Hi VoodooMan
Yes, it can be a tough decision to decide whether to retrofit. When you are looking at buying things like precision ballscrews, and a Camsoft cnc controller and servos, it can easily cost 10 grand, plus your lathe. It will suck up a few of your working hours, too.
It might be a little more than you'e want to spend, but I'd take a look at the Haas TL1 lathe. If you are more concerned with being able to run the machine, rather than retrofit it, this one's ready to go, and still gives you a nifty measure of "man over machine" control. I had a guy demo one at IMTS and I was fairly intrigued by it. Its not all closed in like a full cnc, but for a guy who doesn't want to program every cut, I think this would be a good entry level machine. If I had some spare change, I'd buy one just to play with it and see how useful it would really pan out to be.
I think some other forumers have bought one of these machines, so I'd like to hear their feedback about it.
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(Note: The opinions expressed in this post are my own and are not necessarily those of CNCzone and its management) |