Small Miller

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Small Miller

This topic has 15 replies, 8 voices, and was last updated 7 October 2010 at 13:35 by Tim Ostley.

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1 October 2010 at 16:44 #56342
Oshb5s
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@oshb5s
Hi All

Im looking to get my first small miller i have a small compact 8 lathe. so am not new to machining. I have ben having a look around and doing reserch on the net. And have come to this. I have a budget of up to £500. and ny main machining materials will be delrin andaluminium bar. the longest cut i can envisage doing at the momemt is a 30 deggree cut that wil be 14mm wide 3mm at the deepst end and 300mm in length. I will also need to cut out a 14mm deep x 45mm wide x 45mm long slot. this also in ali.

I have seen the XJ12_300which seems to tick all the boxes price and table movement at the same time as having a stronger motor and a USmade speed contoller. I think that i have seen somewhere that this miller is the samme as the Sieg X2. is this correct?. If so i have seen that there is a problem with the gears so i assume it would also need the belt drive update. Which with the price of the mill and upgrade comes to around my budget..

Any help or comments posative or negative verwelcome..

regards Andy
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1 October 2010 at 16:44 #5210
Oshb5s
Participant
@oshb5s
looking to get a first small mill
1 October 2010 at 19:06 #56355
ChrisH
Participant
@chrish
Hi,

Going down this sort of route myself soon.

Amadeal quoted me £45 delivery charge, to add to the £412. If you live close to them you can pick it up from the store, as it were. Not an option for me really.

You could also look at the Warco Mini Mill/Drill, which looks to be a very similar machine in most if not all respects. Their price is £475 delivered. Don’t know how much you would save collecting from Warco instead of having them deliver.

You pays yer money and yer takes yer choice, as they say!

Chris
1 October 2010 at 23:17 #56362
Bogstandard
Participant
@bogstandard
One thing you must remember when working to a budget, you MUST allow for tooling.

A half decent vice, cutter holder set and cutters will most probably swallow up between £150 to £200. So at least that amount has to be added.

Skimp on the first two by buying cheap tat, and you won’t get the best out of the machine you are about to buy.

Unlike a lathe, where a few HSS cutting tools will keep you happy for ages, when it comes to a milling machine, the list is almost endless, just for basic necessary tooling.

The first bits I have mentioned, but to make life a little easier, a set of say 1/8″ (or 3mm) parallels, a simple edge finder, a set of table clamps (for those jobs that won’t fit into the vice) and maybe a cheap set of flycutters are the basic essentials to keep you going for any length of time, until you can afford to buy more complicated and expensive tooling.

So really, you are looking at around £300 over and above the cost of the machine.

You could save yourself a bit of money by making the belt drive yourself, there are a few designs and builds which have already been shown on other sites.

So I would suggest you price up everything first and maybe wait another few months until you can afford to get it all at the same time.

If you shop about, and can call in personally, sometimes you can get good discounts on tooling if you buy it with the machine. It all helps to keep costs down.

Bogs
2 October 2010 at 01:53 #56368
Oshb5s
Participant
@oshb5s
Thanks for the reply I have seen your name on the Chester forum quite a lot with valuable info. As for the vice i have a good 3″ tilt and turn that i have had for quite a while. the tooling is not to bad as i can get a lot from a friends workplace that dont sharpen they just renew the small stuff up to 12mm I have a lathe sharpener attachment so have a pile of end mills and other cutters.. My other costs which i have about £100 for is tool holder and clamp set. But now have just found out i have £45 to add on to the mill price of £412 if i get the XJ12 for delivery.. So as you say the first project may be the making of the pulley drive in house which will save quite a lot so that could be shared between the delivery and work/tool holding purchases.

What gets me IS why £45 delivery when you have couriers now that will deliver full pallets from £18-£25 Its just small things like that that really get up my nose I would rather pay a label price of £457 for the mill and not have to know anything about the price for delivery if you get my meaning.. Wish it was Chester as they are only 50-60 miles away so could go and collect as well? LOL

Regards Andy,,,,,

Edited By Andy Swain on 02/10/2010 01:55:52

Edited By Oshb5 on 02/10/2010 01:57:14
2 October 2010 at 08:14 #56375
michael cole
Participant
@michaelcole91146
I am paying min £65 for a pallet would be very intrested in name of couriers who charge £18 to £25

thanks

Mike
2 October 2010 at 10:35 #56388
Ian S C
Participant
@iansc
In my part of the world I would suggest to the retailer that he could add a clamping set at least if I pay cash. Delivery here would be about $NZ20, 40Km out of town. Ian S C
2 October 2010 at 15:54 #56403
Cyril Bonnett
Participant
@cyrilbonnett24790
Try http://www.wheelcourier.com/ they were very good at delivering a set of alloy wheels+tyres from Ripon to the Fort William, cost less that £40 and took under 2 days, for this part of wilderness Britian that was remarkable.

I looked at the Armadeal mill, £412, but they quoted £100 delivery to Fort William, wheelcouriers was less than half that.(still pondering though).

I recently sold a surround for the clocks off a yamaha motorcycle for £20, postage was quoted 4.50, that was until the chap who wanted it sent me the £20, I then discovered he’s address turned out to be in Dublin. It weighed less than 1.5kg packed, but I was quoted from £96 down to £38 plus £32 for picking it up from here in Lochaber.

Another internet search found the following,

http://www.wedelivertheworld.co.uk/quote/index.php?site=wedelivertheworld.com

These did it for £25, so it pays to shop around.

Cyril
2 October 2010 at 19:09 #56409
Oshb5s
Participant
@oshb5s
On the couriers side of things

Try My Hermes for cheap shipping. I had a full goto tripod for a large telescope delived by them 2″ steel legs + the pan tolt head unit + 2 5Kg weights Total wight was around 50Kgs That was £18 the box was about 22x 14 x 52 inches.and that was here with in 48hrs.

This dont help me make my mind up about the miller though. Do you know if they go to any of the Model exhibitions like the one at he racecourse nr Chester?

But still i just need any reports about it weather good or bad and if it is the same as the X2 so i can start to prepare for getting it if its OK that is?

Andy

P.S. Iv just seen the Collete set for the M3T is £47 so it would only cost £2 if i got the delivery for free.. You would think an incentive lice spend over so much and delivery is free like a lot of firms do?

Edited By Oshb5 on 02/10/2010 19:13:33
2 October 2010 at 20:49 #56413
Bogstandard
Participant
@bogstandard
Andy,

The reason I gave you the info is because on a lot of sites I visit, the people usually investing in machinery only ever count the cost of the machine, never the tooling to be able to use it correctly. At least you have a good start in that direction.

A couple of years ago, I completely rebuilt my shop to turn it into a shop to make custom, high precision parts and small quantity production items. the cost of the machines was about 7 grand, the tooling cost at least the same again.

Unfortunately personal health problems hit it all that on the head, but at least I have a workshop where I can machine almost anything. So it shows just how much tooling can cost, and there was a lot more I could have bought.

A lot of the words I say on sites isn’t about how to do things. I wait until almost everyone has had their say about the subject, then I will try to come in with some down to earth answers or questions that weren’t mentioned, maybe not what people want to read, but issues that must be confronted.

I don’t do it for spite or elitism, it is to do with the way I have always been trained. If you can, look at every possible angle before proceeding, doing it that way, fewer mistakes occur. Half an hours pre planning, then hopefully, a five minute machining job.

Bogs
3 October 2010 at 00:37 #56418
Oshb5s
Participant
@oshb5s
Hi Bogs

I know what you mean i sometimes spend ages and ages researching something before i take the plunge You have to now days whit how scarce money is and how hard it is to come by Is it not..

As i said with out bringing the extras into anything this mini mill seams to tick the boxes i need with the price and the working dimensions As for the gear stripping problem i dont think i will encounter thta as i said what i need this for is to work on delrin plastic So should be ok Then when i done what i need to do with the plastic i can always start on the pulley upgrade then. And also being aware of the problem If i needed to cut some ali then just do it in small cuts to the upgrade is done.

I did think that someone might be able to say that the XJ12-300 is a copy or a re-badged Sieg X2 But no one has said anything.

Also i thought there might have been at lest a couple of people with either positive or negative comments on the miller But again no one has offered any advice at all?

Regs Andy
3 October 2010 at 19:09 #56451
Oshb5s
Participant
@oshb5s
Hi All I have been pointed towards the Sieg SX2 which already has the belt drive conversion done and is DC brush-less motor and free delivery.. at £487 But the table is very small it only says that it has 180mm of longitudinal travel now that is very short When i need 300 does anyone know if you can get a longer slide and lead-screw for this mill?

Right just dropped on this miller and it does the 300mm that i want also 550motor and is only £385 as is in collecting distance. The miller is at

http://spgtools.com/view_tool.php?pid=22

Has anyone seen used or has got one of these please??

Andy

Edited By Oshb5 on 03/10/2010 19:43:23
5 October 2010 at 22:47 #56551
ChrisH
Participant
@chrish
Humm, SPG Tools seem a little economical in letting you know where they are, other than the answerphone/fax tel code is Hinckley and Hinckley is in their e-mail address. But how can you collect from them if they don’t advertise their address, and why use a mobile number as a main contact number during opening hours and not a normal landline number.

The price is good though…! The machine seems very similar to the XJ12-300 and Warco Mini Mill/Drill in spec too.

Chris
6 October 2010 at 09:54 #56567
Eric Cox
Participant
@ericcox50497
SPG Tools are listed at Companies House as SPG (Hinckley) Ltd.

Their address is

S.P.G. (HINCKLEY) LIMITED

WINDY RIDGE COTTAGE

COVENTRY ROAD

HINCKLEY

LEIC

LE10 0DL
6 October 2010 at 15:07 #56582
Oshb5s
Participant
@oshb5s
Hello Actually even though the reply was quite abrupt I also replied with a little abruptness But had a response from the owners father saying that to come down any time and try the various machines at the address he supplied and that no pressure was put on anyone that came to try as there was no need to buy after trying. Also that there was a new full container arriving a Felixstow in the next week and he would supply me details when they arrived in stock for trial.. And for further information to ring the owner his son?

So i suppose there is nothing at all wrong with the guy. Well at least the original owner Then again new owner (the son) may be like most of the younger generation now days anything for nothing and the quicker the better.

Thats why i personally think the country is in the mess like it is.. But dont get me started on that. Most dont want work let alone to be trained for something like being able too turn to withing a couple of thou’s They have no discipline at all Its all left to us old guys Is it not..

But as i said thats just my own view

Andy
7 October 2010 at 13:35 #56610
Tim Ostley
Participant
@timostley22330
Hi,

Don’t forget that all these far east small milling machines will almost certainly need a complete strip down, clean, firtle and re-assemble before use. If you look at Arc Euro Trade they are up front about the need to do this and provide the details of what needs doing as well as the option for them to do it your behalf.

I was looking around at the slightly larger machines and felt that having spent north of £1000 I shouldn’t have to strip the whole thing down before using it.

I guess we get used to low prices without thinking that to get the price down something has to give.

Tim

(in sunny Mid Wales)
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