Could use some help deciding what route to go to get a cnc mill.

[slashmaster]

I'm not sure if I should first get a drill press, then an X,Y table and then later the kit to make that cnc. Or if I should buy a 3 axis mill and make that cnc or a turnkey cnc. Could I get the pro's and cons of each? Seems to me that at least with the turnkey ones a machine that is twice as big cost several times as much.

[PhoenixMetal]

It won't work well to make a drill press into a cnc mill. Well, fine, if all you wanted to do was have the xy table move around computer controlled for DRILLING HOLES, then it might work great for your application. However, it will not be able to run endmills or do many of the other things that milling machines do as the spindle on the drill press is not designed for taking sideways loads.

[slashmaster]

Thanks Phoenixmetal! That explains a lot. What route do you think I should take if I want one of these machines? Don't care how long it takes to mill.

[PhoenixMetal]

Eh, well there are just so many great deals these days with the economy being bad and all... You very well may be able to get a turnkey cnc machine in your price range. On the other hand, you may enjoy the learning process of doing a retrofit, and it also may be helpful to start out with a manual manchine to get a grasp of basic machining processes before plunging into the cnc arena.

[SRT Mike]

I was like you - wanted to get into CNC. I started buy spending around $1700 on a Grizzly G1007 "mill/drill" with the intent to later convert it to CNC. I even bought motors and schematics to convert it. But I never ended up doing it.... because honestly, converting something doesn't make sense, IMO of course. You are starting with something that will never be ideally engineered, so you are always coming up with work-arounds. For example, on the G1007 it had a round column, and limited Z axis, so people were buying stubby tooling or presetting the tools to equal lenghts when possible... there were all sorts of work arounds for getting the column to line up as well. But in the end, they were all just complicated and time-wasting solutions to a problem that didn't really have to exist.

Then I bought a solder paste dispensing machine that had a controller and X, Y and Z motors and ball screws. I was going to convert that... it worked well (still have it and thinking of selling it actually), and I just mounted a rotozip for the spindle. Not a bad solution, but not ideal. Then I bought a used Brideport Series II with a Boss8 control that was non-working. We used Gecko drives to replace the OEM controller, then we used Mach3 running on a PC to control it. Now this was a "real" cnc machine. We could buy off-the-shelf mills, and make "real" parts. This was a machine that could make money.

We paid $1700 or so for the G1007 w/shipping. Spent another maybe $500 on parts to CNC it.

I bought the XYZ table for maybe $600 and spent a couple weekends making a mount for the Rotozip and making the existing controller work with a PC and Mach3.

I paid $1300 for the Bridgeport, and put maybe $400 into it for Gecko drives and misc parts. I put another maybe $500 into tooling (holders, end mills, etc). I already had a computer to run Mach 3 on.

I sold the bridgeport a few years back for $2500. It was a pretty good deal - very well sorted, with a modern 3-axis CNC control.

After that I bought a 1987 Leadwell MCV-0 VMC, fully enclosed, 4k spindle, 20-tool changer, flood coolant, etc. I paid $5k for it.

Now I have a 1995 Leadwell V-40 40x20 machine, 6k spindle.

Honestly, I don't think there is ANY reason to fiddle with a home brew CNC project unless you just want to say you did it. For $2k I bet you can buy a fully sorted CNC'ed knee mill. For $5k you can buy a working, decent condition (no problems to speak of) enclosed VMC. For $10k-15k you can get a mid 90's nice condition VMC.

I don't think you can put together much of a machine for less than $2k. And honestly, I doubt a $2k machine you built yourself would be anywhere near as good as a $2k machine you got used that was already CNC.

Just my .02

[slashmaster]

Thanks SRT Mike,

What's a cnc solder paste dispensing machine? Yes, I would have to agree that a home brew cnc doesn't make sense if you only want to build small things. Most of the small ones give you 8" and 4" X and Y axis right? Not much I want to build that small. I need something much bigger, but a machine that gives maybe 50% more of each cost like 3 times as much! I was thinking about getting one of these small machines and later trying to build a much longer table with maybe twice the X axis. How much X and Y did your Grizzly have? I was just looking at a G8689 with 9 1/2" by 4".

[Crevice Reamer]

Hi SM. Welcome to the Zone!

That mini mill from Grizzly can be expanded to 18 x 12

http://hossmachine.info/

It is available for much less, $499 and with the more desirable R8 spindle from Harbor Freight.

http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/cta...emnumber=44991

No shipping cost if you pick it up at store.

If you print out this 20% off coupon, take it with you and buy by Monday, it's only $400.

http://www.harborfreightusa.com/usa/...7&keycode=0000

This mill can be CNCd for as little as $600 more. It can easily be modded to get a 11 x 5 work envelope.

CR.

[slashmaster]

Thanks Crevice Reamer! That x2 freak is great!