Are these good machines Lillian, Kondia, TOS

Before I had a First mill 9 x 32 ,,, but things changed and now I have a Jet mill drill . Now I want a 9 x 32 vertical mill . A shop is closing that has Lillian, Kondia, TOS machines ,,, but I don't have clue if they are a good makes .
Some help here would be most appreciated . I know I'll need a rotary phase converter ect.
Thanks ED

ewaring said:

Before I had a First mill 9 x 32 ,,, but things changed and now I have a Jet mill drill . Now I want a 9 x 32 vertical mill . A shop is closing that has Lillian, Kondia, TOS machines ,,, but I don't have clue if they are a good makes .
Some help here would be most appreciated . I know I'll need a rotary phase converter ect.
Thanks ED

Click to expand...

Google is your friend. Also lathes.co.uk

- Lilian (or Li Li An?) shows up as a Taiwanese milling machine maker, many used listings, plus still in bizness:

LILIAN Machine Industrial Co., Ltd.

- Kondia, shows up as "Spanish":

Kondia Milling Machines

But were sold a while back, and after fiscal collapse at that:

600 Group Buys Machine Tools Unit Of Spain's Kondia For EUR50,000

- ToS WERE a wide range of associated firms, former "East Bloc", tell their own story of present-day surviving organization. Google it WHEN you know WHICH ToS - mill, lathe or lathe CHUCK - and of what model and age.

SOMEBODY bought "value for money", not flashy Big Names, as "all of the above" .. generally get higher marks than "Jet".. or even BirdPort.

Or so they did when NEW.

"Blind stag", not "blind SWAG", AKA "no-eye deer" what CONDITION they are in NOW.

Go see'um. You need an experienced Mark One Eyeball before you need an RPC.

Might be wise to "borrow" that expertise, the "mill-drill" and not bothering to even Google start yah came in the door with?

Learn. Grow. Survive and prosper.

Thermite covered most of it. I can only add that we had a Kondia at work BITD. It was a high mileage, worked hard unit. Like they say about Bridgeports, it may not be the best at anything, but they are incredibly versatile machines. And this Kondia Bridgeport clone did everything we asked of it and more. Nothing wrong there.

Kondia and Lillian are typical bridgeport clones.

Tos never made any machines like that AFAIK. Vertical, universal and turret, all heavy duty. The common Tos turret mill that I've seen is the FNK 25 which is a much heavier machine than a bridgeport/clone. If it's one of those and in good order, it will be much more machine than the other two.

With that choice of brands for a turret mill I'd be looking most closely at TOS. By design somewhat heftier than the usual Bridgeport or clone, pretty much comparable to a Beaver really, it has the additional advantage of having been sold at a somewhat subsidised price to gain Western currency. So the overall engineering is a bit better than might be expected from the new price / performance ratio. Hence a TOS generally stands up to heavy use and wear better. But being heftier it may well have been run harder. Its noticeably heavier to handle in some areas. Particularly if rotating the head which, frankly, is a fraught enough business with a Bridgeport or clone.

Big advantage of the basic Bridgeport or clone is spares availability. You can get pretty much all the common wearing stuff so a basically sound machine with faults can be a viable purchase if the price is right. Unfortunately being the known brand Bridgeport and clone prices tend to be high, and rising, these days.

As ever its down to the actual condition of the machine in question. Do remember that at TOS is significantly larger than a Bridgeport. In particular height. A Bridgeport or clone can be used under an 8 ft ceiling, a TOS needs at least 9 ft. I'd always planned to trade up from Bridgeport to Beaver or TOS but when opportunity knocked I found I'd not provided enough space when building the workshop.

Clive

don't know about Lailin but both Kondia and Tos are decent machines.
i could be mistaking but i believe Kondia was sold in the USA as Lagun.
if in good working order i would not hesitate on either of them.
keep in mind that the tooling that comes with the machine is about as important as the machine itself.
the Kondia might have a #30 taper whilst the Tos probably has a #40.
if so i would go for the Tos.

+ another on what's been said about TOS

If all are equal condition etc etc etc - go for the TOS

& IME the TOS FNK 25 turrets are 40 taper, ……….the FNK 25A (a rarer bird) has power feeds on all axis ;- yummy

All things being equal condition wise it's TOS for me also. A good value for money, no nonsense, milling machine.

Regards Tyrone.

janvanruth said:

don't know about Lailin but both Kondia and Tos are decent machines.
i could be mistaking but i believe Kondia was sold in the USA as Lagun.

Click to expand...

Kondia history will be "in the record" if yah want to search in Spanish. Not sure if there's a connection. (Republic) Lagun was founded BY Basque folk, sourced FROM Basque country, mostly if not exclusively. Check their website or ring 'em up and ask if they have parts for Kondia.

ToS was always "nominally" Czech, the survivor is back to 100% Czech, and those folk know their metalworking as well as anyone on-planet. BREN gun was Czech. So was the "BREN Carrier". So are some right-decent hand power tools, globally branded, and most thngs branded Skoda, good VW local builds included (Octavia). IF I ever had any use for a 3-jaw chuck (not so far..), ToS Svitavy is value for money.

Earlier days more than one factory was in the ToS group, and some of the components came from Poland or Bulgaria, even East Germany. They got the job done well enough to be imported by GOOD distributors, not purveyors of cheap trash.

Go have a look.

Before someone else buys the best of the lot.

Lillian makes the milling machines for Kingston Machinery and I believe they also make them for Acer. The only difference between the two is the Acer comes with the Emil electronically variable speed head.

People generally say good things about the Acer mills.

I have a Kondia mill. So far parts for a Sharp mill have all fit fine.

metalmagpie