Hi Gene, I have a Grizzly G1006 Chinese bench top mill drill that may be getting the slowest LinuxCNC conversion in the world. It cost about $1400 new, a long time ago, and it's probably paid for itself ten times over. That being said, if I was buying a milling machine now, I'd buy a used but in decent shape Bridgeport or similar clone. It's an entirely different class of tool.
A few years ago, I bought my Clausing 4900 lathe on Craig's List. It's an ugly shade of blue after someone decided to paint it, but even though I bought it used for $1200, it's a very sweet little lathe. It's only 3/4 HP, but it works very well, and can remove material faster than the 2 HP G1006 that has thin castings and is much less rigid. I initially thought about buying a new G0602 lathe to convert to CNC and I'm very glad I didn't. I'd avoid a Chinese lathe, even if it does say "Pittsburgh" on it. I'd be looking at something like this: www.ebay.com/itm/Clausing-10x24-Lathe-Model-4903-/152086658636 And as Ken commented, it is frustrating to buy a lathe with a bunch of expensive and complicated mechanical features that are only going to be stripped off for the CNC conversion, anyway. I wish there was a stout but simple lathe mechanism that was ready for CNC conversion. Good luck! Bruce On 05/14/2016 01:55 PM, Gene Heskett wrote: > Greetings all; > > Since my toy lathe broke itself, again, and its made out of rubber > anyway, I was watching it fight with a dull chip that actually looked > good under a strong glass a couple days ago, and the major two sources > of flex that induce chip breaking chatter are the spindle itself, and > under pressure from the dull chip, I could see the cross-slide visibly > bowing in its length. This while taking .25mm off the diameter of that > piece of cast per pass at about a 20mm per minute feed. > > So its a piece of crap in the first place. > > Now, knowing that I'll cnc it, and it looks fairly easy, I am considering > driving up to Pittsburgh and getting a new PM-127VF-LB lathe, ebay link: > > <http://www.ebay.com/itm/PM1127VF-LB-METAL-WORKING-LATHE-VARIABLE-SPEED-LARGE-BORE-QCTP-/231943772037?hash=item3600ed1785> > > At that spindle bore, I'd not have any trouble mounting a rifle barrel, > which is a definite plus. The chuck mount is a minus though, almost > exactly like this toy, 3 studs in the chuck thru a flange on the end of > the spindle, so that will definitely need another deer hoist rigged. > Both chucks are 6", but the motor is a bit puny, running on a 15 amp > wall outlet. > ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Mobile security can be enabling, not merely restricting. Employees who bring their own devices (BYOD) to work are irked by the imposition of MDM restrictions. Mobile Device Manager Plus allows you to control only the apps on BYO-devices by containerizing them, leaving personal data untouched! https://ad.doubleclick.net/ddm/clk/304595813;131938128;j _______________________________________________ Emc-users mailing list [email protected] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/emc-users
