Mill design

[Evan]

I'm finalizing certain parts of the mill design so I can draw up a cutting schedule for the rod ways. I am constrained by the size of certain parts and available materials. I have a choice however on how I build the X axis. The easy way gives me ten inches of X travel. The hard way which is also a bit less elegant gives me 11.5" of X travel. How much do you think an extra 1.5" of travel is worth?

[JCHannum]

You can never have too much travel, especially in the X axis.

[wierdscience]

If I had a mill with a 60' table it would still come up short by at least 1-1/2"

Coarse its kinda like asking "gee would a 10" tool be better than a 11.5" tool? On second thought just build the 10" and buy some of that cream

[This message has been edited by wierdscience (edited 07-15-2004).]

[darryl]

Ha ha. Anyway, whatever travel you get will not be enough, so I'd be inclined to do it the most rigid way (npi) if there is that option.

[Bruce Griffing]

In addition to a larger mill, I have a minimill. It has a 9" travel in x. I use it a lot - maybe half of what I do. So for lots of things I do it is great. But the reason I bought a larger mill was the other half. So I would make the travel as large as possible if it were me.

[Evan]

I figured that's what you guys would say. The rigidity is essentially the same either way. The hard part of doing it the hard way will be the need for making four holes 1 5/16" dia accurately placed in 3/4" stock. I have to be extremely careful not to wreck parts in this project as some of the material I have is just enough to make what I need. One screwup could result in long expensive delays.

[CCWKen]

You're obviously not one of our military contractors or road work crew.

[Allan Waterfall]

Weird,

Where can I get some of that cream ?
Does it work the same on both axis ?

Allan

[John Stevenson]

Boots the Chemist.

The trade name is Brute Force and Ignorance.
Garanteed to stretch anything.

[ Doesn't even have to be green }

John S.

[This message has been edited by John Stevenson (edited 07-16-2004).]

[wierdscience]

Allan,tube says something about erection,so it must be for the z axis only