X3 mill with rails, ATC, new motor

[Jonathan]

Another slightly overlook aspect is the locking nut you use should be as good as you can get it. The squareness of the thread to the face is not great in some of the chinese nuts I have come across. In my case I also wanted to lock on the front face as opposed to on the thread. Too a while to find anyone in the UK what had them.

My plan there was to make them - not been a fan of any cheap ones I've bought and making my own at least means it's under my control. Or maybe buy these.

Today's big news is that I collected the newly ground milling table. They did it really quickly - dropped it off at about 9am on Monday and it as done by midday. Will post in more detail later - for now, here are some shiny pictures:



Note the size comparison with the old X3 table :)

[komatias]

Jonathan,

I used these: http://www.spieth-maschinenelemente....ts/series-msr/
Much better than I would have been able to make or get made.

Can't quite see in the photos of the table. It seems that the marks are circular? Did they use a Lumsden grinder? If so then do check the flatness and parallelism they quoted. It is nowhere near as good as surface grinding that I would have thought they would do for a machine table. But it may of course be good enough for what you want....reminds me that my machine could do with a regrind this year.

[Jonathan]

Thanks for the link to the locknuts.

Regarding the griding, yes it was done on a Lumsden grinder.

For the parallelism I've checked with a micrometer at several points roughly down the centerline of the rails on both sides. The range of the readings was 49um, but most were within 20um or so. I'll post the readings tonight. That is worse than one would expect for a commercial milling machine, but I think it is very reasonable for what I need (being realistic about other tolerances in the system) and certainly better than the mill I have. Also consider they only charged £50.

Flatness is harder to check - I've tried bluing a parallel and seeing how the blue transfers to the bed at places across the width and length. It seems fine, but the parallel is only about 200mm long. I do have a ~600mm long surface plate. No idea of it's history though so I'm not sure if there's much value in trying to check flatness with it?

Jonathan,

I used these: http://www.spieth-maschinenelemente....ts/series-msr/
Much better than I would have been able to make or get made.

Can't quite see in the photos of the table. It seems that the marks are circular? Did they use a Lumsden grinder? If so then do check the flatness and parallelism they quoted. It is nowhere near as good as surface grinding that I would have thought they would do for a machine table. But it may of course be good enough for what you want....reminds me that my machine could do with a regrind this year.