CNC mill - WHY?

[irving2008]

OK, so I've decided to retire (e.g. flog) my Warco MD30/Minor round column mill and invest in a square-column CNC'd mill of a similar size - can't get anything bigger in the space I have. Budget available up to £1500 say or more if you'll take the MD30 in part-ex (I can hope!). Must be MT3 spindle as I have all the tooling for that.

The MD30 is fine, but I don't have the time, space or facilities to actually do the CNC conversion I originally planned to do and I want to get on with some project work.

So, WHY?

[rnr107]

Hi Irving,
Personally I would not go for an MT3 spindle on a CNC mill.
1- MT3 requiere a serious amount of hammering to get the tools off, It is OK on a manual mill but on a CNC you are puting pressure and potentially damage to the ballscrew of the Z axis.
2- CNC Mill with MT3 spindle are difficult to find due to (1-)
3- A CNC mill is so much nicer with an auto tool change... Can't do that with an MT3.
4- You will need change tool in the middle of some G-Code, you don't want to have to hammer the tool at that point, you will loose precision.

Go for R8 or easychange .

RNR

[irving2008]

All good points... I suppose I could flog some of it. Pity tho...

[rnr107]

All good points... I suppose I could flog some of it. Pity tho...

Well, If you really like your MT3 tooling, you can always choose a mill with an easychange spindle and by an EasyChange MT3 tool holder ?
(you loose a bit of Z travel tho...)

RNR

[irving2008]

Well, by the deafening silence it might be some time before I need to worry... lol