New Milling Machine
I recently had the chance to buy this slightly used milling machine. It is a model that I didn’t know about previously but which has a lot of attractive features. It is a knee mill (which means that the table raises and lowers) and at 800lbs is a lot sturdier than the tiny mill/drill that I was using. It should be rigid enough for me to miter bicycle tubing and I won’t be running into the limitations of this mill as quickly as I did with my mini-mill.
The seller was nice enough to help me take the machine apart and move it to my house. When we left his house it was on his truck and looked like this:
That is just the body of the mill standing on his truck. The rest is laid on the floor. We broke it down into pieces to make the weight more manageable. It was still a heavy beast to move. The manual crane on his truck was also a huge help. We still had to lift it down the stairs ourselves, but the crane helped a lot when we needed to get it on and off of the truck.
After a few hours work we had it at my house and major pieces were laid out on the floor. The next weekend I rented an engine hoist and Alistair came over and helped me put it back together. Here is the body, head, and knee (600lbs total?) getting placed back onto the stand. I don’t think we could have done this without the engine hoist.
I mounted the mill onto wheels so that I could more easily position it in my workshop. It ended up on the wall next to my lathe. I like the idea of having all of the metal machining in one corner of the shop. The sizes of the two machines complement each other nicely too.
So. Envious.
Where”d the mini-mill go?
Jim — It’’s on craigslist. I don”t need two of them!
I think the mini-mill and mini-lathe were great learning tools and they work nicely for smaller projects. I”m glad that I started with them, but also happy that I”ve upgraded to larger tools.
Alex, I helped build hundreds of cross bikes at kelly all milled made on a less sturdy mill and slightly bigger and nicer lathe than these two. That plus a bandsaw, belt sander and polishing wheel and a helper you can make alot of bikes. Looks great. I am jealous
wow your setup is getting better and better.
with your big milling machine and lathe you”ll never have to buy a jig or fixture… nice!
Alex, I have the same type of machine, called a “Fusalong” and scored it for $500!
The difference from yours was that mine was a solid cast column and base – and my paint job is horrible on it! Anyway, I was wondering what you used for your mobile base and wheels.
I”m using the base that Grizzly sells and recommends. I think it is branded Shop Fox. With a couple inches of plywood between the mobile base and the machine it’’s been working pretty well.