Mill sizing , DRO, thoughts?

[Beagle]

I was looking at a thread I won't mention that involved silly putty and a hammer and it occurred to me that I really think I want a mill. That way I can screw up even larger pieces of metal. Squirrel commented the same about when does the mill and lathe arrive and it made me think yeah, I'm about ready for one.

How big of a mill does it take to do block operations? Boring, decking, that sort of crap. Will a 9x48 be big enough? I'm thinking I want one long enough to deck an inline six cylinder or reach inside a big block for main cap mods. What kind of dimensions do I need to be thinking about ?

The three phase has me worried a little, I think I can get it but I don't know what commercial electric costs. I've seen converter stuff in the past where you use a motor to generate 3 phase, I'm not exactly sure how that works but I think I get it.

Any suggestions? It looks like if I maybe sell a couple of pieces of crap I could buy a Bridgeport and then go broke on the tooling. ?

thinking more about it - are there any highly recommended texts that I should be looking at first?

[squirrel]

A typical Bridgeport type mill is not what you want for block and head decking operations, they make machines just for that, and automotive machine shops have them. It's worth paying a shop with the right equipment to do that. But for making holes and little parts and stuff, and especially making round stuff, you can do a lot with a mill and lathe. I'd get a lathe first, because it has more applications.

The size of your shop might have something to do with the size of equipment you get. Big stuff is hard to fit and hard to move, and then you get to deal with the 3 phase thing (which has gotten easier lately with VFDs).

9" x 24" workpiece size for a lathe is about the minimum.

I have a small knee mill, the table is 8 x 28 I think, it is a bit small but I can do some stuff with it. I really haven't done much care related with it, mostly robot stuff.

[anotheridiot]

they have some combo mills out there, a little different to use as a vertical, but horizontal gives you more room. Still arent gonna get much more than a 9-12 inch high workpiece in them, so decking heads yeah, but entire blocks, no. Most of the table sizes pretty much tell you the size of the part you can do. Once you put a tool in the collet, the distance to the table is not gonna carry a block.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/DECKEL-FP1-UNIVERSAL-MILLING-MACHINE-/140905504289?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item20ce9f5e21

[DanStokes]

Some of my Michigan friends have bought used Bridgeports and love 'em. They're pretty stout but it can cost a lot to get looseness taken out of the table ways so you'll want to check that the table is solid when you go look at one.

But you hit the nail on the head - tooling can cost you your first-born son +. My one buddy got the machine and a TON of tooling from (IIRC) a widow and paid almost twice as much for the deal. Turns out he got the bargain. He got centering rigs, a rotary table, and on and on.

Maybe Nick has some ideas here, too. I'm guessing a cylinder head guy would have gotten his feet wet in this pool.

Dan

[TheSilverBuick]

I was looking at a thread I won't mention that involved silly putty and a hammer

BTW, it was a really small hammer.

[BOSSMAN]

10x54 is what you need, you can get away with a little smaller but that size will take on most. The big thing with mills for machine work on heads/blocks is make sure it has Class 5 spindle bearings, box ways, and the Meehite Casting (Taiwan I believe). I've had my eyes on a new ACRA 10x54 with 3 axis DRO and power feeds. About $12k -$15k.....

[Loren]

Knee mills, which is what I'd imagine you're looking for for g.p., are not the best for block work for a bunch of reasons starting with by the time you have your block indexed and fastened down, your cutting forces are a long long way from the table slides and you're not likely to get precision work unless the machine is a monster and in great condition. The proper machine that an automotive machine shop would have has the strength in the proper places but then not much good for anything else...like with any tool, it's hard to get one thing that does everything well. The little block work I've done on my own Bridgeport was things like doing modifications around the lifter area...boring or decking goes to the guys with the special machines for that, who also already know how to set up so that the dimensions come out right.

In any event, start small and shop smart until you know what you're doing, is my advice. A used knee mill with a box of tooling can be had for $1,000-5,000, sometimes with a DRO thrown in.

[TC]

The 3 phase is nothing to worry about they make converters that transform single phase into 3 phase.....

[TC]

This is the mill that my friend Rick uses at Blue Oval Performance, it does all the stuff your talking about, boring, milling, align boring, valve jobs, etc...... And by the way this is pretty much the top of the line for building race car engines.... In the words of my friend Rich, "if they don't have a mill like this don't take your engine to them"....... Make the investment, when people find out you have a mill like this and you know how to use it, they will come to you by word of mouth alone.....

[BOSSMAN]

Knee mills, which is what I'd imagine you're looking for for g.p., are not the best for block work for a bunch of reasons starting with by the time you have your block indexed and fastened down, your cutting forces are a long long way from the table slides and you're not likely to get precision work unless the machine is a monster and in great condition. The proper machine that an automotive machine shop would have has the strength in the proper places but then not much good for anything else...like with any tool, it's hard to get one thing that does everything well. The little block work I've done on my own Bridgeport was things like doing modifications around the lifter area...boring or decking goes to the guys with the special machines for that, who also already know how to set up so that the dimensions come out right.

In any event, start small and shop smart until you know what you're doing, is my advice. A used knee mill with a box of tooling can be had for $1,000-5,000, sometimes with a DRO thrown in.

With a BHJ Block Tru you can deck blocks, boring can also be done off of this same fixture (seen it done using the 2" bar through the mains to fasten on a roll over fixture on the table), not to mention lifter bore bushings using the BHJ lifter Tru. CP Motorworks makes a fixture to mill heads, manifolds, and a means to mount a head for valve jobs. All of these operations are done on a vertical mill and the main reasons why I'm buying a new one!

[squirrel]

When I worked at the automotive machine shop, we had a big mill for head and block work, I forget the brand...it was a good machine. We had that fixture to square block decks to the cam/crank bore centerlines. Chevy 350 blocks were all out by a mile, Fords were pretty good from the factory.

[Beagle]

BTW, it was a really small hammer.

That was from a small hammer? You are a very determined young man if that was from a really small hammer... I've done similar stuff and it makes me want more tools. I'm just givin ya grief but I did want to offer this for your thread:

http://www.diyporting.com/Sleeves.html


This is brass tubing that you can buy from any hobby shop,
and some hardware stores now carry it. The 4 sizes shown
here are 9/16", 19/32", 5/8" and 21/32". You can see that
it all fits within each other very snug and is great for
building custom bushings, spacers and bearings. But I digress.
It works well for sleeving your push rod holes too. It comes
in 12" lengths and will cost you a couple bucks per at this size.

[Beagle]

10x54 is what you need, you can get away with a little smaller but that size will take on most. The big thing with mills for machine work on heads/blocks is make sure it has Class 5 spindle bearings, box ways, and the Meehite Casting (Taiwan I believe). I've had my eyes on a new ACRA 10x54 with 3 axis DRO and power feeds. About $12k -$15k.....

looks like the smallest they sell in a CNC is a 12x54 and boy would I need to go to school... maybe that is the best thing for me to consider. It'd blow to spend a new car worth of money and find out I am unrecoverably sucky at it!

[TheSilverBuick]

12oz ball peen, the smallest hammer I own. There'd be no threads left if I used something bigger

[MR P-BODY]

This is my mill in my home shop, I have a 52" lathe also
but this mill is not designed to do a car block(V-8) I have
done VW work on it for my brother and in this pic is a motor
cycle engine.... its a 1/2 hp 3 phase but I have a phase converter
(electronic type)... I've done a ton of work on this machine but
I take my engine blocks to the auto places to have them bored
and decked
I bought this and the lathe at a auction for a decent price... in
Mi a few years back alot of places were going out of business
and had auctions