Here are a few pictures of a press drill I converted to a Milling Machine. This is something I had been working on for about a year now. It took me a while but finally found time to get it finished and tested. Works pretty well. I used to do all my milling on my little Taig lathe with milling attachment but it was a bit small for many of the parts I needed to make. This new machine has more travel and can take heavier cuts.

If there is enough interest I might do an article on the conversion. I have documented most of the build. Overall cost was about $500 give or take a little.

Attached is a pic of a T-bar I made using this new mill...I could have make it on the Taig also, but it would have taken a lot longer!

http://www.modelgasboats.com/media/kunena/attachments/legacy/images/3088_DSCN2470_JPGf55679d6b169dece1a6661d87ae98475
http://www.modelgasboats.com/media/kunena/attachments/legacy/images/3090_DSCN2471_JPGd1bd033f78a267fa5671f8b48ba39623
http://www.modelgasboats.com/media/kunena/attachments/legacy/images/3092_DSCN2472_JPG4ae3eb66456a2ce914db0715e0fd6631
http://www.modelgasboats.com/media/kunena/attachments/legacy/images/3094_DSCN2473_JPGd3a6391e25f459fad9379037dc9a55d3
http://www.modelgasboats.com/media/kunena/attachments/legacy/images/3096_DSCN2474_JPGfc0f73926ef5aaba63fee56bf82e5253
http://www.modelgasboats.com/media/kunena/attachments/legacy/images/3098_DSCN2475_JPG4c5e8b1fb979df9d3f009a8a7c28135a

A bit of extra information.

The most tricky part about making this machine is the spindle. You have to take out the cheap 2-bearing supported spindle and make a new one. I made mine from a MT2-MT4 adapter. It feature 6 bearing support. 5 standard bearings and 1 conical bearing. The entire spindle assembly is pre-loaded to take up and vertical lag in the assembly. The conical bearing at the bottom takes the vertical load. I had to have the spindle itself machined by a professional machinist (my brother) because it was too much for my little lathe. The part is ground and hardened. All other parts were done by hand and on the Taig.

To keep the head from shifting sideways, a linear bearing is mounted to it and to the base and top of the machine.

A few other parts machined with my little machines.

The Drive unit was entirely done on the Taig a while back. I needed an extension on the rudder to bring it back about even with the trailing edge of the prop, so I machined one on the homemade mill. I know a lot of guys out there have much better machining equipment, but I'm just trying to show what can be done with small gear, and even homemade gear. http://www.modelgasboats.com/media/kunena/attachments/legacy/images/3100_DSCN2478_JPG60b32245ddd586d8ca0ec917f3eefcb8
http://www.modelgasboats.com/media/kunena/attachments/legacy/images/3102_DSCN2479_JPG52086a9f9b713c5877ec3a6ee4ff1a3c

Nice job, Marc.

If more people would take an interest in small machinery, there might be more available. My brother has 2 small cnc machines. They are small enough that they will both fit on a 60 X 36 table. Their travel is something like 10 inches in the X axis 4 inches in the Y axis, and 6 inches in the Z axis.

For those who don't understand axis movement on a CNC machine, X axis moves left and right, Y axis moves in and out, and Z axis moves up and down.

The machines I had in my shop would move 30" in X, 16" in Y and 20" in Z, and they had spindles that would capable of 100 to 10,000 RPM. Keep in mind though, while your machine cost you $500.00 to build, mine cost close to $80,000 each, and the payments on the 2 machines were almost $1,900.00 per month.

Good job Marc. Keep it up.

Steve

Yes very good Mark. RUSS

marc, awsome job, ive been thinking of a small milling machine for my hobbies, seen as how i have so many that could always use fabricated parts.. i found a couple on ebay that are quite small and is the 3 in 1 job ,lathe,mill,press.. there like $500.00 shipped to the door, but im very concerned about the quality of the tool.500.00 is a far cry from like smittybuilts prices.. anyway very cool mini mill you made..