Re: [CAD_CAM_EDM_DRO] To the moderator

whitey wrote:

> Jon thank you.Jon first I am a gun and car nut so any parts I would make would be fairly small. I just thought it would be nice to be able to duplicate a part when needed for myself. (not for money) I started to look for a tracer mill.

Hydraulic tracer mills are a nightmare I wouldn't wish on an enemy.
There were some electronic tracers, but they were quite rare.
Anyway, a 3-axis CNC is a lot more flexible than a tracer, and anyway,
with CNC, you can always tweak the dimensions a little to get the part
to come out exactly right, much easier than sahving a hair off your
tracer pattern.

> Then my old interest in cnc came back. And from what I had been seeing on the net etc.About conversational cnc etc.as That would make it simpler (I think) and if not too expensive it would be fun to learn.
>

I'm not sure any of the hobby-level CNC programs are "conversational",
although EMC2 and Mach have some of these features.
I have a bunch of little programs that write the G-code I need for a
number of the most common operations, and I use that for most of my work.

> The Gorton mill.Had been sitting for many,many years In a shop that the owner had bought it new.And it was used very little as I guess as it was used the holes in the paper got stretched and would lose it's accuracy.So it just set gathering grim. I got it at his auction years ago when he went out of business.I threw away all the old stuff (and the mice)smile and used it as a manual mill (it is still like new) I did leave all the motor mounts etc and still have all the belt pulleys etc.
> Jon I would not mind getting one of those new super X-3's if necessary as the work envelope would be plenty big enough for me.

But, the stiffness and power might be way too low for gun and car parts
from hard materials. Really, it likely will cost less to convert a
larger machine than to buy a small machine and convert it properly. If
you already have a working machine with ballscrews, I think it is a
prime candidate!

I have a fairly decent Bridgeport, and I couldn't imagine making all
sorts of stuff I do on a smaller machine.

Jon