tramming a mini mill

Excellent point!

The bottom line is there's no substitute for making and assembling parts properly. It is almost a given, if you start out wrong, every time you turn your attention to fixing one problem, it tends to make another one worse.

I just bought one similar but smaller, but

It would have to be a pretty bad story to not be worth the price. What type machine are you talking about?

Harold

That depends. Is it a new 45, or one that has been played, over and over, on a portable record player with a five pound stylus, at one of my brother's "twist til you puke" parties?

Paul K. Dickman

THis one

One other item I've picked up and found useful, MicroMark sells a tool post grinder for the 7 X mini lathes for $100. Replaces the compound slide, so no taper grinding, and has the base machined so you can't swivel it on the compound. Took five minutes in the surface grinder to remove the step on the base, still won't grind tapers, but it works well. Taking off the step lets the belt guard clear the tailstock, wheel ends up dressed with an angle, but that's of no consequence. Not something if you're in a hurry, but for my use, it works well.

Hey, not a bad looking machine for the bucks. Mind you, I'm not a fan of round column machines, but at that price, it lets the guy in that otherwise may not have a shot at a small machine. I can see where a hobbyist that has limited funds could be well served by that little sucker! Just don't expect the performance of a Gorton from it.

Harold

Not sure what the trick is- one per side just like an LP. If you mean what is the pitch, it varies. The leadscrew servo speed is controlled by the signal from the preview head on the tape deck- if the music is louder, the deviation is greater and the groove pitch is wider.

Kevin Gallimore

OOOOOPS! my mistake, or their catalog is screwed up. The price is right but the mill looks like:

They're both dovetail columns, but I'm pretty sure I'll find something out of square that will have to be taken care of. Not sure how I'll square it up yet, probably either grind or scrape it square. It looks more rigid than it really is, the column has one nut on about a 1" stud to hold it, but all I want it for is small stuff anyhow. Kinda interesting, on a bench 30" by 5 feet, one could have a pretty good small machining facility, with the small mill, one of the 7 X 12 lathes and a small drill press and bench grinder. And for less than $1000 to boot.

THinking about it, it might have been mislabeled right from the factory, but I'm still not going to cry.

Yep, I can see by the new link that they are dovetailed columns. The first link, at a glance, was easy to miss. A friend, years ago, bought a little tabletop CNC mill that was built much like these little guys are. I'm thinking they're leaps and bounds ahead of the round column machines. If you got the larger model for the price you said, you'd have been nuts to turn it down. I think both of us know the difficulty of doing small work on large machines. The setup you described could make a hobbyist doing small work quite pleased. I'd be interested in hearing what you have to go through to get yours up and running properly.

Harold

Hey Harold-- I purchased the same machine the 15th of this month. after about 6 hours the muffin fan on the power supply conked out. Called Harbor Freight and instead of just sending the fan they are sending the whole power supply assy. In the meantime I purchased a small $6.98 fan and tied it to the power supply with the cover removed so could still use the mill until the power supply arrives. Otherwise no gripes yet. Been using router bits on wood and yesterday I received the end mills and other hardware that I had ordered from grizzley. So now can try it out on metal.

Cool! I'll be interested in hearing how well it handles metals, too.

A comment on HF. Lots of guys tend to bad mouth the place, and many refuse to go there. While I'm far from enamored with the bulk of their products, I've found that they fill a very important role in my life. Example. I purchased a set of combination wrenches from 1-1/2" up to 2" in size. Cost a whole $20. They appear to be well heat treated and chrome plated, and have already bailed me out one time when I needed a larger sized wrench that I otherwise would not have possessed. At this point I consider they were free. I couldn't have purchased the size needed for that amount, not even from Sears.

One trip to the store in Portland, OR, I found 50 pound boxes of glass bead for blasting, surplus American made stuff, for only $20/box. Roughly half retail, with no shipping fee or sales tax.

I strongly suggest guys check the place. They have many products that, while often inferior in quality and performance, work well enough to get you through in a pinch, that one time you need a given tool and will never use it again, and the price as compared to Made in USA is often but a small fraction. Americans have effectively killed their place in the manufacturing world by outlandish demands in wages and benefits, so we might just as well benefit by the results when we can. My motto is, when appropriate, buy Chinese. The key word is "when appropriate". You'll notice my Gerstner is filled with Starrett.

Harold