New Milling Machine – advice requested

[LimpetParticipant @limpet]

Ignatz 

I have the 12/20 Nylon(ish) spare as I upgraded my Chester Conquest mill to belt drive several years ago. I am quite happy to post to you with the other 2 gears and shaft foc just send me pm with an address if you require them

Lione

 

Edit correct spelling l

Edited By Limpet on 25/06/2018 16:09:20

[IgnatzParticipant @ignatz]

Lione,

Thanks for the offer.

See my PM

 

[IgnatzParticipant @ignatz]

Finally got around to pulling the main spindle out of the mini-mill and thought to post this photo of the arrangement I used.

Of course, I was referencing Neil Wyatt's article, but having no large, metal tubing at hand I elected to go the fussier route and stack up spacing blocks. Considering the small size of this mill I found I could happily use elements from my clamping kit as the spacing blocks. True enough, as Neil states in his article, the blocks did tend to (* ahem *) fall out at the most inconvenient moments, but they did ultimately get the job done.

Lionel was kind enough to send me a replacement for the the intermediate shifting plastic gear (thinks again, sir!), but I still need to order a replacement for the gear that fits round the spindle.

I see that I can order either plastic or metal for that main spindle gear and I was thinking that a plastic gear on the intermediate shaft running against a metal gear on the main spindle might make for (A) slightly quieter operation as well as (B) more or less guaranteeing that if the mill is overloaded in the future then it would be the plastic intermediate gear that would fail first – this being the one that is really quite easy to replace as there is no major spindle pulling required.

Anyone have any thoughts or comments on this approach?

[I.M. OUTAHEREParticipant @i-m-outahere]

I wouldnt sell it on , fit a belt drive conversion to it and keep it , there a times where the little mill will come in very handy – especailly for delicate work .

[IgnatzParticipant @ignatz]

XD 351 – You may have a point about keeping the mill for delicate and/or light drilling work, but since this is the older unit made of aluminum castings I just can't see the value of investing my time in a belt drive conversion. I would already be content with the transmission gear repair.

 

Edited By Ignatz on 30/06/2018 12:34:47

[lfoggyParticipant @lfoggy]

I got the test information below with my Chester 836VS mill. Turned out to be fairly accurate when I checked the measurements.

Spelling quite comical though….

[IgnatzParticipant @ignatz]

Seems pretty good.

Oh… and not to be too cynical about it… are those figures actually written in with a ballpoint pen, or perhaps written once and then printed with the form? I've seen evidence of that sort of chicanery on the internet with some other machine brands.

Of course, your actual measurements are what really count.

One would hope that the figures are indicative of a general level of quality across the machine offerings.

The 836VS looks pretty good, but is about three times larger than the space available in my tiny shop

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