Member postings for David Colwill

Hi Neil,

I take it you have the 3 morse taper spindle. I have not had mine long enough to want to start changing bearings but was under the impression that it is not straight forward on the R8.

Regards David.

Hi Alex,

The runout on mine is .012 mm Measured inside the taper. on the outer surface it measures .04 mm but this doesn't really matter that much to me.

The whole point of this thread was to try and give some idea of what you are going to get so the more info the better.

Ian the peanut theory certainly has merit. Perhaps it's deliberate to make sure that you do clean the machine down. If it is it certainly works. When my 3D printer arrived I had to clean it twice as it stank the house out!

Regards David.

I drilled some extra holes in a Chinese 3 jaw, I can't remember what for. It was a little on the tough side but nothing special. Use a good make of drill, preferably newly sharpened drill and you should be okay.

David

Hi this has been covered here LINK

Regards.

David.

Well I finally got to spend some time on the mill today. I had already stripped the table and cross slide down so it was really just a case of cleaning and checking. On the whole the only bad points were -

1) A general roughness to the machined surfaces especially the edges / corners

2) The Y axis bearing surface (above the dovetail) was a bit too rough for my liking.

My answer to this was a flat rubber block and some 600 grit wet and dry. In my case I only needed to go over it 2 or 3 times to leave the whole thing feeling much nicer. A fine file on the corners sorted them out.

The Y axis got a similar treatment. I have an old gib strip out of a shaper and by laying a strip of wet and dry on the bottom of this I was able to lightly rub off the roughness.

I put the whole thing back together with plenty of slideway oil and got my DTI out.

The front of the table is to within .02 mm over it's travel and the x and y axis are square to within .01mm over the length of my granite square (100 x 63mm).

I was initially going to take the head off but having seen the rest of it I am happy to leave it for the time being.

I did a quick test cut with a 10mm slot drill and was very impressed.

One thing I should mention here is that the T nuts supplied with the machine and in the free clamp set allow the stud to pass right through. I was told that this is a bad thing so I took a small cold chisel and put 4 small vee's across the bottom of each one.

My overall feeling so far is that this is a very good machine for its size. I know that there are people out there who would say that I shouldn't have to fettle it myself but I would rather do that myself than pay Sieg to do it for me.

I can already see a number of things that I would like to add / change but am going to live with it for a while before I do any of them.

I will try and add to this as I use the machine more.

Regards.

David.

I have tried the superglue chuck but found it a waste of time. I usually have more than 1 item to make and the mag chuck wins every time.

Regards.

David.

I have a round magnetic chuck which I use on my lathe in exactly the way John McNamara describes, it works very well even on small items. You can only take fine cuts but I find it extremely useful.

Regards.

David.

Edited By David Colwill on 23/07/2014 09:34:19

I have a fobco star and as a pillar drill it is first class. Beware! My bench model does not have a 2 morse taper. It has a jacobs no6 to take a half inch drill chuck. Don't try and mill anything with this and don't ask me how I know (it was a long time ago honest).

Regards.

David

+1 for Papplewick.

David.

Todays job is......

Stop the workshop falling down!

Actually it has been the job of the last week.

I am having to replace a rotten lintel. Needles to say my bricklaying skills are minimal but I'm nearly there.

Right O back to work.

David.

My main purpose for starting this thread was to show others who may be considering buying an X2P what to expect in terms of accuracy / power etc. I haven't really started yet so I don't know what this is going to turn into but so far things look very good.

I should also point out that I have no connection with Arc except as an occasional customer.

Regards David.

On Friday I took advantage of Arceurotrades offer on the X2P and thought I would share my experiences with it. Although I have a large and reasonably well equipped workshop I do like to tinker about at home and this was bought for that purpose.

I went for the R8 version because I already have tooling that I can use.

I would also like to point out that this is not a rant, nor is it any kind of fit for purpose debate. If you don't like Chinese machine tools go and buy yourself a Swiss / British one.

Having got it into my workshop (the big one) I couldn't resist trying out this newfangled motor that Ketan keeps banging on about. I got a 6mm drill (not a particularly sharp one at that), a lump of en8 and drilled a couple of holes in it. Initially I set a fairly low speed thinking that I would hear it slow down as per other motor / speed controllers I have used but this wasn't the case. I then tried the same drill again but with the speed set as low as I could go and to my suprise only a small speeding up. I should also point out that I was leaning on it quite heavily. All in all a very positive start.

I know I said this wasn't a rant but what do the Chinese put into their oil to make it smell like that?

I'm hoping to make a start taking some measurements of runout etc in the next week Prior to taking it apart to clean and oiling so will post my findings.

David

I must nip and tweak me Gilberts!

David.

Plus one for soft G.

David.

Good to see things happening again. I've been watching this from the start and am looking forward to seeing the finished engine!

David.

The smart and brown 1024 gets my vote as I've got one They are very heavy!!! but lovely to use.

David

As to your Ml1 experience well I think we've all done it at some time I know I have. The chances are that when you come to sell it you won't lose too much money and the education is well worth that.

One thing in the (reputable [a rare beast]) dealers favour is that they can spot the junk a mile away so won,t be selling it. Also in order to command top price they will fix any issues. While they are indeed adding profit and VAT they may be offsetting this by being able to buy at a lower rate than you could, for instance buying an entire workshop and splitting it.

Interestingly a few dealers I have spoken to have separate Ebay accounts for the dross. so when they buy a collection of machines the shiny super 7 goes on their website and the knackered zyto on Ebay.

As to the Boxford I couldn't see it on G&Ms website so it may be sold. You have to remember that they will have had to get that advert ready to publish some weeks before the mag comes out. It is worth adding the usual suspects G&M, home and workshop, quillstar, Lathes.co.uk and of course homeworkshop.org to your favourites on your browser.

Keep looking.

David

I would like to point out that some of the machines mentioned could potentially be 40 - 70 years old. New paint and scotch brite don't improve accuracy. There are a great many people trying to pass worn out machines at top prices.

A machine that has been flogged to death is only going to frustrate you. You will end up making mistakes and not knowing wether it is the machine or you that is wrong.

That said if you do come across the gem (and they are out there) then you can end up with a machine that should have no niggly problems to sort out and be a delight to use.

Also if buying second hand at that kind of money I would be looking for it to be complete with accessories ( good 3 jaw with both sets of jaws, 4 jaw, faceplate, steadies at the very least ) .

Getting advice off someone who knows is an absolute must in my opinion.

£2500 is a good budget that buying new or second hand should get you a machine that will do all you need.

Good luck David