Lathe vs milling machine

2 mills, 1 vertical, 1 horizontal, and 2 lathes, 1 nice, 1 for grinding & polishing. Still looking. jw

4 lathes: 9" Logan workhorse, 10" Enco project, 10" Atlas junker, 6" AA shelf queen 1 minimill. Gotta work on that mill thing.

Always looking

Rex

2 lathes; 12" American Tool Works, 6" Atlas

2 mills; 1 Brigeport, 1 Sheldon horizontal

Basement full. Time for bigger house?

Gregm

Cheater!

Gunner The two highest achievements of the human mind are the twin concepts of "loyalty" and "duty." Whenever these twin concepts fall into disrepute -- get out of there fast! You may possibly save yourself, but it is too late to save that society. It is doomed. " Lazarus Long

Lathe Dementia. Recognized as one of the major sub-strains of the all-consuming virus, Packratitis. Usual symptoms easily recognized and normally is contracted for life. Can be very contagious. michael

Or from folks that have used purpose built machines and don't enjoy having to tear down a setup so they can use the machine for a different purpose. If multi-use machines were a wise investment, you'd find them in industry. It stands to reason that they make poor production machines, although for a person with limited space and funds, they might be a fair choice. Not picking on them, just speaking facts that, to some, are important. Personally, I'd be well annoyed with the idea that I couldn't use my lathe because I had it set up for milling. I don't endorse 3 in 1 machines, nor do I endorse mill/drills. Ted Edwards uses a 3 in 1 and is well pleased, and has turned out some excellent work. What matters is what you expect from your machines.

Harold

If I could only have only one mill, it would be a vertical mill. Horizontals are very useful for some jobs, but a vertical is more general purpose. Of course some people would disagree.

Two lathes. One small one and one big one. Two mills. One vertical and one horizontal.

Lets add a shaper and surface grinder to the shop too. Maybe a shear, brake, couple grinders, drill sharpener for good measure too. Oh what the heck, lets add a foredom too.

chuck

You forgot to add a good welder. A forklift, or at least an engine hoist is real handy for moving heavy goodies like 10" tilting rotary tables.

Pete C.

At home, personal:

Three lathes: 3" Unimat SL, 4" Levin instrument lathe, 10" Logan (Ward's).

Two mills: KBC A1S vertical, Benchmaster horizontal.

One 8" Logan shaper.

One 'homebrewed' manual surface grinder.

At work, in "my" shop (I'm the shop supervisor) at Univ. of MI - Flint:

Three lathes: 3" Unimat SL, 6" Atlas, 14" Rockwell.

One Bridgeport mill.

One Vernamo 14" shaper.

One manual surface grinder.

Lots of smaller/simpler stuff at both sites.

Dan Mitchell ============

Bringing up another possibility for starting out: get a lathe and a shaper (and a decent grinder). Very compatible in both tooling and learning. Lathe makes (mostly) cylindrical surfaces with a single-point tool, shaper makes (mostly) flat surfaces with a single-point tool. The shaper is cheaper than a comparable mill and the tools are drastically less expensive.

Eventually you will want a mill, but in the meantime you can learn a lot, make many things, and have budget left for all the measuring instruments you will soon be buying.

I bought one of these at an auction for $10 and had the hydraulics done over for around $50.

It's great for lifting, moving and positioning heavy machine parts, jacking up and working on the garden tractor, raising the log splitter to a comfortable working height, welding either sitting or standing, bandsawing long heavy stock or structural steel, hanging weldments for painting, fixing the washing machine, and so on.

I made larger & wider stainless steel wheels with welding-rod needle bearings for it so it will roll around the yard easily. The stock ones are useless on dirt. It could use outriggers at the caster end for stability but it's OK with wooden blocks kicked underneath the uprights.

If the platform is at the top I can load it into the pickup truck by myself by tipping it back so the handle rests on the tailgate, then raising the wheel end and sliding it in. I put pins at the top of the rails to stop the platform from sliding off when it's horizontal.

jw

Yes -- if you have a CNC milling machine. Most home shops don't start out with one, though there are projects to modify various grades of milling machines into CNC capable machines. (But -- generally you will need both a Mill and a lathe to make all the parts involved in the conversion.)

Yes -- nice if you have CNC -- rather useless without it. :-)

Enjoy, DoN.

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Indeed so. Otherwise, all we would need is a drill press to treat as a milling machine to treat as a lathe. :-)

Enjoy, DoN.

Power tool list:

6 lathes: In order of size 12x24" Clausing 6x18" Atlas/Craftsman (bench queen). 5" Compact-5/CNC 4"? Taig 3"? Unimat SL-1000 2-1/2" Watchmaker's lathe (still missing cross-slide.) 5 mills (I think -- depending on how you count):

Bridgeport Vertical (undergoing conversion from old stepper CNC to more modern servo CNC) Nichols Horizontal mill with vertical head.

Emco C5 (milling column for the Compact-5 lathe mounted to a more serious X-Y base.

Unimat SL-1000 Same as the lathe above -- (it is a convertible).

Hardinge Ancient benchtop horizontal mill, with knee leadscrew passing through bench top, and flat belt to overhead mounted motor.

1 shaper

Rockwell/Delta 7"

1 surface grinder

Sanford 4x10"

2 Drill presses:

Floor-standing 16-speed Taiwanese from about 1977 or so.

Cameron Micro precision -- bench sensitive drill press with maximum bit shank of 1/8".

Of course -- including looking for more space in my shop. :-)

Enjoy, DoN.

I got lucky and got a 3,000# Yale stand-up riding forklift with a nearly new battery for $300. I just had to track down a 24v charger for it and ended up getting a basic 10a charger for like $60.

Pete C.

Well said, DoN!

H

Only those that don't live in the "real world". I ran my (commercial) machine shop without a horizontal mill for 16 years and turned out a huge variety of work, including a considerable amount of tooling. I couldn't have done most of the work on a horizontal------nor on a non-drop-spindle vertical mill. I've always owned Bridgeports, but only because of economics. Had I been wealthy, I'd have filled my shop with Gorton mills.

Don't misunderstand. There are things you can do with a horizontal that are impossible on a vertical, but the vast majority of the work out there doesn't require one, and may not benefit from the use of one.

One place a horizontal leaves a drop spindle mill in the dust is in metal removal. For those that have never witnessed a serious horizontal mill running a large side or slab cutter, the metal removal rate is almost frightening. You'd swear there's no way in hell the machine could stand up to the task, but they do, and easily.

Harold

Welll...you didnt specify.

chuckle

Gunner

The two highest achievements of the human mind are the twin concepts of "loyalty" and "duty." Whenever these twin concepts fall into disrepute -- get out of there fast! You may possibly save yourself, but it is too late to save that society. It is doomed. " Lazarus Long

Ok...if we are mentioning other stuff....

Logan 8" shaper Covell 6x12 surface grinder Covell 5x18 OD grinder Ramco 8x18 surface grinder (2) Boyer Shultz 6-18 surface grinders (anyone want a fixer upper?) Darex M500 drill shapener Darex Endmill sharpener Baldor cutter tool grinder Taiwanese version of the Baldor Cutter Tool grinder (not chinese) Various Baldor grinders Craftsman grinder BurrKing 2" belt sander HTH 6x48 x12 belt.disk sander Delta 1x42 belt sander Homemade 1x42 belt sander Porter Cable 4x48" belt sander

Chicom roller/shear/brake Diacro finger break (in my trailer at the moment..needs work) Diacro 6" power notcher (for sale)

52" Pexto hydraulic shear (16 ga..for sale) Compact bender 15 ton press tiny 3 ton press 20 ton press with bad seals

Lincoln Weldpak 100 Mig Dan-Mig 200 amp Mig Lincoln Tig 250/250 Airco Squarewave 300 tig Miller Dialarc 250 stick welder Marquette 110vt stick welder Century 250 stick welder (out on loan)

(2) Buffalo #18 drill presses (for sale) (1) 1/2" Delta Rockwell drill press (1) 3/4" Rockwell drill press (1) Taiwanese 1/2" drill press (1) 3/8" Harbor Freight table top drill press (1) Pratt & Whitney (Cameron?) double headed 1/8" sensitive drill press unit (two seperate sensitive drill presses on the same frame) for sale

Oh..and 2 Foredoms

I know Im missing something....

Gunner

The two highest achievements of the human mind are the twin concepts of "loyalty" and "duty." Whenever these twin concepts fall into disrepute -- get out of there fast! You may possibly save yourself, but it is too late to save that society. It is doomed. " Lazarus Long