Warco wm18

Hi everyone, have just aquired a warco wm18 that has never been used, and when I disassembled the machine it came to light that the gas strut is missing, do you any of you knowledgeable people know the length or find an online manual.

Was surprised that there is no online manual.

Some don't have the strut, the later ones do.

Mines 2007. No strut. Good idea though. That said I have to apply a bit of nip on the quill for accuracy.

Bri

Hi Tony,

I lost my manual for my WM14mill, could not find online so contacted Warco and a kind gent sent me one as an pdf

Give it a try

Mick 🇫🇴

Same here Mick... almost by return too! Very fast to mail me the PDF back.

Drop them a mail. They will send you the manual.

Ian

Thanks guys. I have dropped them a message.

The main reason for asking about the gas strut is the ball and cup are both fitted but the ram is not, surely they wouldn't fit the balls and cup's??

Bit of a mystery. My 2014 WM18 doesn't have a strut and Warco's blurb doesn't mention it as a selling point either. Not having the strut certainly makes cranking the head up harder but not so much I've felt the need to do anything about it. This is because the head is only moved during setting-up, and then only short distances. I even wondered in another recent thread if the presence of a strut might make vibration more likely : don't know!

Of course a strut would allow a smaller motor to be used in a CNC conversion. And, because the lifting wheel is awkwardly placed on the top of the column (and I'm 6' tall), a strut would be useful for operators on the short side, or anyone with weaker arms than me. (I'm a weed)

Dave

Hi all. Bit of a late add-on, but I've just installed my own WM18B and if it has got a gas strut it sure doesn't do anything! Why is the handle placed at the top, seems crazy to me?

Edited By Terry Kirkup on 27/05/2021 09:49:17

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Just wondering ... Might it have something to do with the shipping restrictions that are briefly discussed here: **LINK**

https://www.copenworld.com/community/threads/getting-gas-bonnet-struts-wont-ship-from-japan.3945/

MichaelG.

It's to keep you on your toes!

Seriously though, I think the WM18 is as big as this style of mill can be without the controls becoming uncomfortably spread out. The position of the column handle is OK on smaller members of the family, but it's a stretch on the WM18 for anyone much under 6' tall.

Dave

Terry, have you peeked inside the column to check whether the strut is actually present?

The gas strut on my WM18 is present but has never really offered anything like as much assistance with raising the head as I have seen on other examples of the same mill. I suspect not all gas struts on these mills are actually working as intended when new.

Spare a thought for the small number of people, including me, who have to use their left arm to crank the right-positioned z-axis handwheel.

Edited By Bill Phinn on 27/05/2021 13:05:47

Wonder what made you choose it if you think the handwheel position is crazy, one of the reasons I went with the X3 is the handle is nice and easy to use at the front.

I have seen similar to the warco retro fitted with a belt/chain drive down to a handwheel lower down on the side of the machine.

I think the z-axis handwheel position is pretty logical, Jason, though obviously not ideal for me or anyone.

Though I knew before purchase that its top-right positioning would be more inconvenient to me than in most people's cases, the inconvenience it causes me would certainly be less than it is if the pressure in the gas strut on my mill was as high as I'd expected it to be and as it evidently is in some examples of WM18s I've seen. Sadly, it appears it never has been.

Fortunately at present I do have a reasonably healthy left arm, and lifting the head, whilst tedious, is certainly less onerous than the heavy manual lifting my day job (and evening job) unavoidably entails.

Reasons for choosing the WM18 over the SX3 were as follows:

Table is substantially longer

Spindle to table distance is bigger

X-axis handwheels are present at both ends, not just on right

Bigger range of spindle speeds

Choice of having a factory-fitted DRO (this option wouldn't be so important to me now as it was at the time)

Choice of am or pm delivery slot was available at no extra cost

Warco were giving an apparently rare 10% off everything the weekend I happened to visit the site with a reasonably firm intention of buying a mill that day either from them or someone else.

Things the SX3 has that I'd like the WM18 to have, but knew and accepted, pre-purchase, that it didn't:

Brushless motor, belt drive, low-positioned Z-axis handwheel.