Turning possibilities on a mill??

[Aeromech6425]

Hello all I am new to this forum =) I had a quick question about the capability of a mill to produce parts typically turned on a lathe. I know you can mount a rotary table and a tailstock to the table and proceed as necessary but is there anyway to use a mill to cut interior surfaces of the stock short of turning the piece on end and going for depth?? Thank all who advise in advance ;-)

[ZipSnipe]

man there was a two cool video's out there, one being a VMC and the other a Taig bench cnc. Both had a fixture plate which was mounted to the table and held various lathe bits, do a search for the vids. Sorry no link.

[joejared]

Originally Posted by Aeromech6425 Hello all I am new to this forum =) I had a quick question about the capability of a mill to produce parts typically turned on a lathe. I know you can mount a rotary table and a tailstock to the table and proceed as necessary but is there anyway to use a mill to cut interior surfaces of the stock short of turning the piece on end and going for depth?? Thank all who advise in advance ;-)

alot, but not all operations would work well with small endmills turning, but it would be relatively easy to setup on my own router. I was actually looking at one of my rotary tables for an idea similar to what you're suggesting, but noticed immediately that the tail stock would need to apply a constant pressure to keep the rotary table from shifting longitudinally. It would be a relatively simple matter to just make the rotary table with opposing bearings, and gear it to performance, but my first assumption would be that torque would be an issue, for actual turning speeds and chiploads. To make that fifth axis with my current setup, first, I'd have to make the servos interchangable between Z2 and A, but otherwise, I see what you're descibing as possible. For my own setup, up to the point that I used actual turning tools, I wouldn't have to make much modifications, and plan to do just that for one part of my latest invention, eventually.

[metalbyter]

Heres a couple of links to a Taig mill Turning parts
in 2 different configurations.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wbfXXeiSHsw

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wbfXXeiSHsw

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Munq_hXxTs

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Munq_hXxTs

I hope this helps.
Mark
http://microtools.ca

[Geof]

Here you are; discussion, examples, links, what more do you want?

http://www.cnczone.com/forums/showthread.php?t=51075

http://www.cnczone.com/forums/showthread.php?t=52028

[KentL]

Wish I had video of the spherical plastic parts we did on a Burgmaster vertical a dozen years ago.

[ryansuperbee]

Areomech. Check out www.youtube.com. And type into the search duality lathe. Watch that and tell me what you think. And keep in mind while watching this video, that you don't need any special machines, this would work with any CNC mill and plain old bench lathe. That is all you need.

[cnczoner]

I did this, but I haven't finished making my gang-tool holder yet, so no completed parts to show yet ... http://cnczone.com/forums/showthread.php?t=54688

[ryansuperbee]

This is my setup. Tell me what you think.