Member postings for Patryk Socha

Hello. I am very new to machining, and my limited knowledge was sufficient for what I was doing so far, but the recent project proved to be a little bit more challenging.

So what I need is to mill with reasonable precision some features on both ends of long (550mm) workpiece. 550mm exceeds the X travel of my table, therefore I need some way of doing this in two steps. My best idea so far is to make some kind of reference edge in the centre of the part, use it as an origin point, machine features on one end of a part, then flip it 180deg, find origin point again and then machine the second end of the part.

Is there a better way to do this? Tried searching online and in those mach9ining books, I have on the shelf, and could not find much...

Edited By Patryk Socha on 23/04/2019 13:40:09

Yup, fully agree, and this is what I have started to do. I am Field Service Engineer for the company distributing large format printers, so I get to travel a lot up and down of the country (8 times out of 10 its London). Today have been in East London and I paid a visit to Amadeal. Guys were trying to be very helpful but as the owner was not there they could not answer a lot of the questions I had... But at last, I had a chance to see some of the machines (though older models). I would accept your Ketan's and Nige's invitations and pay a visit too... Sooner or later I will be driving Warco direction as well...

Leave the wallet at home? Please! Puny obstructions

Hmmm... Might be a little too big for tennis ball size workpiece...

I don't like to generalize, but sometimes it is true. The amount of time I had to spend managing customers expectations after they were told they will get unicorns and magic flutes...

But actually, this argument made a huge impact on my decision making. Whenever I can I always try to spupport innovative developer. This is why I have started enquiring about Optimum machines in UK. I had read some 10-year-old ME article where it was mentioned Optimum machines were 20-30% more expensive than £650 Waiss (Weiss?). If that would be the case I would rather opt for Optimum, however, the price difference nowadays seems to be quite a bit greater.

??? You mean wood, right?

Thank you. For the moment I was terrified that I have miss-wrote this sentence somehow!

And just as I thought that tools and accessories choice will be far easier...

I think I was misunderstood. At no point, I have indicated (I think) one or the other direction. I have asked the question only yesterday, and you are right, the response is overwhelming, for which I thank you very much. Thanks to it a lot have been clarified for me, and I have now much better understanding (still long way to go). For this example, I have almost completely discarded second-hand machine, for the very reasons you have just stated. I had no idea yesterday that almost all mini mill is coming from handful manufacturers, I was only suspecting it as some looked similar, and was expecting that people here will be suggesting a much wider array of manufacturers or distributors. Unanimous surprised me a bit, that's true. And to make matters more interesting, the only person pointing a finger in other direction than SEIG is representative of SEIG distributor

See, at this point I still need to find out what "good vice" means...

Posted by Ketan Swali on 24/07/2018 21:28:35:

....In a phone conversation, introduced myself as a SIEG dealer, to be met with the response 'I do not consider SIEG to be a real machine manufacturer. If you want real machines, we can talk', and that was the end of that conversation

WOW! That is not really professional approach!

Anyway. I was checking previously companies you have provided and Excel is not offering their mills, and Techsoft doesn't have many mills in my price range sadly... After checking Optimum website I think their machines a slightly too expensive for a person like me...

This looks very interesting, lots of tools and accessories... But I have no knowledge of these machines. Literally, I have seen Myford machines on eBay before and I had no idea is this something worth pursuing. I have never heard about them before (I am not from this country originally). If something is not right, I would be in the cold water. Out of curiosity, does anybody have rough idea how much such Myford VM-E might be weighing?

Edited By Patryk Socha on 24/07/2018 19:44:09

My chrome shows your HTTPS as secure...

Quillstar - interesting. Most of the machines are waaaay over my skills/budget/load bearing capabilities. But it is worth keeping an eye on it. Thank you

Edited By Patryk Socha on 24/07/2018 18:37:25

Yeah, buying from Bristol is probably as good as buying from China directly. I think it would be like a buying £1200 lottery ticket. If I would be more experienced I could probably work on the machine, but being as green as I am, I will need support and warranty, etc.

Thank you. I appreciate honesty... I still would argue that I am fairly unbiased (if possible). However, I find your findings in "purchase psychology" quite true . In general. I am different

Edited By Patryk Socha on 24/07/2018 17:33:00

Yes, I do know this... Now. Thanks to this thread

WOW, a lot of meat to chew on in the last posts!

@Ketan Swali To some extent you are right. The machine, like the one from my link, is somewhat desirable because at the beginning of my fascination with milling machines I have seen YouTube video of a comparison between Precision Mathews PM-25MV and some Grizzly machine. Knowing absolutely nothing at that time, I have assumed that PM is proper, western build machine, and I was disappointed that it was not available in UK. So it may be a case that I give slight subjective preference to this kind of shape/body. But I am no fool (or not a big one), and I like to base my decisions on rather more objective arguments. This is why I came here and asked people I consider to be much more knowledgeable than I am to help me sort out those arguments before I will commit. However, I am also not a person which will buy something advised by an expert without question. It is probably a safe bet, but I like to ask "Why?" I think I have already made a massive progress since OP, but have made no decisions yet. So don't give up on me, but I have a feeling that you are using on me some sort of reversed psychology

Edited By Patryk Socha on 24/07/2018 15:59:05

That is true, and reason I acctualy skiping in my search all the smalles machines

Does Arc Trade has showroom available?

Dangerous for me to do so as I could easily get overexcited and leave with big dent in my credit card from the first showroom I would walk into... Know thyself!

I barely resisted the urge this Saturday to drive to Warco's Open Day event...

Are there any voices for different distributors? So far votes here are rather unanimous in favor of Sieg, if discard voices discouraging from a mini mill at all. But I would like to at least consider other options as part of an informed decision.

As my understanding is increasing, I think that some distributors are "modifying" stock machines from China, or improving them, before sticking to them their brand name. I am probably asking for impossible, but is there some sort of list or comparison of what changes/improvements are done by importers? For example, what are the differences between Arc Euro Trade and Axminster machines? What parts have been replaced, etc.... It would be a little bit more transparent...

Just skimming through distributors websites shows there are a fair bit of belt driven machines available. I think you guys are putting upward pressure on manufacturers in China. It is no secret that Asian manufacturers don't really bother with testing their products, there is simply no time for that. They instead use their userbase as a testing platform. So newer models seem to be largely belt driven.

Edited By Patryk Socha on 24/07/2018 11:56:24

And what about Warco? They seem to have a large selection of machines, and apparently around for 20 years? Any opinions?

As much as I love this machine **LINK** at its price I start to realise that probably there is no support for it, nor warranty of any sorts....

So far I was leaning towards SX2.7 (X3 a little bit too expensive). Does it still fall into X2 problems?

Edited By Patryk Socha on 23/07/2018 21:14:38

Edited By Patryk Socha on 23/07/2018 21:15:25

My plan exactly!

Thank you very much. I am more in the Milton Keynes area, but sometimes I have clients in East Anglia, so I will be sure to give you a ring.

I think I will do that, just need to wait couple more days, all the bank accounts have been obliterated!

Shame, I like weird people

And this is it is all a bit confusing. There is no way for me to know what components and materials have been used, where the cuts have been made... At least Sieg seems to be people favourite here... That is probably a good indication...

Yes, I feel it is a must. But the way I want to do it is to initially experience the machine as it is and learn to operate it on optical indicators. Then add DRO, as a project. Seems to be simple enough.

A couple of good points here too, you are right, I am assuming that the table will be infinitely rigid! I have already made this mistake this month! Thank you. I am afraid that beefing up the floor is not an option any longer, so to quote great AvE "sometimes you've got to piss with the c... you've got!"

Edited By Patryk Socha on 23/07/2018 21

Agree. Plus as a complete newbie, I will probably nor realise for very long that something is off until it is too late...

Sieg seems to be coming up a lot online too... So which one of the say Warco machines is an equivalent of Sieg X2?

This would be an overkill for me but my life experience teaches me that I always regret going for smaller/cheaper kit as later I wish I had gone bigger.... So today I have found this: **LINK**

Spec seems to be quite good for that price, in USA this machine is sold as Precision Matthews.... Warco has similar ones, albeit a little bit more expensive.... Why pick one supplier over the other if machines are nearly identical?