CNC machines in the Uk

Hi, looking to purchase CNC mill and lathe but little or no machines available in the UK, does anyone know any available or market place to try please.

What size, capability and price range are you looking at?
There are some UK suppliers but price/size ratios aren't particularly good.
Have you considered second hand small industrial stuff with a converter from Transwave?

Hi Kevin

I advertised an Emco 5 cnc lathe on here a few months ago, had some enquiries but nobody purchased so still up for grabs.
Because you don't have many posts I am not sure if you can access my Photo Album, if you can there are several pictures there of the lathe.
It is in good mechanical condition and just needs some modern steppers and a controller to be up and working.

If you are interested just PM me and will send more info.

Emgee

For a CNC mill, assuming you don’t want to convert your own, there are three choices:

1. Buy a hobby level machine, usually with stepper motors

2. New industrial - mega money

3. Secondhand industrial - a lot for the money but you’ll need to be knowledgeable about electronics when it goes wrong

I bought a Tormach CNC mill from the US; high end hobby with a readily available 4th axis, which I’ve used a lot. The original Mach3 software was messy and the 4th axis functions didn’t work properly. The new PathPilot software from Tormach is much better.

There don’t seem to many secondhand hobby CNC machines for sale; I suspect they’re still quite rare in the home workshop. And most people who have them keep them.

Andrew

thanks for the replies guys, never had any CNC machinery so no glue what to look for, It would have to be a machine already to go, I can do main motors/inverters but not looking to mess with stepper motors at this point, I have been looking on Youtube and the Tormach seem ok for the home workshop but you are correct not cheap I may start out with Boxford or Denford to test the water. I already have the workshop full of manual machines and may have to sell some if I went for a Tormach size machine.

Hi Kevin

For a good milling machine if you can find a Denford Triac that has not had industrial use you may find it has a work envelope to suit your needs.
The other Denford cnc mills are a bit short on distance spindle to table, but depends on the type of work envisaged if these would be suitable.

Another cnc mill is the Emco F1, all cast iron with tapered and adjustable gibs, very capable machine in original form for 2-1/2D work but for 3D you would need to change the control system.
Max working envelope is X 200 and Y 100 with 200 Z, quite a bit less than the Triac.

Emgee

Hiya Kevin, It may help if you visit a workshop with CNC capability like mine I'm in Co Durham.

Where in the country are you located.

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Hello Kevin

Also available for a visit. Live near Newbury and running Tormach 440 with their Pathpilot controller and using Fusion 360 for CAD/CAM.

Alan

To pick up on a couple of points made by Barrie:

Correct, the Tormach is CNC only, no handwheels. That didn’t worry me as I only use it for CNC milling. As yet I haven’t used the MDI or inbuilt wizards in anger. For manual milling I’ve got vertical and horizontal mills available.

The Tormach 1100 spindle is 1.5hp, same as my Bridgeport. The Tormach is happier running smaller cutters at higher rpm and feedrates than the Bridgeport although the metal removal rate is similar. As the Tormach motor runs from a VFD it doesn’t have full power available at low rpm; hence smaller cutters at higher speeds.

As said a lot will depend upon the usage. A lot of my parts are 2.5D or 3D, but the 4th axis, along with a high speed (24000rpm) spindle, allows me to make intricate parts with small cutters, like these bevel gears:

Andrew

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I did look at the Tormach speeder, but it's quite expensive and is reputedly rather noisy. That's important to me as I live in a very quiet rural location. I ended up with a 24000rpm induction motor and VFD. I bought the demo package from Arc when they stopped selling the items. I had to make a bracket to hold the motor onto the mill spindle:

Of course it's difficult to swap between main and high speed spindles within a job, and the high speed spindle is not quick change, so prefilled tool tables can't be used. But so far that hasn't been a problem making small parts only needing a single cutter.

Andrew

Now Tormach are releasing Servo machines perhaps they'll also fit higher powered spindles in order to deliver useful low speed torque, in the same way that most industrial CNC mill manufacturers do?

Let's hope they don't use Haas 'horsepower'.

Andrew

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As mentioned I don't use tool tables when using the high speed spindle. But for the main spindle I make extensive use tool tables as the tool change system is repeatable. Initially I used to manually change the Z value each time I changed a tool. But that became tedious rather quickly, and led to some "interesting" tool crashes when I forgot to change the value. So I invested in an electronic tool height gauge that enters the value direct into a tool table. The original Mach3 used with the Tormach was poor on tool tables, and only saved them if you remembered to do it explicitly on exit. The new PathPilot system is much better, it saves automatically.

Andrew

Barrie;

I read your comment about the Wabeco and handles for manual movement.

1) Look for "MPG"s - these things allow you to move the axes with a knob on the MPG, much like you'd do with a manual mill, and you have a built-in DRO as well. And, one can set the speed of the movement, so you have fine movement and the ability to get the table to move quite a lot without lots of cranking of the handle.

2) Your software should also allow you to manually move the machine table. With a mouse.

3) I have 2 CNC mills, one has a spindle quill on it. I don't have a pillar drill, and, while I do have another largish mill with a quill, I tend to just use this CNC one in manual mode. I flip on the power - the computer boots up, and it's ready to use. The MPG gives me axis movement, spindle speed setting, and a DRO.

4) LinuxCNC (and, likely PathPilot, which is LinuxCNC with a different GUI) has built-in the ability to engrave from image files, like JPGs.

5) My CNC mills do not have any keyboards in the common "computer" sense. I do have track balls and do have numeric keypads connected, but these last ones are rarely used, as the computer screen allows you to select numbers. If I had touch screens, I'd not even bother with the trackballs.

All in all, my CNC mills get used more than any other thing in my workshop, I'd expect.

This is all fun stuff.

Edited By John Alexander Stewart on 28/12/2018 22:19:57