Richard, newbie to milling from Blainville, QC

[RickyD]

Ill take that bet! And counter with 3 months!
Welcome to the forum!
Enjoy your stay!

Quite possible... need to familiarize with the mill first

 

[RickyD]

Welcome. The forum demands pics of your mill. Also gonna give you six months before you get a lathe. Oh just one question, do you have a bandsaw? If so good to go. If not that’s likely your next need to have.

Thx djberta,
Got the revolution cut off saw, band saw on my list... the lathe... well at some point I guess !!
Pic of the new PDM30 mill attached below... I still need to degrease and oil it... need more time...
*Any tips for do's and don'ts with a brand new mill?

 

[CWret]

Any tips

Beautiful looking mill.
If you plan to move it occasionally then that rolling base looks like it is very capable but - as a “tip” - I’d prefer to find a spot and level the stand feet on the concrete floor. Bolting the stand to the floor or not bolting down has been debated. Some people would suggest putting it onto hockey pucks and others use vibration isolating feet. I (right or wrong?) put mine on 1/4” rubber pads and the snugged it down (bolted) to the concrete.
First “tip” - undo the 4 bolts holding the mill base to the stand. Those bolts can put an uneven pressure on the base and cause it to warp. Use a feeler gauge at each corner to determine which corner has a gap. You can also use a small pinch bar to apply the same upward pressure at each corner and help find the corner that needs a shim. (It is extremely unlikely that all corners are on the same plane.) Then tighten the 4 bolts gradually - 5 ft lb, then 10, then 25 and finally 35!ft lb.
There is a ton of other things to do - but getting it level is a good start.

PS 1: levelling (as described above) is more important for a larger mill and maybe overkill for a mid sized bench top mill like yours. My bench top mill is just a little bigger than yours & I put a lot of effort into levelling it.
PS 2: You can leave it on the rolling stand and still level all corners on the concrete. Then later moving it would be simple.
I built a HD rolling stand for my small lathe. When i finally figure out where it will be located, then l’ll level the rolling stand.

 

[Susquatch]

Pic of the new PDM30 mill attached below... I still need to degrease and oil it... need more time...

If you stop that silly business of keeping such a neat tidy organized shop like that, you will have oodles of free time!

Just kidding. Whatever floats your boat. About 1/4 of us are neat and tidy like that too. The rest are at various degrees of organized chaos. Feel free to post about yours here and enjoy the humour!

Thread 'Is your shop messy or spotless?' https://canadianhobbymetalworkers.com/threads/is-your-shop-messy-or-spotless.6305/

 

[RickyD]

Beautiful looking mill.
If you plan to move it occasionally then that rolling base looks like it is very capable but - as a “tip” - I’d prefer to find a spot and level the stand feet on the concrete floor. Bolting the stand to the floor or not bolting down has been debated. Some people would suggest putting it onto hockey pucks and others use vibration isolating feet. I (right or wrong?) put mine on 1/4” rubber pads and the snugged it down (bolted) to the concrete.
First “tip” - undo the 4 bolts holding the mill base to the stand. Those bolts can put an uneven pressure on the base and cause it to warp. Use a feeler gauge at each corner to determine which corner has a gap. You can also use a small pinch bar to apply the same upward pressure at each corner and help find the corner that needs a shim. (It is extremely unlikely that all corners are on the same plane.) Then tighten the 4 bolts gradually - 5 ft lb, then 10, then 25 and finally 35!ft lb.
There is a ton of other things to do - but getting it level is a good start.

PS 1: levelling (as described above) is more important for a larger mill and maybe overkill for a mid sized bench top mill like yours. My bench top mill is just a little bigger than yours & I put a lot of effort into levelling it.
PS 2: You can leave it on the rolling stand and still level all corners on the concrete. Then later moving it would be simple.
I built a HD rolling stand for my small lathe. When i finally figure out where it will be located, then l’ll level the rolling stand.

Thx for the tips... I will check the 4 bolts on the mill/stand and check if needed to get shimmed.
Levelling is definitely a priority !

 

[whydontu]

Mildly dissenting opinion. Levelling the stand is a bit irrelevant. The stand is folded 16 or 18 ga mild steel, it isn’t rigid enough not to flex.

And having the table level is nice but it’s not critical. It’s not like a lathe where the bed might twist.

Get the table as close to level as you feel like but don’t spend hours on it. Spend the time carefully checking tram and nod in the column to base connection.

 

[CWret]

it isn’t rigid enough not to flex

Agreed. But with a mild dissenting opinion. Sure it will flex. But it will flex and return back to where it was. I didn’t mention that the stand feet should be adjusted to have equal bearing on the floor. Levelling is not really the concern. After all - lathes and mills work perfectly well on a ship. The point is not to have the mill bolts distort the mill base.
IOM - The stand that it comes with is rigid enough to distort the mill base. What is needed is to align the top of the stand with the bottom of the mill base. Level is not the issue, alignment is the issue.

 

[CWret]

Further to previous post-
If the base of your mill has a twist (stressed induced) it can transfer into the table and make tramming the head difficult.

 

[jcdammeyer]

Welcome from Victoria.