Enco 45 - vibration concerns

[LUCKY13]

Hey guys, I just got my mill up running ( Enco 45 dove tail column) and it seems to be vibrating a little more than I expected. I just made some test cuts on some aluminum bar stock and after I tramed the head in I cant say it was a bad cut, infact it done pretty good but there was more vibration than I expected from this size machine.


Knowing that many people do mod these machines with epoxy filling the base and column it seems that this might just be normal. I dont have a base to set it on yet so I used two inline 6 cylinder engine blocks with wood covering the tops and bolted the mill down to these. It worked out really good to tell the truth but I am wandering what its going to take to smooth this machine out.


Is most of the vibration from the mill body itself, or is it from the gear drive in the head? I want to try and help this as much as I can but I cant do everything at once. What would be th ebest mod to help this ? I wish I had a camera to show the cuts I made in the aluminum, I dont think the vibration really hurt the cuts because they left a really nice pattern that showed the end mill was cutting nice and even on both the leading and trailing edges. But smoother would have to be better.


I plan to CNC this machine and I want to get it in as good a shape as possible before doing so. But right now the budget is holding me back and I want to do either the belt drive, or the epoxy mod. Which should I do to help the most ? Or is there something else that would be better?

BTW the cuts in aluminum where with a 1/2 2flute tin coated HSS endmill, that I used at several different DOC's to test with. It was mounted in a R8 collet and the piece I cut was mounted in a 5 or 6" kurt vise ( not sure of size it was given to me and I havnt measured it yet, but its hugh).


My spindle runs true and all the bearing in the head are doing good. I did have to replace the ebaring in the top of the head because the mill had set and the bearings that where above the oil in the head had draw mosture and rusted. I am wandering if the vibration may just be from not having enough RPM for the aluminum, it maxes out at 1970rpm with the motor it has now. I do have a nice 3 phase motor here and I am going to get a VFD and use it latter so I can get some more RPM, but a belt drive could do this also and the motor is a 2hp 220v motor now that is doing good so I would like to wait on buying a VFD. I have excess to a good machine shop for doing a belt drive and I am kinda thinking this might be the best thing to do first, but only if it helps the vibration of this machine.


Thanks for your help, Jess