Yet another ‘which mill shall I buy’

[mark smith 20Participant @marksmith20]

Posted by Richard – on 12/11/2019 16:14:40:

The Alex vertical head is 4mt, the original draw bar is S20, I'm getting quite proficient at cutting it, both internal and external.

I've done allsorts on mine, if you mount off the vertical where the table fits you can bore all the way to the floor!!

Point to note when using a vfd you will still be changing belts as you lose torque,

Richard

Edited By Richard – on 12/11/2019 16:17:20

Richard what year is your Alexander /number??

Mark

[Richard –Participant @richard-3]

Hi Mark,

I'd like to know the year, I think 40's it must be late ish as it has needle rollers in the head, reads 1493

Richard

Edited By Richard – on 12/11/2019 18:11:59

[mark smith 20Participant @marksmith20]

Hi Richard your is probably from around 1958 or maybe later. Mines numbered 1220 but strangely the head is numbered 1224.

Mine was made on the 7th Feb 1956 and sold to the watchmaker and aircraft dial maker Louis Newmark (or the machine was finished being made on that date)

Mine doesnt have needle rollers but the round ballbearing rollers . One or 2 were corroded but i managed to find an old stock stack bearing on ebay and used two piece of that to finish the head stack.

 

Edited By mark smith 20 on 12/11/2019 19:44:46

[Richard –Participant @richard-3]

Where did you get the buyer details?

What tooling did it come with?

[Anonymous]

Sometimes you just need a larger mill:

And VFDs are great but sometimes you need power at low spindle speeds to drive a 1" countersink in steel:

Can't remember where I got the countersink, but I think it was in a box of bits 'n' pieces I bought from a member of my gliding club as they were too big for his machine tools.

The steel plate is 600x500x15 and is one of the very few times when unknown material I've been offered has turned out to be useful.

Andrew

[Iain DownsParticipant @iaindowns78295]

I'm still dithering.

I think the machine I would most like would be the SPGTools 2217 30BV (£1500) or the Toolco WM32B (1440) which I think are both the same Weiss machine.

Both these are out of stock and both from suppliers who seem not great at communicating (in fairness to Simon at SPG Tools, I bought my lathe from them and have been happy with support – he just doesn't like emails!).

They are 1500W variable speed with back gear with a movement of 565 x 220 and just big beasties (for a home machine). R8, of course.

The other possibility is the Amadeal AMAT45FG which is even bigger (£1732), but has fixed gears. I don't really know how much value the variable speed has. My CMD 10 has variable speed, but I probably only use 3 speeds (2000, 1000 and 500 ish). So perhaps that would work. Any thoughts on fixed gears?

I've decided that I can clear the end of my shed , move the lathe bench up the shed and fit most of these in. Not a bridgeport though.

I'm trying hard to control my impatience though. In truth, there's no real rush.

I'm also wondering why I'm spending more time researching and fretting over this purchase than I would over a house at vastly higher cost!

Iain

[Martin Hamilton 1Participant @martinhamilton1]

I must say Toolco do seem to be a bit of a strange company, they dont have a single lathe for example in stock out of the range they offer. Been like this for quite some time now, they also had no mills in stock the last time i looked.

[Iain DownsParticipant @iaindowns78295]

It looks like Amadeal is about to get stock of the one I like. Still waiting for confirmation of price and specs, but I'm hopeful!

That's led me to as a question. How on earth am I going to get a 320Kg machine on a bench (or a stand if I go for one).

For that matter, how to get it out of the case?

I'm imagining that at best it will get delivered in a box to my shed (access is a tad awkward). I don't have an engine hoist, and the hire costs seem high. Further more, I'm not sure an engine hoist would get high enough or would have the flexibility.

I thought of building some kind of crane in the shed, but I suspect the tiny angle iron in the roof isn't up to the load and my welding skills barely touch 'beginner'.

I don't think I know enough REALLY STRONG blokes just to lift it up (I'm not one of them).

So how would you guys take delivery of this?

A related question is around disassembly, either to tweak things or in the event of a house move (expected in the next few years). I suspect some of the bits are beyond single person handling…

Iain

[JasonBModerator @jasonb]

Check what the delivery conditions are, most will just have a pallet truck and if they can't get up the drive will drop at curb side, doubt they will take it down the garden to a shed.

I used an engine crane for the KX-3, about £20 to hire the crane which was reasonable to me

Edited By JasonB on 21/11/2019 17:45:28

[Iain DownsParticipant @iaindowns78295]

Thanks, Jason.

Where did you hire it from? The ones I've found so far are somewhat more expensive…

I presume the stand is metal it looks a little light for it to be wood…

Iain

[JasonBModerator @jasonb]

local hire shop, had it back to them in a couple of hours.

Timber

[Iain DownsParticipant @iaindowns78295]

I've found a chap in Otley offering a day's hire for a 2 ton hoist for 15 quid on eBay.

Can't complain at that!

Iain

[John RutzenParticipant @johnrutzen76569]

I've got an Amadeal 25 long table with brushless DC motor and R8 taper and I'm very pleased with it. The quality is really good, a surprise because I was expecting much worse from China. The motor is silent and never gets hot. The R8 taper is a real plus and I think it's only amadeal that supply it. Service was great and delivery only £75 to Northern Ireland. I think it's free to Uk mainland. Nothing to complain of really. It would be nice if it had back gear.

[PackmuleParticipant @packmule]

Hi Iain,

I bought from SPG SP2217-IV some 2 years ago and other than operator error recently have had no problems whatsoever Its done everything I wanted without a hint of struggling. These also go under the name of Grizzly G0705 in the U.S and if you google there are plenty of sites from owners who have upgraded to cnc etc

I fitted Dro from Allendale for I think £350 but that was 12months or more ago, no connection to either company,

Bob

[Iain DownsParticipant @iaindowns78295]

Well.

As usual there isn't quite the perfect machine.

The one I feel is the closest fit is a Weiss VM32B.

I like this because it is big: 840×210 bed with 580×210 movement, 100mm stroke and 470 spindle to table.

Also 1500W DC brushless, back gear and 60-4000 rpm and heavy (240kg) which must count for something.

But, no-one seems to sell it in the UK. Amadeal thought they were getting some in, but it's a less powerful machine (VM32L – 1100W with only one gear and a smaller speed range).

I spent some time with Ketan this week looking at an SX3 which I like. Has a lovely Z axis wheel at table level and of all the providers in the UK, I'd most like to buy from ARC. But it's smaller (sob). Still a contender at the moment.

I've been in touch with Weiss about importing a VM32B which looks like I could get one into the UK for under £1500 quid, but the obvious concerns there are spares and support. You can't send one back under guarantee!

My current (changeable) short list is:-

Weiss VM32B – if I can get one

ARC SX3

WM18 – I'd be happier if it had a more powerful/ brushless motor

Amadeal VM32L: I really liked the idea of a back gear and a bit more grunt, but it's a reasonable spec for all that.

Iain

[Iain DownsParticipant @iaindowns78295]

Just as a matter of interest has anyone upgraded the motor on a WM18 to a more powerful / brushless / VMD version?

Thanks

Iain

[Clive Brown 1Participant @clivebrown1]

Posted by Iain Downs on 29/11/2019 21:11:19:

Well.

As usual there isn't quite the perfect machine.

The one I feel is the closest fit is a Weiss VM32B.

I like this because it is big

But, no-one seems to sell it in the UK. Amadeal thought they were getting some in, but it's a less powerful machine (VM32L – 1100W with only one gear and a smaller speed range).

Iain

Axminster market the SX4, big brother to the SX3 and seems broadly similar to the VM32B without the high speed range.

[Iain DownsParticipant @iaindowns78295]

Until now I've been flirting with tender young things, beautiful but flighty, but I've just been seduced by a glamorous mature lady with huge experience and tremendous assets…

And before you lift the phone to call the police (or a Doctor), I should tell you the the glamorous lady was an Aceira F3 in extra-ordinary condition!

Yes, I was swayed by the seductive lure of old Iron. The machine was lovely, felt lovely, smooth as silk. It had a bunch of accessories and despite being older than I am still showed the original frosting on the ways. A youthful body with plenty of experience and accessories. What more could a model engineer want?

Despite falling half in love, I've decided against the purchase. Transport, Imperial, cost of additional tooling or repairs. I also wanted something with a bigger work area (though God knows if I'll ever use it) and I found the layout odd – not bad, but not something I'm used to.

So I'm going to return to my juvenile sweeties, but I will always slightly regret the one that got away…

Iain

[Iain DownsParticipant @iaindowns78295]

So, yesterday I made the long trek down to the smoke to see an Amadeal VM32L somewhere in darkest East London.

And I ended up buying one (which I mainly expected to). I was pleasantly surprised to see that the name plate reckoned it had a 1.5kW motor despite the spec saying it was 1.1.

Hugh had a MT3 with DRO and an R8 without. I reckon I would never be allowed to post again if I ordered an MT3 version (based on comments in other posts!) and the machine does not have a clever way of releasing the taper.

So the R8 version is coming on Friday with no DRO, but the factory DRO will be arriving a little later as an add on kit.

The slides feel nice and silky and the backlash no worse than I would expect.

the one thing that took me a little aback was the sheer X size. To be honest, although I wanted a big machine I would probably have been happy with a non-L version of this. As it is I need to find 6 foot of horizontal space to deal with the travel of the table.

Today was spent building a bench for it. I will post pictures which I've disguised the limitations of my joinery.

I am a little nervous about the delivery as my shed is round the back and there's a definite slope to get there (though tarmac, if rough). In the best of times, the delivery guys will trolley it round for me. In the worst case I may need to go and hire some kit at the last minute.

Getting it into the shed and on the new bench is also a bit scarey. However, I've rounded up some of my kids friends to help push and position.

Iain

[old martParticipant @oldmart]

Later on you will be glad the X is a decent size, when some odd job comes up and you say "I can do that, fortunately". It will also be nice to have a DRO, and forget about the horrors of backlash, which is always there even if minimal. I always recommend R8 if there is a choice for middling machines when buying.

Good luck with the installing.

[VicParticipant @vic]

I had to do a job yesterday that I’ve needed to do several times before and so glad I got a knee mill. The job required drilling into the end of a long bar. In this case it was only 300 – 350mm long but I have done it on bars as long as 600mm in the past. Quite a simple setup, an angle plate was bolted to the rear of the table and the workpiece is securely clamped to it for drilling and taping. The head of my VMC is swung round until it’s directly above the workpiece. It’s not as good as my old Omnimill for head movement but just being able to swing the head around has been very useful.

[Author]

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