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This video provides complete instructions for building a milling machine.
Jose says: 'In this nearly 12 hour long video marathon, you will witness the seemingly impossible! Observe the author as he builds a fully operating and capable 80 pound variable speed milling machine with existing TAIG Micro lathe components and readily available stock aluminum material. A commercial heavy duty X & Y milling table is utilized to complete the project. This is definitively not a 'TOY' but a complete milling center that will outperform just about anything in its class. For a total expenditure of less than $300. You too could have a tool that will perform better than milling machines costing more than twice as much. This video will take you through every step from its initial conception and planning to and beyond its very successful conclusion in painstaking detail so that you too will be able to easily duplicate this achievement! As an extra bonus, you will be treated to a fully narrative and visual step by step presentation on the building of a 60:1 geared dividing head that with the addition of a simple shop made indexing accessory will allow it to divide anything into as many as 21,600 equal divisions and for that matter, any other number divisible into that. You will also learn how to easily cut perfectly fitting dovetailed sliding joints with the simplest of equipment. These two items alone would be worth the price of this video set. See how to produce a professional quality engraved dial with nothing more than a small lathe ( TAIG ). You will see each component being worked, fitted and assembled as the unit is magically transformed more and more into a 'REAL' milling machine. The final two hours or so will be devoted to a full battery of milling operations performed on real components that make up part of the geared dividing head including other milling goodies. During the filming of the final milling tests, cuts were routinely taken on 6061-T6 alloy to depths of over 90 thou with a common imported 1/4'' diameter four flute end mill. We do not recommend that you routinely cut to those depths but it sure is nice to be able to so when needed.
This a definite 'MUST' for anyone who has grown tired of using alternative milling methods but either is not ready to invest the big bucks for a commercially available bench top milling machine or simply not satisfied with what's presently available out there.
(about 540 minutes)
This video was added to our catalog on October 04, 2004 in Metalworking::Milling.
Product availability: available now, ships immediately!
Well I've been a fan of Jose's videos, all except this one. The videos good, the content is good, so what's my beef? Well it's just to darn long, 12 hours to be exact. Also you're not going to learn to build a milling maching from watching this video. It's a good video "diary" of one mans project and would probably give you some good ideas if you wanted to design and build your own lathe so if you're coming at it from that perspective then by all means I'd rent it. But if you're hoping to learn step by step how to build this milling machine I'd probably not rent it. As always it's classic Jose doing a good job of showing you what an average guy with an average bankroll can do in his basement, and that's one feature I've always appreciated of Jose's videos.
This video series is very long. Jose is a very good teacher but too much time is spend watching him make pass after pass milling parts on his machine. I also question the $300 cost as he got some rather favorable deals from manufacturers. Not everyone will get these kind of deals.
Watching Jose perform his operations gives me confidence that I can also build things on my new mill.
My recommendation to Jose. Increase video resolution and decrease repetition of operations to speed up getting on with the video. It gets boring to wait so loing for an operation to complete. There is no need to drive the tack in with a sludge hammer.
R
An interesting and useful guide on milling with limited tool power. I'm used to a Bridgeport type machine. The video gives lots of ideas and hints. The series also helped me with my new 7X12.
I think Jose is a very good teacher. I have a 3 in 1 machine and both the Lathe work and the machining were loaded with tips. if you combined all of the "Actual" mill building scenes (which are scattered throughout the 12 hours) you would get maybe an hour and a half. On a side note: he spends almost an hour making something on a Lathe that doesn't even have anything to do with the Mill. The portion on the deviding head was very informative, but still it had nothing to do with the making of a Mill.
Excellent, well recommended view. If you want to learn a few methods and tricks, this is the videos you want to see. I also enjoyed the gear making worm driven indexer project outlined in the video
A long and rambling video, but for a newcomer to metal working, there was a lot there to learn about. What the actual time spent 'building a mill' was somewhat brief (maybe an hour of the four hours), I found much of what remained to be pretty worthwhile. The set should probably be renamed to 'Build a Mill, and a bunch of other things.'
