WM16B mill

Hi has anyone fitted a X & Y axis DRO to a Warco WM16B mill. X axis would have to be fitted to work table front edge otherwise Y axis travel would be restricted. Just weighing up the pros & cons.

Thank you Bernard Reilly Glasgow.

Fitted X and Y axis DRO’s to my Champion V20 mill, albeit it is not a Warco, the principles are identical, I put my X axis on the front edge of the table purely because I didn’t want to restrict the Y axis. Fitting both axes was straightforward, no problems encountered and the fitting kit which came with DRO’s was a great help. Good luck with fitting it, makes life so easy that you wonder why they don’t come as standard on all mills.

Dave W

I have the Warco WM-16 and use a Vertex 100mm vise for most of the stuff I'm doing at the moment. I originally fitted one of the small display type of DRO to the machine from ARC Eurotrade. The X scale was screwed to the front of the table on 20mm deep mounts and the scale would often hit the Y-axis winding wheel.

I've since fitted an Easson ES12B with magnetic scales from M-DRO and the X-scale is mounted to the rear of the table. So far I've not been in a situation where the table has needed to be wound back far enough to cause a problem. It really depends on what you intend to machine and how big the initial part is.

Ed.

I also have a WM 16 to which I also fitted magnetic DRO from M-DRO.

The X axis scale is fitted to the front of the table utilising the channel provided for the table stops; I made some extra screws to secure the magnetic track backing. I also fitted a piece of aluminium angle to prevent swarf falling in to the minimal gap between the read head and the track

The read head is on the bracket originally provided for the table stop.

The downside is that I now have no table stops but I haven't really missed this facility, I just use the DRO to tell me when I've gone too far.

I made a bracket for the Y axis read head and mounted it on 2 tapped holes in the table carriage and I mounted the track using 4 tapped holes I put in the machine base.

The installation works well and has done for 6 years now.

Jim

At the Midlands Model Engineering Exhibition last year I had a chat with a helpful gentleman on the Machine-DRO stand. While they do not do a kit specifically aimed for the WM16, they do a kit for the Chester Champion 20V mill, which is basically almost identical.

Anyway, I ordered the kit at the show 10% discount. I had no real problems fitting the kit to the Warco mill, and have been very pleased with it. Some pictures below. The X-sensor is fitted to the front of the table, so there is no loss of Y travel. I think there may be about 10mm loss of X travel to the extreme right due to the Y sensor assembly fouling the X winding handle at the extreme right travel - not an issue for me because the opposite end handle hits the shop wall to the right of the mill first!

Emboldened by this, I later asked whether the kit for the Chester DB10 lathe would fit the WM250 lathe. I was told that it would (but there are 2 variants for different cross-slide designs). Conclusion is that it does fit, and I am very pleased with that kit also! (I did not like the offering I saw once at the Warco sales area, as the cross-slide sensor on that badly obstructed travel of the tailstock towards the headstock end, causing reach problems using a drill in the tailstock chuck. Hopefully Warco have changed that by now). I shall sort out the photos for this later.

Hope this helps

Martin

I have fitted X & Y axis remote read out scales to my WM16, a straight forward job to do. I made a couple of extension spacers to allow me to use the X axis stops,& fitted an aluminium angle to cover & protect the read out head. The X axis is fitted on the front of my machine so I don't lose any Y travel, has worked fine for me for the past 5 years. Well worth doing.

George.

HI thanks al forum members who responded to my post. I now have a fair idea of what is involved in installing a DRO system on my newly purchased WM16 B milling machine.

Bernard Reilly Glasgow.