just for comparison, this is the machine I am currently working with with a porter cable router mounted on it, not rigid at all,l but to a newbie it looked good to me at the time I guess
and this is a rough mock-up of what I was planning on building as my ideal machine before this knee mill hybrid idea entered my head. it would have had added gussets and supports welded in too and cross beams below the deck and I think it would have made a nice machine actually. would have had a 20"X20" work envelope and the 2 dual 6" vises would have been semi-permanently mounted, could clamp a flat plate above them for flat work if ever needed. I haven't completely ruled out eventually building this but the more I think about it the more I think the knee mill with router head may actually be all I will need so this now goes to the back burner/maybe someday area of my head. worse case the new knee mill conversion can help me build this new machine eventually too if I ever decide that it is still necissary for me to build it
and here is the spindle I plan on mounting on the knee mill. I also have a pair of extreme overkill linear rails that I will mount to a 1" thick steel plate for the Z, to keep the Z axis as rigid as the rest of the machine. pictured is just one of the rails but I have a pair of these, they are HRW35's and they are massive, just the thought of going from the flexy wet noodle of a machine I am using now to this has got me pretty excited and it really shouldn't be too hard or take to long to build either I think