For context here, I'm also a hobbyist though I've been at it for three
decades. I've never been a professional machinist.
Small machines like this can mill steel just fine if you take small
enough bites per pass. Rigidity is far more important than
horsepower in a small mill. The motor on my Bridgeport J-head is
only 1 HP.
Rigidity does seem to go with weight. If you want light weight then
you must expect less rigidity. In hobby work, that's only a time
limitation. It doesn't take a lot of rigidity or horsepower to skin a
few thou off of steel or even 303 stainless witha sharp endmill. It
just takes patience.
Sharp well-ground endmills can make a big difference. They cost
about double the price of cheap imports and work at least twice as
well. That could make the difference between satisfaction and
frustration with a small mill working with steel.
Since price is not a strong limiting factor for you, I'd say go for a
small machine. It may well do what you want to do just fine. If
it doesn't, or if what you want to do gets more ambitious, you'll
learn from it what you might like down the road.
When we're done buying tools we're ready for burial, right?
My newest toy is a Miller 210 MIG machine. Ernie advised me that it
is an excellent machine, nuff said. I thought I knew how to weld
but I now see that I have ample opportunity for growth ... I'm making
strong sound welds with it, still pursuiing beauty. I'm already
sure I'm gonna like that hoss a lot when I learn to ride it well.
On Wed, 11 Aug 2004 19:35:43 -0400, "BP" wrote:
Would like to buy a small hobby mill. Think grizzly might be good as to
parts availability. Price is not a limiting factor to some degree. What
does limit me is size and weight as I want to put it in my basement which is
not too large and I really don't want to move excessive weight. I am a
complete beginner so I was looking at the grizzly models G8689 and G0517 at
http://www.grizzly.com/products/item...010&sort=price .
These both seem to be manageable from size/weight perspective. I notice the
smaller one supposedly has more Horsepower. Any suggestions or other
options? Would these be powerful enough to actually mill steel? Any other
suggestions.
Thanks
Barry