Get a Milling machine!

Lathe mill systems are awfully limited in what you can hold.

Martin

If you only want to mill small workpieces, then go ahead. The milling experiance will be useful, and should you later decide to get a mill, then the milling attachment can be sold fairly easily.

I do not have a milling machine unfortunately I do not have room for one so all my milling is done on my Myford S7, yes it takes longer to set up and you have to be patient small cut's are the order of the day.

H

there is not really enough meat in the WM180 cross slide – there are no T-slots tho I guess you may be able to drill & tap a few holes to hold a slide

Good morning William,

Warco have a small milling slide that fits in the tool post which might suit your needs. But be mindful that it won't be overly rigid. They also have a base plate for the WM240/250 that takes a larger milling slide. It may be possible to adapt it to fit the WM180 cross slide.

I've had perfectly acceptable results from the milling slide on my WM250, it's just a nuisance to set up, and even more of a nuisance when you revert back to turning, only to find you still have another milling operation to complete. Also, compared to a milling machine, workpiece visibility can be a little restricted.

Can't help with specific attachments for your lathe, but do consider HSS cutters – they are more forgiving of the lack of rigidity inherent in a lathe milling setup. After initially being blinded by the multiplicity of cutter options and then promptly snapping a tooth off a fancy specialist carbide one I decided to road test a 10mm stub length HSS cutter in the lathe. It works a treat. IIRC it was from Drill Service Horley.

Hi Bill,

That vertical slide looks about the same size as the one I have for my 2.5" EW. The one I was referring to is probably twice as big.

As with most things here, there are different experiences and opinions. I don't know what work you are planning to do – or how often you intend to do it. My parts are generally small and I do have a choice of machines available. But I'll try to give a bit more detail on my experience in this area.

Do you need to make vertical height adjustments whilst machining? Some operations (drilling, slot milling, edge milling/fly-cutting) often don't – and if the work can be correctly positioned and the right tool fitted – then a vertical slide might not be required, indeed a heavy angle plate might be better. If you know the 'bed to centre' and 'bed to top of cross-slide' measurements, then you can set work either on (or off) the lathe fairly easily. Packing blocks can give simple work height adjustments too by removing or inserting blocks of known thickness. Slip gauges are not required!

Apart from rigidity, there is another reason I don't feel 'swivels' work for many vertical slide operations. My large slide came with a rotary base but I soon discovered that most times I needed the actual table to overhang the cross-slide. This is because otherwise the slide's table will be mostly above the lathe centre height – and things like vices make lack of travel even more of a problem. Hanging the sliding face over the edge of the cross-slide really helps but also limits any use of a swivel. So I replaced my rotary base with a plain adaptor plate to match the vertical slide with the cross-slide, whilst giving a more secure mounting. Same for my EW slide.

So in summary, you can certainly mill in the lathe without a vertical slide and 'swivels' may not be as useful as they first seem (think of a vertical mill and it's table – generally the table doesn't swivel!)

If you have a simple milling job to do, why not try doing it with what kit you already have? Clamp the part in a tool-holder or on an angle plate if you have one. You could hold the milling tool directly in your 3-jaw but better to make a simple round tool holder (in mild steel – just drill or bore it and fit a grub screw). The chuck will grip the mild steel much better than the hardened tool and the grub screw will hold the tool if a small flat is ground in it.

Then have a go. Small cuts and slow feeds, saddle locked and with the gibs on the tight side. It may not be perfect but it will give you some idea of what is possible with patience and practice. You may decide it's not going to work for you – or that it's perfectly good enough. Either way it will help you decide what is best for your needs.

It might even be fun trying too!

Regards,

IanT

I used a vertical slide on my Taig (Peatol) lathe to put slots into steel angle to build a rest for my bench Grinder.

I will add a photograph if I am able to discover how to do so!

If I fail (and if anybody is interested), please send me your email address OFF-LIST and I'll send it.

With best wishes.

MC Black (Dr.)

Milling clamps… how long is a piece of string? Really depends on the job and your ability to problem solve. Certainly sthe type with studs, 'T' nuts, step blocks and so on are useful on some occasions but they are not the answer to everything. Sometimes you need studs and a piece of thick enough bar drilled to clear the studs to form a strap across the job. Sometimes a vice is best. Harold Hall's site has several designs of low profile clamps fo you to make. As others have said, sometimes you can co-opt the toolpost stud to help with clamping. The general rule is probably that you never quite have what you want.

One of the challenges of milling in the lathe is that you have a lot less free 'T' slotted (or whatever) space in which to put your clamps. Quite often I find that this precludes the use of step blocks. Gravity as another challenge – on a mill you can set up on the table at your leisure. With a vertical slide or angle block everything will fall off so you need to set up off the machine.

TBH I think that the many piece clamping sets are overkill – yes you get lots of bits but they are all of a similar type.

Start simple, take things slowly, learn what a healthy milling cut sounds like and how much 'demand' your setup can cope with. Be careful – I generally assume that a milling machine (or lathe doing milling) is always trying to damage itself, the job and/or me. Try to figure out how many ways it will find to trip you up – for example apart from flinging the job across the workshop the cutter can work like a corkscrew and either pull itself out of the holder and into the job or else pull the job in towards itself.

Have a look at Steve Jordans videos on you tube,he has a particularly good set up for his chinese lathe.