Milling machines - western-made s/h recommendations up to £2k

I appreciate your moral stance William. Not sure which new British-made machine satisfies all the criteria, but if second hand is good enough there is plenty of suggestions above and reasonable market, so patience will be rewarded I suspect.

Sports cars are a lot of fun for 8 months of the year, I would rather have both a car and a cheap milling machine that an expensive milling machine.

Needs looking at because sheds can be almost anything from an earth floor, paving slabs, concrete raft, or suspended on wooden rafters. Not done it myself, so can't comment on how well it works, but at ground-level machines only need to be supported directly under their feet, which can done with concrete blocks or brickwork. Once the weight is supported with a pillar or whatever, it's only necessary to level the machine on top. To make it easier to move a heavy machine into position across a weak suspended floor, 1" plywood sheet could be used to spread the load, and itself supported by strategically placed pillars, perhaps temporary. Much depends on the floor and how easy it is to get underneath.

Provided the load is spread by a thick plywood sheet, paving slabs or breeze blocks laid on sand will take a lot of weight. The goal is avoid bending wooden beams or have the concentrated weight of the machine punch a hole through a weak spot. A machine weighing 1000lbs with four 1" square feet will put 250psi onto the floor: the feet are made 6" x 6" each, the pressure is less that 10psi, and a thick plywood sheet will spread that out even more.

Dave

William

Much depends on the soil in your area and of course was the base prepared before the shed was erected.

IMO you need 100mm of hoggin compacted by vibrating below a concrete slab of 100mm thickness to provide a suitable base for your machines, you may want to consider a steel mat insert for added security.

Emgee

You can park a car on 2ft square paving slabs, so an amateur type machine won't cause any grief. I have in the past had a 5" Colchester in my workshop, which is this construction. The organic top soil was removed and replaced with hardcore.

If you do go for a Centec 2B I'd advise getting a three phase one and driving it off a VFD. The motor is supported off the cabinet and single phase one made it drum badly. Now switched to 3 phase, very quiet.

Actually they're in the entrance hall. They were in the kitchen, but after a complete refit a couple of years ago i was told no way they're were going back. And you don't argue with my mum! The sitting room is for work in progress and parts waiting to be fitted:

Andrew

Being a big lad my heel will put a load of 240lbs through a few square inches when walking, this does not trouble most floors although some sheds do skimp on the wood thickness used for a floor. A very strong wooden floor can be constructed for not too much money.

Mike

If you can get one in good condition these are very good and likely the inspiration for some Far East mills.

Omnimill

As for floors, concrete is horrible under foot compared to wood. I’ve had several of the former and now use the latter although it is on a concrete foundation. My Warco VMC works happily on it.

Yes, I guess I can use thick ply sheeting to reduce flex on the floor and potentially add more joists to reduce the centres, and then paving slabs/etc. under any machines as required. I leaned towards concrete because that was what my current garage is, but thinking about it, it is maybe unneccesary.

Just to be clear, for 5" gauge locos and 2"-scale traction engines with space to spare, what kind of X/Y/Z movement and table size should I be looking at? The VMC seems (obviously) much smaller than say a Bridgeport, but I'm not sure at what point I'm over egging the size requirements. This is separate to the discussion about overall mill size and weight if that's OK?

Thanks for the recommendation, Vic!

MY 2" Fowler which is a large 2" TE (ploughing engines excepted) was done on a mill with 400mm X. 160mm Y and 3000mm Z.

As for the shed if the existing base is suspect take it down and put a new base in. 100mm concrete with A142 mesh on 70mm PU insulation trowelled finish and paint or lay Film faced ply on top with DPM between. Rebuild shed adding wall and roof insulation.

As a general rule, bigger is better. It's because big machines are more powerful, more rigid, and can take larger work. Usually, the limit is the maximum size of the job that can be accommodated: small mills can't do big work.

Less obviously, it's also easier to set work up on a big machine simply because there's more space. In comparison, squeezing work onto a small machine is tricky because of limited room for clamps, rotary tables, and other accessories. Rather than just bolting the job down and getting on with it, considerable ingenuity is required, just because the machine is too small.

The exception is small work, like clock or instrument making, because below a certain point big machines become unpleasantly clumsy. For that reason, some workshops have both big and small mills.

As to the size needed to make a 5" gauge loco's and 2" Traction Engines, I'll leave that answer to someone who has done it. If no advice is forthcoming, I'd get the plans of a suitable candidate and study them carefully, asking of each part, what do I need to make that? Things like wheels determine lathe swing, and perhaps the need to mill spokes with a rotary table drives how big a milling table is needed.

In my workshop, inside a single garage, I have the biggest lathe and milling machine I could get in. When they aren't big enough, I do the job by hand, change the design, or out-source the work. Most of us have to work around limitations occasionally. My biggest problem making a loco / traction engine isn't the machine tools, its my very limited brazing facilities: making a boiler is beyond my current workshop and skills. I'd almost certainly solve the problem by buying one.

Dave

That's what I did - bought the plans and then decided what machines to buy. The swing of the lathe was set by the flywheel and the distance between centres by the front/rear axles. To some extent it depends upon how much the OP wants to do himself. Making spur, bevel and worm gears for instance will dictate sizes and capability. I had to drill/bore the hornplates for my engines in several steps as the Bridgeport wasn't big enough, particularly in Y. I didn't turn my wheels but made them by the fudgeit and bodgeit method and hoping for the best. Most spoke/strake holes were freehand drilled, but I had to get creative for the first row of strake holes, even with a 12" rotary table:

The biggest issue will be Z, followed by Y and then X. I've run out of Z several times and have needed to buy stub drills/mills or collets. I've also run out of Y a few times, but X only when machining the rear rims before rolling:

I also ran out of Z on the horizontal when cutting the final drive gears:

i suspect size of mill will be dictated by a 2" scale traction engine - in general parts for a 5" gauge loco will be smaller. I'd also echo SoDs note about clamping. It can take up a surprising amount of space/travel, not just on the mill but also on the rotary table.

Andrew

Looking at the drawings for Maid of Kent I cannot see that there would be any difficulty fitting the components for the loco on even the smallest hobby mill - the assumption until the 1980s or so seems to have been that an amateur would use a vertical slide in the lathe for milling as it was not as usual as today for a milling machine to be available (although it usually was in a club workshop of course)

This is not to say that a small mill would necessarily have sufficient power to do the milling on a loco, just that bits would physically fit.

I see a Tom Senior listed not too far from me, is this a good bet?

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/tom-senior-milling-machine/254927624387?hash=item3b5aded8c3:g:0N4AAOSwUlBgaKzO

You don't have much space between the spindle and table with that, if you need it for drilling also, with a keyless chuck you'd be very limited with what you could drill.

If you are going to use the shed then imho a concrete floor with a damp proof membrane is a must. I would however seriously consider the nuclear option if you think you are going to outgrow the shed as extending a slab is more work than pouring a new one. My friend built his 5 x5M wooden workshop 25yrs ago and apart from renewing the paint it has had no more maintenance that my blockwork one. I built the daughter aplay shed using the same principles which my missus has been using as a home office since the first lockdown it’s a great space. The construction techniques are simple and the materials readily available. I would recommend the use of bitumen roof shingle over felt every time.

Popular make, rarely criticised, this particular model a bit small for you maybe. Read all about them at lathes.co.uk

Don't forget this is a second-hand machine of unknown vintage, it's been restored, and there isn't much technical detail in the advertisement, such as motor power.

Write out 1000 times: 'Condition is everything when buying second-hand.'

Ideally machines should be seen cutting metal by someone who knows what to look for. Faults, missing parts, knackered bearings, smoking motors, and significant wear and tear are far more obvious when machines are put to work. Minor problems are to be expected, and often easy to fix, but it's never good to spend a lot of money on kit that turns out to need multiple major repairs. New motor, rewire electrics, replace lead-screws, bearings, grind bed, weld cracks etc. As vertical milling machines are top heavy, they fall over during moves more than might be expected, Look for repaired handle-wheels on bent axles! Personally, I distrust fresh paint and signs of recent cleaning. Could be the seller has genuinely improved the cosmetics to get more money, or it might mean the machine has been tarted up to hide faults, like cracked castings.

On the plus side, many Tom Seniors are in reasonable condition, and they make a decent small workshop mill.

Dave

PS.  Don't forget Covid Restrictions!

Edited By SillyOldDuffer on 04/04/2021 10:29:25

It's got the horizontal bits

It will cut your gears

It's got a power traverse

It's been nibbled by rust on the horizontal parts, but not on the table where it matters.

Go and beat him down £300 for the rust damage whilst channeling SOD sucking his teeth

I don't think anyone has mentioned Emco's FB-2. A beautifully-built and accurate machine, which clearly inspired a number of variably miserable oriental knock-offs. Table power-feed available (at a price). It isn't the largest or most rigid machine, of course, but has a small footprint and can manage large workpieces for its size. If it's good enough for Graham Meek and Joseph Noci... (just look at their work and feel humble).

Thank you for the tips re: the Tom Senior - unfortunately no delivery on the item at all, so I'm having to wait until I can call a company and get a quote on that. I do have a VW Camper van and have read that some mills (such as the Senior) can be broken down into bits big enough to lug into a van, would that work for this one?

I will also check out the FB-2. I have been keeping a weather eye on eBay but no VMCs, no Raglans, no Centec 2B's with a vertical head - although it seems HomeMachineryWorkshop has a 2A but it's over £2400!

Luckily I'm in no rush and I can wait for the right item, but I can see why people would prefer to put their money in the hands of Warco/ArcEuroTrade and get something from China...

Hi William,

I have moved (and owned) a Tom Senior M1, Tom Senior Universal, Centec 2A and Centec 2B single-handed, using a LWB Land Rover. They all come apart easily and quickly enough. The manufacturers' bases are bulky and heavy, and the main bodies ( 'columns' ) are fairly heavy, so an assistant is useful - otherwise it's inclined planes, baulks of timber, levers, sweat and swearing. All those machines are good in their own way, but will all now be showing signs of age and/or abuse, and they are large for their capacity. Also, vertical heads, particularly with a quill, are like hens' teeth. Top speeds are also low. My view is that Seniors were no-nonsense, heavy and crude, but less refined than Centecs. Centecs suffered from small tables. The Centec C was, unfortunately, very rare, and I wouldn't try to move one of them...

The Emco FB-2 is altogether lighter, and far easier to dismantle and move.

You might also consider Boxford's milling machine. AFAIK, no quill-feed head was available for the excellent Harrison mill, which, like most horizontal machines, was very short of headroom when fitted with the vertical head.

I think the versatility of a vertical mill, with a swivelling, quill-feed head is a winner, for 'reasonable-sized' work.

BTW, Myford's mills were tarted-up (by Myford) Taiwanese machines. Apparently OK quality. The smallest did not have a swivelling head.

Hope this helps. Good luck with your quest.

Edited By Kiwi Bloke on 05/04/2021 10:37:08

Edited By Kiwi Bloke on 05/04/2021 10:37:54