I own a Grizzly G1006 2HP Benchtop milling machine. http://www.grizzly.com/products/2-HP-Mill-Drill/G1006
I've had it for almost 20 years. It's maybe rigid enough for a 1 HP spindle. Lead screws instead of ball screws of course, as is the case with all machines in this class... and not very good lead screws at that. It is what it is. Before I bought it, I consulted with a machinist friend who started an automation business and now owns a very nice machine building business (lots of robots and vision systems). He advised me to spend the same amount of money on an older American made milling machine of the Bridgeport type, with modest wear - probably a maintenance shop machine as opposed to a production machine. I should have followed his advice, but I didn't. I can't really complain too much about the Grizzly milling machine, though. Most of my work has been low tolerance and it's probably paid for itself tenfold. Some precision work is also possible, with great care. My shop needs grew and I needed a lathe. I looked at a Grizzly G0602, thinking I might CNC it. http://www.grizzly.com/products/10-x-22-Bench-Top-Metal-Lathe/G0602 I considered my friend's good advice, and bought a nice old Clausing 10X24 lathe instead for $1200. It's the opposite of the Asian imports. They look good at a distance (on a website) but come up lacking when viewed up close. That old Clausing lathe had been repainted a horrid shade of blue, which is chipping off in a few places. It looks a bit rough from afar, but up close, it's gorgeous. It oozes quality. A lot of care went into the design and manufacture, and it's still nice and tight today. I put a VFD on the spindle as the first step of the CNC conversion, and I've used it as an electronically variable speed manual lathe so far. I've slacked off on my numerous CNC projects this past year, but it's slated for my big Summer Of CNC Projects, currently underway with a CNC router project I've been working on steadily for the last week. I'll CNC the Grizzly milling machine too, for very low tolerance light production, with a ball screw upgrade later. The CNC Grizzly is an extreme example of turd polishing. I seriously thought of selling it and buying an older Bridgeport style milling machine to CNC, but after the troubles I had getting the 1000 pound lathe in the basement shop (no deaths, and nothing injured but my pride), the idea of moving one milling machine out and another in did not sit well with me. I've looked at the 3-in-1 machines quite a bit over the years. It feels like a morbid fascination. I like the concept at the zoomed out level, but there were just too many compromises, including change over time, machine flex, and small & inconveniently shaped work areas. I liked the looks of the Smithy Granite series, but just couldn't talk myself into one. I can appreciate not having the space for a milling machine and a lathe, but that's still my recommendation, even if it required building a heavy duty shed in the back yard as a shop if that's possible, which would also be great to keep the machining sounds and smells out of the house. I'd also strongly recommend haunting Craig's List to find a good old lathe or milling machine made in the US, Germany, etc., with a lot of life still left. It'll last longer and it'll be a lot easier to do good work with it. It'll be a lot less frustrating, and using a quality machining tool just feels so much better. On 04/27/2013 11:53 AM, Jon Elson wrote: > But, the rigidity and capability of the heavier machine > will reward you every time you turn it on. If you have the room, definitely > go for a well-built heavy-duty machine rather than Chinese desktop machines. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Try New Relic Now & We'll Send You this Cool Shirt New Relic is the only SaaS-based application performance monitoring service that delivers powerful full stack analytics. Optimize and monitor your browser, app, & servers with just a few lines of code. Try New Relic and get this awesome Nerd Life shirt! http://p.sf.net/sfu/newrelic_d2d_apr _______________________________________________ Emc-users mailing list Emc-users@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/emc-users
