Looking for New Milling machine advice.

My work wants me to order a milling machine. Mostly for cutting keyways in shafts so we can make our own in house and save downtime and money. I know basic machining and was taught on a Bridgeport. My work would like a new machine. Was told "find something on Grainger and well order it". I don't know much about machine specs and spindle tapers. Except R-8 which I don't think is made anymore. So if you were told to order a Milling machine for general machining what you order and why? I saw Grainger had a Dayton Heavy duty Milling machine but is it quality? or Taiwan Junk? Thank you

Stay away from the R8,go with a 40 Taper if you can,and Taiwanese machines can be fairly good.
What price range ?

If you are looking at a new Bridgeport style mill, a Prototrak SMX machine is the same money as a good quality manual with the options, and a lot more productive.

skip grainger, they are a big ripoff the same stuff is almost always available for 2/3 or 1/2 somewhere else.

tell em you need one of these-
Mega Mill - Lagun Engineering Solutions

Ries said:

skip grainger, they are a big ripoff the same stuff is almost always available for 2/3 or 1/2 somewhere else.

tell em you need one of these-
Mega Mill - Lagun Engineering Solutions

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Yoy, that's a fun-looking toy . $20K? $25k?

Interesting that they use ballscrews, in a manual machine.

Regards.

Mike

mnelson6688 said:

My work wants me to order a milling machine. Mostly for cutting keyways in shafts so we can make our own in house and save downtime and money.

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Old "Day Job" did those every day. Under 3/4" and/or "closed" that needed round ends for the pockets, I used a Cincinnati Toolmaster vertical with endmills.

More common 3/4 and larger, I used a K&T Horizontal, milling cutters.

The miniature Burke #4 AKA B-100-4 here was - per the previous owner - used for nothing much BUT keyways for 30 years. However - 1/4", 3/16" and the odd Woodruff, similar size.

You doing railroad and mining machinery size keyways?

Or lawnmower blade-hub size range?

FWIW-maybe-something department... if you don't have a mill hand on-staff who can put something as DUMB SEEMING as a keyway right ON the radius, first-time, EVERY time?

"Offset" DIY keyways will give a whole new meaning to "downtime" as you fab or source new shafts.

2CW

If you are going to use the mill for primarily cutting keyways, I would be thinking of getting a horizontal machine.
You don't say where you are in Ohio, but I am pretty sure you would not have to look far for a good solid horizontal.
Dave

I would look for a good used machine, but that may not work for accounting/depreciation reasons.

If you want American made, you can buy a new mill from Wells Index.

Do you have any lathes at your facility? It is possible to do 'milling' operations on a lathe.

steve45 said:

...Do you have any lathes at your facility? It is possible to do 'milling' operations on a lathe...

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Theoretically...but I wanna be there to watch when some inexperienced guy is trying to cut a 12" long keyway in a 6 ft. long shaft...

Get yourself a 40m/taper spindle.Tooling is easily available new or used at reasonable costs.You should be looking for a machine with a table of decent width and lenght but most machines with a 40m/t should be have a decent size table.It doesnt mean you need a 10ft long table to accomadate a shaft of same length a 5ft table could easily accomadate a 10ft long shaft.Go onto you-tube and imput cutting keways in shafts on a milling machine it might give you some clues.Me personally swear by parkson milling machines are excellent for cutting keways from 1/8ins to 3ins width, used to take the 3ins wide keways depth of 2ins in one cut a truely robust machine that rarely needed attention but theres plenty of others a decent size cincinnati second hand but take an experienced guy with you for check before buying.Then a brand new clarkson chuck with a reducer sleeve and screw in collets is all you need to produce keways of different lengths and widths with no danger of your cutter pulling down.A used machine in good condition could be easily bought at reasonable cost but I would recommend a new clarkson chuck with new collets and reducer should be bought as most keways have a tolerance of .001ins and you dont want a used one that could be running out as if it is will be making a reasonably easy job into a near impossibe one tolerance wise

D KIRBY said:

If you are going to use the mill for primarily cutting keyways, I would be thinking of getting a horizontal machine.
You don't say where you are in Ohio, but I am pretty sure you would not have to look far for a good solid horizontal.
Dave

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How do you cut key ways in the middle of a shaft with a horizontal machine using cutters on the arbor ? The kind of key ways that have radiused ends at both ends.

My last place cut plenty of key ways. The small stuff (1/4" up to about 3/4" wide ) was done on vertical milling machines and the bigger ones ( up to 3" wide ) were done on Plano-milling machines.

I can't recall the last time I saw somebody cut a keyway on an horizontal milling machine in industry unless the manufacturer specifically asked for the key way to feather out like you sometimes get on electric motors.

Regards Tyrone.

Yes agree it has to be either a vertical or a universal.I would go for the universal then you could use it for other things not just keyways of course theres the machines sorely for keyways. The keyseater, but why tie the machine down to one use.Horizontals are more tricky to use for keyways as has been said the cutter on the arbor will leave a sweep on blind keyways,you could take the arbor off and work off the coloum but then you will be back forth to see what your doing making things more difficult for yourself.So it would be a vertical or a universal.If he was a one man band and was wanting value for money he could consider a decent size horizontal boring machine depending on size of jobs he was doing but a borer could do multiple tasks obviously boring,drilling and general milling and shafts of large diameters and lenghts with the added bonus of the table revolving giving the option of keways that have to be opposite each other (180 degree)or keyways that have to parallel to a taper.Plenty of room on a borers table of a machine of decent size but it sounds as if he is not under fiancial restraints

I like the idea of a Prototrak. If they are telling you to get a new machine and have the money go for it. Get a three axis SMX you can use it as a manual machine with a read out and program it to do just about anything. 30 to 40 grand gets you a lot of machine from them.

You can't go wrong with a Prototrak no shop should be without one.

Good Luck

Make Chips Boys !

Ron

mnelson6688 said:

My work wants me to order a milling machine. Mostly for cutting keyways in shafts so we can make our own in house and save downtime and money. I know basic machining and was taught on a Bridgeport. My work would like a new machine. Was told "find something on Grainger and well order it". I don't know much about machine specs and spindle tapers. Except R-8 which I don't think is made anymore. So if you were told to order a Milling machine for general machining what you order and why? I saw Grainger had a Dayton Heavy duty Milling machine but is it quality? or Taiwan Junk? Thank you

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.
one make sure of your budget and include in cost tool holders as they can quickly add up.
.
R8 is very common and cheap buying tool holders but be aware for cnc it cannot repeat too good as the tighter you have it the more it pulls in. many prototraks have kwik switch tooling usually 200, it is more steep angle and usually a quarter turn to lock tool in.
.
many bosses say buy machine but they quickly want to buy a $10,000 machine rather than a $20,000 machine. i would double check your budget

Monarchist said:

Old "Day Job" did those every day. Under 3/4" and/or "closed" that needed round ends for the pockets, I used a Cincinnati Toolmaster vertical with endmills.

More common 3/4 and larger, I used a K&T Horizontal, milling cutters.

The miniature Burke #4 AKA B-100-4 here was - per the previous owner - used for nothing much BUT keyways for 30 years. However - 1/4", 3/16" and the odd Woodruff, similar size.

You doing railroad and mining machinery size keyways?

Or lawnmower blade-hub size range?

FWIW-maybe-something department... if you don't have a mill hand on-staff who can put something as DUMB SEEMING as a keyway right ON the radius, first-time, EVERY time?

"Offset" DIY keyways will give a whole new meaning to "downtime" as you fab or source new shafts.

2CW

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I would add keyway length into that to. One of the reasons we got a large piece of old Cincinnati iron at work is we have some 1/8" and 3/16" keyways but 24" to 36" long.

JohnMc45 said:

I would add keyway length into that to. One of the reasons we got a large piece of old Cincinnati iron at work is we have some 1/8" and 3/16" keyways but 24" to 36" long.

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Those I just purchase as pre-keywayed Thompson shafting. 1 1/2" X 36" the most recent.

Straighter than they would be if I were to mill them myself, and all-up, a rather modest premium vs the time and hassle. Might even be cheaper, actually.