control (although you still have to gear down for the torque required for big cutters) soft start, soft stop, e-stop etc but does have to be wired direct to the motor so you lose the machine controls and have to think about powered feed motors, coolant pumps etc which might be 1ph anyway. I've seen 20kw rotary converters which would be more plug and play and easy to use on more than one machine but the current draw gets a bit much for domestic and they're not cheap. One of the reasons I went for a CNC conversion was to cut down on the amount of tooling required. I'd like to do it to a bigger mill but will probably never get around to it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
landroversforever Posted October 29, 2019 Share Posted October 29, 2019 One thing to bear in mind with the price is, is it too cheap? If its very cheap compared to other models then you might find there's a reason for it. Our old Excel was a total POS. It's a chinese copy of an XYZ (good machines) which are in turn a copy of a bridgeport. Some times stuff is cheap because they're up grading and just need it out of the way or other genuine reasons but other times a cheap machine is just that and it will frustrate you no end. Just be aware basically . Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vulcan bomber Posted October 30, 2019 Share Posted October 30, 2019 Here's a link to a build thread on a model engineering forum I use. http://modeleng.proboards.com/thread/8734/5-inch-gauge-9f For the People that were commenting here about the machine the OP is looking at, Harrison make very good machines. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lo-fi Posted October 31, 2019 Share Posted October 31, 2019 Loving the loco build thread! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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