Anyone built a vertical mill for horizontal miller?

[Reuben]

Has anyone built a vertical milling head to mount on a horizontal miller? I have an old Sheldon horizontal milling machine and wanted to get a dual use from this machine so i won't have to eat up floor space to get a separate machine.
i was wondering if anyone has done this and if there are plans to build one.

[Bob-O]

Never built one, but I have seen small Bridgeport heads on horizontals. I put a Milwaukee Mini-Matic (?) head on a Hardinge TM mill I had several years ago. It was self-contained like a Bridgeport J head, but smaller.
Bob

[This message has been edited by Bob-O (edited 01-25-2005).]

[mrchurchill]

Matter of fact, if you look down a few posts you'll see I was asking about just such a machine - a conversion done to a Brown and Sharpe horizontal mill that I was considering purchasing.

If you can locate an M-head or the like the conversion itself seems like it is very simple to do - mount the M-head to the outbord arbor support arm. You'll lose the ability to run arbors with horizontal cutters w/o removing the conversion but I guess it depends on what you need most, eh?

Time to shop Ebay? 8*) -ajr

ajr

[jcurrell]

You may also cosider a good vertical vise to do the same thing.

------------------

[CharlesM]

I have a Kearney & Trecker #2CE Horzontal mill that came with a small vertical head as an option. It was only 1/3 HP with #2MT spindle. Not enough HP to do any serious milling. I took it off, built a mounting adapter and installed a Lagun 3 HP vertical head on it. The only problem was it was a real pain to change back and forth. I recently acquired a Lagun FTV-1 and took the Lagun head off of the K & T

[J Tiers]

I have a vertical head for my smaller H-mill. It IS a pain to swap, and I usually would rather just put the work on an angle plate, using the end mill in the spindle.

The other thing is that often the V-head is a bit wiggly, and not secure against being shoved out of tram by cutting forces, and "kicks" when entering or leaving the work. The adaptation is often not nearly as secure as a "real" V-mill, and even a "real" V-mill of ram type is susceptible to that to some degree. Using the cutter in the H-spindle it is really solid.

Plans? Your machine probably has no plans for a special head. And you'll probably never find a Sheldon head, if there was one. But you can either put on a Bridgeport head, adapt plans such as the "Marvin" head (for small atlas) to yours, or excercise your imagination.

[suomi]

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v507/mhill/2004_1111mikesjunk0002.jpg
heres the adapter I made for my vernon mill which is a real close relitive to your sheldon
Mike

[Too_Many_Tools]

Any chance we could get closeups on that Vernon vertical adapter?

Looks to be an interesting adapter.

Thanks

TMT

[Michael Az]

I have a Cincinnati #2 horizontal and was going to put a jhead on it. I bought the jhead but think I have changed my mind about doing it. Got arthritis pretty bad and hate to think about the work involved, and the jhead is pretty small.
Michael

[suomi]

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v507/mhill/2004_1111mikesjunk0003.jpg
heres anouther shot of the adapter. I went and tried to take a couple more but the computer isn't responding to the camara. Basically the rectangular block has a hole bored through it with a 2 inch round welded in it that slips in the overarm support location. then there is a half round bolted to it creating the area where the bridgport adapter bolts to. The adapter came with the cherrying head and was intended for the rear ram location on a bridgport, all I did was rotated it vertically instead of horizontally.
in the picture you can see a bolt which keeps the head from rotating upward while under a load. if anyone needs dimensions I would be happy to take some mesurements.
The clearance under the spindle is in the neigborhood of 10 inches.
thanks Mike

[J Tiers]

Nice....

How do you keep it in tram around the overarm center? Is there some sort of "prop", or is it by the overarm clamp only?

Mine is by the overarm clamp, and it has a significant mechanical advantage versus that. It has been known to slip. I need to dope out a better system.

[Reuben]

Thanks for the replies everyone!
I was inspired by one of the projects in metal articles of Terry Sexton building his own v-mill head for his own h-mill. Reading the few issues i had- i wondered if there was any articles that followed of plans to build one.
Looking at ebay the prices are out there though it may be the way to go if i can find one. Where i live -shipping is the downside for me.
Vertical vise is a good suggestion.
Nice adapter on that vernon mill Mike!

a few questions after reading.
i was wondering what's the differences between a j & m head?

[reggie_obe]

You could post your question on the Yahoo Sheldon lathe group. There is a member (John, a.k.a. kx) who was a Sheldon employee. He has a wealth of first hand Sheldon technical information. He is very knowledgeable and would be happy to help you out.

[hoffman]

I've seen some Rusnok head retrofits. May be cheaper than Bridgeport but I have no idea where to get a Rusnok head. I only mention it because it may be cheaper than an old Bridgeport head.

------------------
Hoffman in Warner Robins Ga

[JCHannum]

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by hoffman:
I've seen some Rusnok head retrofits. May be cheaper than Bridgeport but I have no idea where to get a Rusnok head. I only mention it because it may be cheaper than an old Bridgeport head.

</font>

Buy one from Rusnok; http://www.lathes.co.uk/rusnok/index.html

They are still being made. Not cheap, but also a nice little milling machine.