mini mills - which is the best?

. . . and a more powerful belt driven head assembly

Russell.

Indeed John, but it's a shame that the SX2 keeps the same downfeed arrangement as the X2, rather than a leadscrew. I know it's faster but as far as I can see the only way to get accurate downfeed is to measure it by adding a DRO or using a DTI. Rack and pinion doesn't seem to me to be the best approach.

Nigel,

Like many people on this forum, I find ArcEuro to be a fair, informative and neutral supplier. Also like many, I make use of their preparation guide which describes the areas where grease is applied. This is part of their preparation service.  I followed the guide and would hope that it isn't going to be detrimental to the machine. As I understand, Ketan of ArcEuro has a background that should qualify for compiling the guide, which has been around since 2007 and there has been plenty of time for thorough peer review.

Dave

Edited By David Haynes on 16/06/2012 11:23:00

For what it's worth, I bought the 2217-30 from SPG Tools last year - it arrived before Christmas.

I've only given it a small amount of use so far, although it's seen action on mild steel, aluminium and nylon so far. Most of the time since I've spent building/welding together a cabinet/stand for it. It did make some slots in the top of the unit (3mm mild steel) for coolant drainage (going to cobble up a coolant set up for it, have washing machine drain pump at the ready for this duty!)

Good machine, although as yet I haven't done anything needing lots of precision so can't comment on that. It's the equivalent to the Warco WM-18, but was significantly cheaper than the Warco at the time.

Pleased to see the price has gone up by £200! Glad I got it when I did.

It's 215kg (when I finished the stand a couple of weeks ago, an engine frane was used to lift it up), so relatively hefty for a bench mill.