Warco Economy Mill

[Simon Williams 3Participant @simonwilliams3]

If it's any help I bought exactly the same machine, albeit with an Alpine badge on it, and still have it in my shed, used regularly. It's got its shortcomings as a mill, but it makes an excellent drilling machine.

If you want photo's of how the pulley idler is arranged, also the crank and lifting rack let me know and I can add some photo's to my existing album. This album presently shows a simple mod' I carried out to improve the belt tensioning arrangement.

I'm in West Gloucestershire – nearly South Wales – if you want to visit and take measurements etc you're welcome.

I've changed the motor to 3 phase with VSD which avoids a lot of belt changes, but I wouldn't like to forfeit the low speed/high torque capability of a two stage belt driven reduction.

[Clive FosterParticipant @clivefoster55965]

In your position I'd certainly go 3 phase motor and VFD. Probably similar price overall to getting the mechanical parts after selling the old single phase motor. Well worth getting two more pulleys and arranging a two speed drive.

My old Chester square column mill with a factory (or importer) fitted VFD arrangement had two speed ranges with a decent overlap 125 to 1400 and 250 to 2800 rpm. Which worked very well indeed. Large overlap meant I pretty much never needed to shift the belt mid job but when I needed plenty of power at lower speeds the motor didn't run out of torque.

Objectively a bit less overlap and a bottom speed nearer 50 rpm might have been even better.

I fitted a knob with twelve numbered segment skirt to the potentiometer (from RS Components). A calibration table matching number to speed for both ranges made it easy to set there right one.

Clive

[jay gParticipant @jayg67738]

Hi all thanks for the replies.

 

Took a while to find things to get the mill up and running for as cheaply as possible and the time to get around to getting them fitted.

I got this manual hydraulic ram for £3.

 

 

I will mount the ram fixing at base to the mill stand when i get around to building it. The ram works very nicely going all the way to the top of column and down low enough that you would not have to use the quill feed. Might add a gas strut if i find one for free but it’s not really needed tbh as the release valve has great control when lowering. The picture makes it look like the shaft on mill could snap but it seems solid enough imo.

 

Next i found a donor for parts 🙂

 

 

I got this 750w 3 phase pillar drill with a broken table for £43.

It was a shame to strip it to pieces as it was a nice little drill but the mill needed some of the parts and i will use 90% of them.

 

I used the quill handle as the warco one was missing a ball end and the plating was flaking off and looked crap.

 

Looks nice on there imo.

 

 

I needed a M12 drawbar which i was going to make but once i priced up the parts it was pretty much the same as buying one from aliexpress for £16

 

Next part was pulley from the drill press to fix my missing one.

 

I found a tv stand base that was about 5mm thick and drilled the hole unfortunately i did not have the exact size to match the column but close enough. The pulley shaft goes through the 5mm plate into the belt cover base and then i used the leftover shaft collar from the missing gear rack to hold it in place. Apart from being aluminium and not as heavy duty as the original part it works very well also.

 

I also have a tacho and laser from amazon that i still have to add as well as the the foot and hand e-stop to wire in.

 

The drill came with a lovely little 1-10MM MT3 Porta J2 keyless chuck and of course the 750w 3 phase motor which i am not sure i will use yet.

 

The drill press came with a free  520w 8 inch wolf grinder which i will mount to the drill presses base and column.

I have stripped the head for the bearings and quill cabling screws etc

Everything will be kept apart from the head casting and belt cover i see no use for them at the moment.

 

Everything bought including fuel costs still has the total cost below £200 so doing quite well still for a budget build.

 

I will add more pictures as i progress thanks all

[Speedy Builder5Participant @speedybuilder5]

You need one of these. The pulley on top is my way of changing from low speed to high speed by just changing one ‘V’ belt.

[jay gParticipant @jayg67738]

That’s a great idea will keep eye out for some pulleys in future to possibly do that if i don’t go the vfd route.

[jay gParticipant @jayg67738]

This week i added the tacho,cross laser,digital vernier caliper as a cheap dro and an 80mm ring light.

 

 

Very pleased with the results after testing just need to get around to fabricating a nice stand next.

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