"I had a disagreement with my employee today. I said that a retrofitted CNC
milling machine, like my Bridgeport Interact, is supremely useful as a shop tool, but a CNC lathe has very little usefulness. I felt that there is not really much that one can do with a CNC lathe. He disagreed, but could not offer specifics. I want to see what you think, is a CNC lathe all that useful for someone who is nota job shop or a manufacturing operation." I had to chime in. "A lathe is the only machine tool that can reproduce itself" I read that somewhere a long time ago. That being said I can't imagine a shop without both but given the chance I would pick the lathe every time because the metal removal rate is so much better in a lathe than a mill. I do a ton of square and rectangle parts in our turning centers using 4 jaw chucks. If I can turn it I will, but I have 7 Turning centers with fairly big capacities. Chucks from 8 inches to 28 inches. My next step is to find a live tool turret machine so I can start cutting keyways, flats and bolt circles right in the lathe. Jeff L Johnson Superior Roll & Turning Superiorroll.com 734-279-1831 Fax 279-1166 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Symantec Endpoint Protection 12 positioned as A LEADER in The Forrester Wave(TM): Endpoint Security, Q1 2013 and "remains a good choice" in the endpoint security space. For insight on selecting the right partner to tackle endpoint security challenges, access the full report. http://p.sf.net/sfu/symantec-dev2dev _______________________________________________ Emc-users mailing list [email protected] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/emc-users
