Review of turnkey G0704 CNC conversion from Midwest Machine

[RTTIM]

My new mill arrived today! At first look it appears to be nicely done. Will get some initial pics tonight and post them a little later on.

Everything was bolted or wrapped to a single pallet - slid it off the delivery truck lift gate right into the back of my pickup and I was able to take advantage of break in the rain this afternoon to get it unloaded & in the garage at home.

Unfortunately, there it will sit until I get a chance to start setting it up....hopefully Saturday.....I'm starting a major alignment project on a marine vessel tomorrow that could run significantly into the weekend depending on what we find. I hate it when the real world interferes with what I really want to be doing!

Unlikely I will make any chips this weekend as the tooling I ordered won't be here until sometime next week. Might be able to find an old end mill laying around that didn't go with the old Jet...will take a look.

Tim

[RTTIM]

Here are a few pics of the mill.

The first pic is a general view of the mill. You can see the X & Z stepper motors and the swing arm mount for the flat panel monitor. Y axis stepper is mounted onthe back of the machine.

The second pic shows the familiar stand - boxes on top contain the PC & monitor.

Pic 3 is a close up of the truly massive Z axis stepper.

Pic 4 is a shot of the inside of the stand showing the PS & stepper motor controllers installed in the upper section. It's not real clear - will get a better one later on. The Pwr. cable, parallel port connector, stepper motor connectors and switched outlet for the coolant pump are on the right side of the stand. A cooling fan is on the left side.

[hoss2006]

Looking good, keep the pics coming. Thanks for sharing.
Hoss

[RTTIM]

Sigh,

Made absolutely no progress getting my mill set up over the weekend. Spent most of Friday getting one marine alignment issue straightened out for a customer, only to have to turn around & do the same for another (including a 300 mile drive RT) on Saturday. Guess I shouldn't complain - it beats the alternative. Yesterday was full of family stuff.

I'm hauling a shop crane home today & should at least have it on the stand & bolted down tonight - wish me luck!

[Titaniumboy]

I hate when that happens. Darn customers.

Looking forward to more pictures and an in depth review once you get her up and running.

What kind of work do you envision doing on your turnkey G0704?

Titaniumboy

[RTTIM]

I hate when that happens. Darn customers.

Looking forward to more pictures and an in depth review once you get her up and running.

What kind of work do you envision doing on your turnkey G0704?

Titaniumboy

Got it up on the stand last night, but that's as far as I got.

One of the things we do is sales, training and field measurement service work with precision laser measurement systems. My primary use will be for custom fixturing & adapters for specific measurement applications. It's mostly pretty simple stuff, a few at a time, involving minor modifications to a few basic designs. There are a couple fixtures we designed that also have some small volume sales potential. Just for chuckles, once I get the mill set up I will be using one of our laser systems to check all the alignment, flatness, etc.

Small, quick turnaround job shops are getting hard to find, and the bigger guys aren't cost effective for small volumes. The guy we were using most retired, sold all his equipment and moved to Hawaii. I had an old Jet bench top mill & lathe that I could manually machine them with, but it's a pain - so I sold them & bought the G0704 to do the work with. Will also be acquiring a small lathe soon as well.

My other use will be for building scale model stationary steam engines. I have plans for several designs I want to build, including a triple expansion marine engine. I'm also about half done with my own design for a scale model single stage, curtis wheel steam turbine.

Tim

[RTTIM]

Sorry for the time lapse - been out of town most of the last 1-1/2 weeks on business.

When I last left off, I had it on the stand (first pic) - and there it sat untouched until this weekend. Since the drive electronics are in the upper portion of the stand, it is imperative to make sure the mounting bolts are sealed so there is no coolant leakage path - I used loctite blue, then RTV to form an additional liquid tight seal.

The next step was to mount the monitor and hook up all the electronics and the PC. The 2nd pic shows it with everything hooked up - pc is on the shelf at the right. Still need to wire in a dedicated power outlet and dress all the cables......

The concrete floor is sloped slightly for drainage, so I temporarily leveled the machine using wedges. I've got enough 2x1x3/16 channel laying around to build a nice solid base with leveling feet - will have that done in the next day or two. It will also raise the machine by approx 2-3/4", which makes for a more convenient working height.

After lubing all the necessary points, I powered everything up to make sure it all worked as it should. Next step was to shut the spindle down and spend some time playing with Mach3 to get familiar with it, then setting up the table soft limits, jog settings, etc. Soft limits are fine for now, but one thing I definitely want to add are home/limit switches.

Did a quickie-check of the X-Y-Z stepper calibration with a long travel dial indicator and it seems to be right on over distances up to an inch. Used a couple of the wizards to generate some test code and ran that to verify everything was moving as it should. Finally got around to running the spindle break-in procedure yesterday.

The one glaring omission was a lack of documentation on the conversion components - I have emailed a request for that information.

[RTTIM]

Sheesh...another wacko busy week! Guess I shouldn't complain - it beats the alternative. On the plus side, anytime you can align a 14 ton engine & 9 ton gearbox to within 0.0002" of the target numbers, that's very good thing!

Here's a couple pictures of the base I built for the mill - finally was able to get around to it today. It's made from 2x1x3/16 steel channel on edge, with four additional pieces flat underneath to mount the leveling feet. This will raise the mill a little over 3 inches, for a more convenient working height. I designed it so that you can drop a thin piece of sheet metal or wood in the middle, then fill it with non-shrink grout to add mass and increase stability if desired. I won't do that initially - want to run some vibration tests first & see what the spectra look like......

Rather than dragging out the arc welder, I used my Oxy/Acteylene rig & some bare filler wire to fusion tack it together & after making sure it was square & flat, some 85,000 psi brazing rod to finish the job. Cleaned it all up and shot it with a couple coats of Rustoleum hammer tone gun metal gray paint. Still need to drill the holes for the feet and to mount the mill - will do that when the feet get here later in the week.

Tim

[buck_weat]

I am thinking about ordering one of these, and am just wondering if you are happy with the company and the machine. Any regrets about ordering from them? Would you do it again?

Any information that you might give would be GREATLY appreciated!

Thank you, and have a GREAT day !!