Sieg X1 aka clarke cmd10 review.

[samuel heywoodParticipant @samuelheywood23031]

Thought i'd post a review of the X1 mill as there seems to be very little info out there on the X1 mill or the SX1 variants…. mainly CNC conversions it seems, which whilst clever, don't interest a handle twiddler such as myself.

One of the best available sites for X1 owners or potential owners is mikesworkshop.weebly.com (No affiliation,just trying to be helpful.)

Purchased a CMD10 a few years back now, bit of an impulse buy, but who can't resist a bargain? It was either a customer return or shop soiledI, think the as new machine price then was circa £350 which now seems very reasonable.

I wanted to see the machine running, seemed to be an issue with the Y axis & some minor parts missing but i was confident i could fix the mechanicals as long as the electics worked ok.

Initially the Machine Mart assistant was very reluctant to plug it in~ health & safety or some such , but quickly grasped that if he plugged the thing in he'd get & sale or otherwise i was walking out.

Ok, onto the review proper.

Not having an engineering background, prior to purchase I'd never even seen a milling machine much less used one but felt it would complement the mini lathe nicely, my initial requirement was for 'precision drilling' of non lathe shaped objects.

Having sorted the Y axis & a general lube & adjustment the CMD10 worked pretty well straight out the box.

This was a revelation to me as my prior purchase (a non Seig mini lathe) required a fair bit of work & a VERY steep learning curve before it worked as intended…. it works very nicely now~ but that's another story for another day.

The X1 mill differs from other X1 variants in that it has a shorter Y axis~ often quoted @ 100mm travel…The 240mm long table having 200mm X axis travel.

The solid column is a major plus by all accounts, though never having used a tilting column i'll have to take others word for it.

Motor power is a miserly 150W. My experience, unless iv'e been doing something badly wrong, is that (head) vibes set in before i've reached the motors' power limit whilst milling. I've never stalled the motor whilst end milling, even up to a 14mm end mill.

So i'd say the motors output power is consumate with the machines' milling capabilities.

There were quite a few comments on the internet about the X1 only being suitable for Aluminium, some of which may have subsequently disappeared,since i read a few years back.

I've thus far milled far more steel than Ali~ granted you;ll not be taking large bites, but the job gets done & i'm very impressed with the finish.

Quite easy to get a surface on the finish pass with an endmill that passes the 'fingernail test' Impressive stuff for such a cheap & tiny machine.

As far as drilling goes. being able to place a hole exactly where required was an amazing experience for novice me.

I do have a drill press but i'll probably only ever use it now for jobs the X1 can't handle……

Excellent for small holes say 1/16" to 1/4" by the time you get past 5/16" things start to get a little tedious.

I have drilled 1/2" holes in mild steel with the X1 but you may wish to make a cup of coffee first~ to sip whilst you work.

As a drilling machine IMO the X1 is woefully underpowered.

I'm sure it could use 500w plus for drilling purposes but had Seig installed a 500w powertrain i guess some novice such as myself would be visiting A &E after trying to use all that power for milling purposes.

I have stalled the motor numerous times whilst drilling.

The X-Y table i feel is more than capable of taking anything the X1 might throw at it.

It was not long before installed a long table From ARC on my X1. In all honesty, all my milling exploits to date could have been dealt with by the standard table, your mileage may vary, but the long table adds some much welcome additional damping to the proceedings.Worth the price.

I usually climb mill !!!

Sure, i read all the warnings about climb milling on manual machines (twice), but thus far, no problems. I guess the lowly 150w motor helps tame any potential problems~ maybe if i'd bought an X2 i wouldn't be feeling so smug.

Now onto that infamous cheese geared gearbox……

Ok, i was one of those kids who just had to take things apart….still am.

When i saw the gearbox i was horrified… It just looked SO toy town.

I quickly purchased some spare gears from ARC. As an aside, all credit to ARC for carrying an extensive if not exhaustive selection of spares for Sieg machine tools.

I'm sure running a Sieg machine would be more problematic in Uk without their sparesd service,

Ok, so i was horrified, i panicked & bought some spares. I was a complete novice to milling.

The Spares still sit unused.

I've yet to break a gear in the X1 mill, not sure what you're all doing with your (S)X1 mills to wreck the gears????

I have bust a mini lathe gear once, but if you run your cutter into the chuck through lack of concentration that's to be expected.

I did crash the X1 badly one time when testing a home built fly cutter~ the cutter dug in, the table lurched badly & the motor tripped out.

Thought i'd bust more than just a gear, but no,suprisingly no harm done once table was readjusted.

 

 

 

Edited By samuel heywood on 06/12/2022 02:50:36

[samuel heywoodParticipant @samuelheywood23031]

[samuel heywoodParticipant @samuelheywood23031]

The gearbox's fragilitity has IMO been overplayed.

Also, thus far the electronics have been totally reliable.

The gearbox is however quite noisy, though there are ways to reduce this.

Iv'e been quite happy with my X1 thus far.

It's been an ideal introduction to milling.

Summary.

CMD10.X1 Pros~

WAs cheap (less so now, the other variants probably represent better value now)

Fixed column

Plenty of scope for 'improvement' AKA modification.

MT2 spindle means tooling can be shared with mini lathe plus some other hobbyist lathe~, great for the thrifty minded.

A fine finish is possible.

Twin speed at the turn of a knob

If needs must @ a stated 32kg, probably one of the very few mills you could consider portable. I've had one hernia, 50kg plus might give cause for concern.

Cons

Noisy gearbox.

Low power motor limits drilling utility.

Will not remove large amounts of metal in one pass.

Summary~ Worth a look, if you can live with the slower work envelope, it has some features i prefer than the more popular X2… one of which is a qulll.

[samuel heywoodParticipant @samuelheywood23031]

I'm hoping a few X1 /Sx1 owners will chip in with comments / tricks /tips because there really is So little info out ther on the vast WWW about Seig micro mills & it is, IMO an unsung hero.

[David Davies 8Participant @daviddavies8]

Hello Samuel

I agree entirely with your summary of the CMD10. I bought mine many years ago and it has served me well. I have managed to break one gear and blown a couple of the small on-board fuses in that time, Every instance was due to an error on my part.

I don't like the X/Y dial graduation. 1 turn equals 2mm travel which isn't a problem but the dials have 80 graduations not 100 which has caught me out once or twice. I should make some 100 grad dials for it.

The best things I have made for it are a couple of Stevenson blocks, square and hex. I use them regularly.

I use either an ER20 or ER32 collet chuck in the spindle.

I did think about buying a bigger table for it but I haven't done so yet.

Cheers

Dave

[Iain DownsParticipant @iaindowns78295]

Like the OP I bought a CMD10 from Machine Mart. In my case it was full price – clearly I lack bargaining skills!

I found myself going through gears like lollipops to start with and it was a while before I discovered you can adjust the mesh in the gearbox. Since then I've not had any gear failures.

I did do some of the twiddles (thrust bearings on the X and Y for example, attempting to scrape the ways and replacing / improving then jibs) but other than that it's served me well.

Unlike the OP I've managed to stall the motor (and blow the fuse) on more than one occasion – I'm just more brutal I guess. Despite that the machine has gamely carried on.

The little machine has tackled some surprisingly large jobs with more competence than its owner, including the build of most of a 50mm bore vertical mill.

I would, however, echo the general comments in this forum. Bigger is better. I upgraded to a somewhat bigger mill a couple of years ago and it was transformational. Even more so when I added DRO.

Iain

[Ches Green UKParticipant @chesgreenuk]

Samuel,

Thank you for the insights.

As a comparison, I own an ARC Sieg SX2p and am very happy with it, apart from the (inconsistent) Z axis 'drop'.

I intend to take the mill to bits once my current beginner-project (Stuart cast model) is finished and have a look inside at what may be causing the drop. I believe it is to do with the way the rack meshes with the gear. There are plenty forum threads on the matter. Your mill, being a bit lighter, possibly does not suffer from this.

The SX2p uses a loaded spring to support the weight of the head, but that support changes in strength as the head comes down. This means the Z clamp degree of optimum tightening varies as the head gets closer to the bed. Typically, I nip up the Z clamp and use the Z fine-feed dial but even then occasionally the head can suddenly drop 1mm or 2mm.

Like David, I use ER32 collets. The deepest cut I tend to take on mild steel, say, is around 10 thou (0.25mm). I recently bought a flycutter to reduce the wheel turning in the Y axis

I did think about your mill when buying mine but I had the space for something a bit bigger. I guess it all depends on what one needs to do/make on the mill determines it's size and power.

Ches

 

 

Edited By Ches Green UK on 06/12/2022 10:28:28

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