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question about mill / lathe machines

LomitaBob

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I have been kicking around buying a small lathe and/or maybe one of those small combo machines. I only want one for tinkering in the garage, I will not be doing any kind of precision stuff at all. that being said, does anyone have any experience with the Harbor Freight small lathe? I know most of the tools from harbor freight are crap but I cant see spending a ton of cash on a machine that isn't gonna get much use.
 

lbhsbz

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I started with the HF mini lathe and mini mill. What are you planning on using them for?
 

Chopperman

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I've got a little Smithy machine. Works well for home projects. Not really suited for heavy duty use, but built well, works well, and good customer support services. I bought mine from Smithy via eBay. Got a pretty good deal. At least I think so anyway from what research I had done. The machine I bought was a trade in. Guy got it, unpacked it, and it wasn't big enough for what he wanted to use it for. Traded it in on a bigger machine. I got a "reconditioned" new machine with full warranty as a new machine and paid quite a bit less. I like it because it has 2 motors. 1 for the mill, 1 for the lathe. Runs on 110/120v. Works good for fixing shit around the house. 4 wheeler parts, r/c car parts, gunsmith work, hobby stuff. It's been a good little machine. Be prepared to spend as much if not more on tooling and associated bits and parts as the machine costs. That shit adds up quick. image.jpg
 

LomitaBob

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I started with the HF mini lathe and mini mill. What are you planning on using them for?

I am one of those people who knows a little about everything and like to be able to say "I made it myself". I kinda want one just to have one. I am thinking I could use a mill to make all of the R/C parts I break all of the time. I also want to build a nice "solvent trap" for my .22 and could use a lathe for this, I want to make a custom tap and C02 top for my keg growler so I can have a mini draft setup in the motorhome. nothing too crazy.
 

COCA COLA COWBOY

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You may want to post your budget. We like to spend every penny you have.
 

rvrrun

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I started with the HF lathe (Sieg C2, I believe) and it's ok for soft metal and plastic. I returned it and bought the Sieg C4 from Little Machine Shop http://littlemachineshop.com/products/product_view.php?ProductID=4841, the only thing that holds this back is the size chuck you can swing. It takes up more room on the bench and is very heavy but is steel gear driven and has power cross. The C2 was light enough to lift off the bench and store when not in use and has a ton of internet forum support/mod info.

For the mill, I went with the Grizzly G0722 (Sieg SX4), http://www.grizzly.com/products/Milling-Machine-with-Power-Feed/G0722. The good/bad thing about both of them is the brushless motors, they both have more than enough power, but if anything goes wrong I will be out of my depth trying to fix them. They have both been solid for 5 ears now. The SX2 is cheaper and has a ton of info for CNC modding if you think you might want to go that route.
 

AzGeo

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machine work .
 

lbhsbz

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Lathe:
They are great little machines to do little work. You can do bigger work but you have to get creative. The 5/8" spindle bore is a huge limiting factor...anything bigger than that more than a few inches long and you're not doing any ID or facing work due to excessive stick out. It's also not very rigid...so it eats carbide tooling on stuff where you kinda need carbide tooling unless you take stupid light cuts, which usually isn't good for carbide tooling. If you have room for a larger lathe, for not much more money I would recommend you get a larger lathe. Example: I had to make some ball joint spacers for my old race car. They started off as 1.75" 4130 square stock about 2" long. I had to turn one end down to 3/4" round for about 3/4", then drll/bore a 3/4" hole in the other end. It took me about 4 or 5 hours to make each one on the mini lathe. I was approached to make a set for someone else after they saw my 8 year old forum post, so I grabbed the leftover stock and chucked it up in my 14x40 Cadillac lathe and had 2 done in about 5 minutes (not counting the time to switch the chuck).

They are not perfect...fit and finish leaves a bit to be desired. You'll have to do some work to it to make it "right". I would recommend reading around at littlemachineshop.com, as well as http://www.mini-lathe.com/ I had the Cummins tools version of the lathe which had a 2 inch longer bed than the HF lathe, but was otherwise the same. That extra room was priceless.

As has been said, the lathe is only part of the purchase, and probably the smallest part. You'll probably want a couple different chucks, you'll need measuring tools, cutting tools, and there are a whole bunch of other things to use up your money. Everything on these lathes is small, so there isn't much available used tooling. If you get a bigger lathe, you can buy crates of tooling on ebay for not much more than scrap value, which is what I generally do.

Mill:

The only downside, aside from the obviously small work envelope, is lack of rigidity and the plastic gears. DO NOT use HF endmills on this machine...they are crap. Use good endmills that actually cut properly. You'll need to take light cuts and use mostly smaller tooling. It's possible to do very precision work, but you may die before you finish what you're doing...because you can't do anything fast. Other than that, it's fine. If you have room, buy a bigger machine.

Just like welding machines and air compressors, everyone usually starts off small and then replaces them with bigger units shortly thereafter, repeatedly until they arrive at suitably sized machines. This costs a shit load of money. I've learned to just buy the biggest machines I (a) can move and (b) have room for, then I'm done.
 

RiverDave

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To tell you the truth I am kind of the wrong guy to ask about this. I grew up machining on full size machines, and then went to work for machine and mold shops, all running bridgeports and full scale lathes etc.. I have never really worked on the smaller hole type stuff.

My advice would be for a mill is to get something with a DRO. It will save you so much time and increase your capabilities so much that I couldn't imagine not having one. Fucjing around with travel dial indicators and magnetic basis is ludicrous to me.

As far as the lathe, if it has auto feed, and a gear box so you can single point threads then you should be good. Other then that you will be limited to the size and rigidity of the machine on material removal. I'd buy an old southbend or a name brand lathe vs some HF deal. Or at a minimum maybe a Jet lathe if I wanted something new and cheap.
 
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