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Burke Horizontal Milling machine

Lil-Tot

Plastic
Joined
May 13, 2020
Good Evening all, Im looking into potentially buying a milling machine, and found this Burke (BURKE MILLING MACHINE milling machine Milling Machine - tools - by... ) in my local area. I cannot figure out which model it is, and do not know sufficiently of mills to know if this will meet my needs. I make small parts for espresso machine primarily, and occasionally larger parts such as the case at 12" length. Please help me find more info and understand the capabilities of this machine. Thank you all for any input.
 
I would stay away from that specific machine, it is really beat up, and has a lever for moving x ways versus preferred wheel. For that size machine, you should checkout the Burke No 4 Milling Machine, many available in good shape and you'll have powered x ways, and if lucky you might find the vertical head as well.

But, you might consider going with larger machine like a Millrite or even a Bridgeport. You will really struggle with the 12" work size you desire on these little benchtop machines.
 
Good Evening all, Im looking into potentially buying a milling machine, and found this Burke (BURKE MILLING MACHINE milling machine Milling Machine - tools - by... ) in my local area. I cannot figure out which model it is, and do not know sufficiently of mills to know if this will meet my needs. I make small parts for espresso machine primarily, and occasionally larger parts such as the case at 12" length. Please help me find more info and understand the capabilities of this machine. Thank you all for any input.

What drcoelho said. That appears to be a #4 // B100-4.

I have one - disassembled at the moment for a significant modification to get rid of the silly bizness of hanging a heavy motor way out to one side.

It was about the same money, but at least not worn out, had no significant damage, and even came with enough B&S #9 tooling and cutters that I didn't have to spend a great deal on tooling.

Page two:

It isn't good choice for general-purpose milling to begin with.

The ridiculously tiny work-envelope (12-13 inches is the LONG axis, the others are EVEN LESS!) wudda been fine for a company making multiple tens of thousands of some small part year after year, but is just too restrictive even as to set-up when one job after the next is NOT the same as the one before it.

Naturally, I soon bought a larger mill! So in a sense, the #4 was money wasted.

For "tiny spaces", a sliding-head Burke or Diamond (both very rare) or a sliding-head Nichols (not rare, just not common) are all far better mills in not a lot more floor space.

Burke, USMT, Sheldon, Hardinge, and a dozen others made more useful small horizontals above that, about "one size up" if not two.

Further, unless you were TRAINED on a horizontal for a couple years BEFORE verticals, and actually PREFER them? You aren't a "mill hand" and would be better-off starting with an easy-peasy vertical mill.

Most verticals are not as stiff, but they don't require a lot of skill to learn to do the basic stuff with, either.

Vertical mills make lousy drillpresses, (the reverse, even MORE so!!) but lousy is better than NONE, and better than drilling with a horizontal, so there's another reason to go with a vertical mill for a space-limited hobby shop.

Keep looking...
 
But darn if it ain't SOOO cute! Industrial art! Restored, it would make an awesome plant stand in the livingroom.
 
But darn if it ain't SOOO cute! Industrial art! Restored, it would make an awesome plant stand in the livingroom.

Not so. That would be a Lincoln. Or the Whitney a Burke is an UGLIFIED copy of.

The Whitney ran the drive power off the ass-end of the spindle, didn't have that sidegodlin motor mount swing nonsense as makes a Burke resemble a "donie-fried" Chipmunk on drugs trying to make-off with a basketball in one cheek to stash for the winter.
 
You guys are great, had a couple of good laughs, and a lot of lessons learned. I will keep an eye out for some of the recommended mills and will probably post another in the future haha Thanks for the input on vertical vs horizontal, I will look into the differences and better understand my needs.
 
For the OP, virtually every important milling machine made has been reviewed in great detail at this website:

Lathes + Machine Tool Archive

This would be a very good place for you to start your researching for choosing a quality milling machine, or for checking on one you might be considering buying.

And some advice coming from someone who started just a few years ago building up a non-production machine shop:
- I started off looking at benchtop machines, both lathes (SouthBend 9") and milling machines (Rusnok, Burke, etc)
- The more I got into it, the more frustrated I was with the limited work envelope of these machines
- The small machines are in demand by hobbyists who tend to drive up the prices because they seek very small machines to fit their small work spaces
- The somewhat larger professional machines can be had for very low prices and if you are careful and selective you can find very high quality machines. The most common milling machine being the Bridgeport, but as previously mentioned something like a Millrite has a very small footprint but a respectable work size.
- I'd recommend that you do as much research and reading as you can, and watch a lot of Youtube videos to see how folks do things and get at least an intellectual understanding of the basic operation of a milling machine and why milling machines are setup as they are.
- You will come to appreciate that the small benchtop machines, and worse the small chinese imports have limited "bulk" to them and as a result when cutting they tend to twist and flex, resulting in frustration trying to get quality results.
- The bigger more professional machines have sufficient stiffness in their design to give consistent quality results.
- There are lots of other gotchas when buying used machines, and I might suggest that you identify an experienced machinist to help with methods for testing/evaluating a used machine to avoid issues related to a heavily used and worn out machine.
- I'm now outfitted with very professional machines, but I did waste a lot of money and time chasing the super small machine space and regret having done so....should have just gone with mainstream professional equipment to start.
 
One other thing.

If you can avoid it, NEVER BUY a milling machine that has ONE T-SLOT (like the small Burkes), unless you are collecting antiques.

For actual use, one slot is pretty horrible for setups. That gets worse if you want to use the thing to the limit, and bury the cutter in a part to get the depth you want. Even just a simple thing like cutting a keyway on a shaft is more difficult when the table has only one slot. If you use the slot as part of the setup, as is common to do, and very convenient, the only place to put the hold-downs is covered up.

With one slot, you'll need to use v-blocks, and putz around to get it aligned correctly to the side of the slot, instead of slapping it on the slot, and clamping from the side using the other slots.
 
After doing some more research, I ran across this milling machine Milling Machine - general for sale - by owner. about largest footprintI can fit in my home shop. Steep price to pay considering I got my logan lathe 200 for $500. Wanted your thoughts on wether $1700 is a fair price for the rockwell 21-122. From what I gathered the additional T Slots will help with set-up, the vertical mill set up is easier to get into. And the rockwell shared the same taper as the bridgeport so there's is a wide availability of tooling. Thanks for the guidance this far guys.

Delta Rockwell milling machines
 
If you are gonna spend $2200, why would you not buy a Bridgeport, can't see that a Bridgeport is much larger than the Rockwell mentioned? Also, as previously mentioned, watch out for Millrite, a little smaller than Bridgeport but solid mill. And if you want to go for the "best" in small format mills, checkout the Deckel FP1 (very hard to find in USA, but readily available for shipment from Europe).
 
The Rockwell is much more compact than a Bridgeport. I’ve had a Rockwell for 25 years and it was perfect for my garage machine shop. Mine was a vertical only version. That one is horizontal/vertical combination mill. In good condition they are accurate and user friendly basic milling machines. The price is right too. If it will do what you want then go for it.
 
The Rockwell is much more compact than a Bridgeport. I’ve had a Rockwell for 25 years and it was perfect for my garage machine shop. Mine was a vertical only version. That one is horizontal/vertical combination mill. In good condition they are accurate and user friendly basic milling machines. The price is right too. If it will do what you want then go for it.

Seconded.

This one looks decent. Simple creatures. Not a lot of work to refurb, even if NOT in the greatest of condition.

Get a task that would stress a BirdPort? Just do it with the horizontal spindle.

Waaay TF stiffer, even on a small mill!
 
That's a good looking unit. Vari-drive is a nice feature. As thermite correctly stated, if there's anything the vertical can't do, the horizontal probably can, it really should handle your needs. $2200 is a lot but it has the variable drive and looks very operational.
I thought I'd mention that you're getting two mills... horizontal and vertical. You really need both of them and you mentioned you have limited room. Getting two mills in a small footprint is worth more than twice what you'd pay for one. Could you get by with a vertical only and save some money? Sure. Will you be a lot happier with both and save yourself near endless time going forward, absolutely.
 
That's a good looking unit. Vari-drive is a nice feature. As thermite correctly stated, if there's anything the vertical can't do, the horizontal probably can, it really should handle your needs. $2200 is a lot but it has the variable drive and looks very operational.
I thought I'd mention that you're getting two mills... horizontal and vertical. You really need both of them and you mentioned you have limited room. Getting two mills in a small footprint is worth more than twice what you'd pay for one. Could you get by with a vertical only and save some money? Sure. Will you be a lot happier with both and save yourself near endless time going forward, absolutely.

I did not consider the rigidity and space saving benefit of having both the vertical and horizontal. I watch this clean up Rockwell Horizontal/Vertical Mill Rebuild - YouTube from a rockwell owner on this forum and and it's seems to be a simple design with alot of room to learn horizontal and vertical milling.

Again I appreciate all the input, I am going to pick it up the weekend of Sept 18th. I'll definitely upload pics.
 
Thanks for the input

That's a good looking unit. Vari-drive is a nice feature. As thermite correctly stated, if there's anything the vertical can't do, the horizontal probably can, it really should handle your needs. $2200 is a lot but it has the variable drive and looks very operational.
I thought I'd mention that you're getting two mills... horizontal and vertical. You really need both of them and you mentioned you have limited room. Getting two mills in a small footprint is worth more than twice what you'd pay for one. Could you get by with a vertical only and save some money? Sure. Will you be a lot happier with both and save yourself near endless time going forward, absolutely.

I did not consider the rigidity and space saving benefit of having both the vertical and horizontal. I watch this clean up Rockwell Horizontal/Vertical Mill Rebuild - YouTube from a rockwell owner on this forum and and it's seems to be a simple design with alot of room to learn horizontal and vertical milling.

Again I appreciate all the input, I am going to pick it up the weekend of Sept 18th. I'll definitely upload pics.
 
I did not consider the rigidity and space saving benefit of having both the vertical and horizontal. I watch this clean up Rockwell Horizontal/Vertical Mill Rebuild - YouTube from a rockwell owner on this forum and and it's seems to be a simple design with alot of room to learn horizontal and vertical milling.

Again I appreciate all the input, I am going to pick it up the weekend of Sept 18th. I'll definitely upload pics.

You can get a couple of serendipitous easter eggs out of a combo mill, too.

Example;

- USMT "Quartet" here came out of Adam Booth's (late Dad's) hands WITH:

-- an already-adapted K&T all-angle head that is driven off the 40-taper 5 HP horizontal spindle, not the #9 B&S sub-2 HP vertical spindle.

-- same-again an already-adapted K&T slotter with about 7" stroke. Folk have shop-fabbed their own slotters for even the tiny Burke's 1 to 3 HP capable horizontal spindle. Consider that as a worthy "DIY project" as it can do 90% of what we might use a shaper for, given a shop already has a mill. To wit, INTERNAL keyways.

-- A horizontal mill can also be a "coldsaw". Inherently. Add a bit of jiggery-pokery to a slotter? Now it can also be a sabre saw or die filer workalike.

-- A horizontal mill is also inherently a HORIZONTAL drillpress. Sounds couner-intuitive, but some work, that's exactly what is needed.

-- Implement a short "bed" but large SWING lathe by mounting a faceplate and/or chuck to the horizontal milling spindle. PM has an example wherein John Oder needed to turn something large, but short. Not as unusual a need as all that, even for folks like John who already have "big boy" lathes. Plan for it!

Any of these can be one-off problem-solvers that need NO extra floorspace or power, and not even a great deal of bulky storage-greedy tooling or adapters.

NONE of them are as "easy" to do with a BirdPort, if even it can do them at all.
Rigidity thing every bit as much as spindle-axis orientation. A horizontal cannot flex at a joint it doesn't even HAVE.
 
At the risk of just repeating all of thermite posts... I'm going to do just that. Once you start thinking horizontal, it is amazing just how many uses the horizontal mill has. I had a very small turning task that I couldn't get trued in on my lathe. Put the piece in a collet on the horizontal mill and fixed a tool holder on the table and I was done in minutes. So yes, large swing lathe... but it can also be a very precise "detail" lathe.

Please do post lots of pics. :)
 








 
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