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  1. #1
    BDH's Avatar
    Lives in Mansfield, United Kingdom. Last Activity: 30-05-2021 Has been a member for 3-4 years. Has a total post count of 26. Received thanks 3 times, giving thanks to others 22 times.
    This is a bit of a basic question for which I will apologise for in advance!
    What Denford mills are available as second user machines and what are the advantages and disadvantages of any particular model?
    Brian

  2. #2
    m_c's Avatar
    Lives in East Lothian, United Kingdom. Last Activity: 3 Days Ago Forum Superstar, has done so much to help others, they deserve a medal. Has been a member for 9-10 years. Has a total post count of 2,908. Received thanks 360 times, giving thanks to others 8 times.
    It all comes down to size.

    In terms of their dedicated milling machines.
    Starmill is the smallest.
    Novamill is the next size up, although I don't think there is much difference in terms of spindle size/bed motors than the Starmill.

    Triac is the largest of the commonly available models, and came in various configurations over the years, from basic stepper driven models, to industrial servo versions.
    The VMC is very similar in terms of size to the Triac, and is essentially just a Triac replacement.

    There was also a bigger industrial style machine which I've forgotten the name off.

    They've also done some smaller combination machines, and routers.


    Best option is to go and look through the various brochures on the denford forums.
    Avoiding the rubbish customer service from AluminiumWarehouse since July '13.

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  4. #3
    Quote Originally Posted by m_c View Post

    There was also a bigger industrial style machine which I've forgotten the name off.
    .
    Zero centre

  5. #4
    Quote Originally Posted by BDH View Post
    This is a bit of a basic question for which I will apologise for in advance!
    What Denford mills are available as second user machines and what are the advantages and disadvantages of any particular model?
    Brian
    If you are interested I have a very clean Denford Starmill complete with machine cabinet and the original control electronics box
    It has been converted to Mach3 and will include the mach3 config files
    It can include a PC and monitor at extra cost

    It is an R8 spindle, and there are a very cheap chinese R8 tool holders on ebay, I have used R25 collects and found them to be perfect
    The machine is set up with tool probing which makes for easy work setup.

    It will equally run on Linuxcnc, which to be honest is what I have desided to standadise on.
    I've used it to machine dural, brass and steel with no problems at all. Its a small but well build and strong machine
    I don't think the machine as done much, spent 20 years in a school and don't think they had a clue how to use it so it was an orniment in the schools 'resistant materials workshop'

    PM me if you want more details, I'm in Lancashire nr Blackpool
    The machine is roughly a 740mm cube and will transport in a van or estate car or even a large hatch back. Its heavy though so needs a 3 or 4 strong men to lift it


    Cheers,
    Paul

  6. #5
    Quote Originally Posted by depronman View Post
    The machine is roughly a 740mm cube and will transport in a van or estate car or even a large hatch back. Its heavy though so needs a 3 or 4 strong men to lift it


    Cheers,
    Paul
    The Starmill will actually fit in the back of a 2008 Fiesta Style - been there done that.

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  8. #6
    BDH's Avatar
    Lives in Mansfield, United Kingdom. Last Activity: 30-05-2021 Has been a member for 3-4 years. Has a total post count of 26. Received thanks 3 times, giving thanks to others 22 times.
    Many thanks for the offer Paul. Unfortunately, I don't know enough about ANY machine at the moment, to be able to work out what I want.
    Brian

  9. #7
    hi Just a quick question I am getting a starmill that has mach 3 on it , could you advise what tool probe do you use and how did you set this up with the machince. Mine has the original controller board and can see a spare connection for the tool probe, next to the xyz datums ?

    Thanks

  10. #8
    I made my own
    Basically a 6mm ball bearing silver soldered on to a piece of silver steel about 2” long
    The other end is threaded m4
    It screws into a piece of brass bar and the brass bar is bonded into a Tufnell sleeve (to electrically insulate it from the machine)
    I then machined up a ‘tool holder’ with a slightly tapered bore and three adjusting screws at 120deg spacing
    The Tufnell sleeve is a tight fit in the top end (small end) of the tapered bore the opposite end of the tapper is a piss fit in the Tufnell sleeve thus allowing the three adjustment screws to be used to centre up the ball of the probe
    On first use a dti is used to clock up the ball using the three screws similar to clocking up a part in a 4 jaw Chuck
    Thereafter unless the probe is knocked it runs true after repeated tool changes

    In use a crock clip is used to add power to the probe and when it touches the work it completes the circuit and trigger the controller
    Obviously only works on metal work
    On none conductive work then sticky aluminium tape is used connected to the machine with a crock clip

    The accuracy as proven very good I clamped a 30mm bore bearing on the bed and probed the bore adjusting the ball dia in the probe settings until the bore was measured as 30mm dia
    The ball is physically 6mm dia, in the software it is recorded as 0.05 different to 6mm

    It will repeat the 30mm bore measurement within +/- 0.01 over 20 tries which more than good enough for my use
    It will also probe in Z
    I have a tool height probe which is insulated from the machine so I need a opposite polarity crock clip for probe to tool height setting block
    I use the probe as my reference tool
    Then set up all other tools height as a delta to the probe and load these into the tool table using g43 on tool change to load the tool heigh delta
    This has proven very effective so far and saves having to touch off the tool every tool change but does need a number of R8 tool holders with the commonly used cutters pre loaded

    I must admit the boxford vmc190 that I now have is much easier on Tool changes as it as a manual drawbar and tool holders with pull studs - nice

    Cheers. Paul

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  12. #9
    Brian, perhaps useful to explain what your use-case for a machine is - what you're cutting, and size, and whether you're in a production environment or hobbyist.

  13. #10
    BDH's Avatar
    Lives in Mansfield, United Kingdom. Last Activity: 30-05-2021 Has been a member for 3-4 years. Has a total post count of 26. Received thanks 3 times, giving thanks to others 22 times.
    Thanks for your reply Doddy. Any machine I buy would be for hobby use in brass, steel and occasionally, aluminium. The largest envelope (if that is the right word) that I can see at the moment is 9"in X 9"in X 3"in and that is an aluminium job that would be difficult on my present manual machines.
    I am learning to use Fusion 360 for modelling and have just started to have a look at the CAM features.
    I have no background in cnc work having been a Quality Engineer/Quality Manager in the aerospace industry for most of my working life.
    Brian

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