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Another "Thinking about acquiring a mill" thread
- Thread starter justindavidow
- Start date
justindavidow
(Justin)
So; my mill arrived on Thursday last week (Jan 20 2022)!
I was NOT expecting to have the mill in my possession this early in the year, let alone setup and hours away from being ready to make parts! When I initially emailed Precision Matthews to get the shipping quote; they mentioned that they were expecting stock to arrive "late January" and then expected (guessed) that shipping would end up taking a few weeks to arrange + execute. Given how quickly everything happened, I'm actually a little stumped on when I'm actually going to get a chance to USE the mill as I'll be busy with work for the next 6-9 weeks.
After my PM-30MV shipped, the various freight companies along the way ran into the snowstorm in Ontario in early January, then a back-logged CBSA took 6 days to actually release the shipment. All said and done it left the Precision Matthews warehouse on Wed, Jan 12 2022 and was put into the back of my truck in the afternoon on Jan 20'th.
I picked the crate up at the freight terminal, the staff were super helpful and loaded the mill into the back of my truck with a forklift. Very impressed with the overall process. Everyone was very professional, accommodating and wonderfully helpful to answer any questions I had.
I had to strip the mill down to components to move it into my basement, there was no hope in moving the mill in one piece without hiring a rigger so I took the afternoon off of work Thursday and had arranged with a friend to borrow his garage. Given the -25 weather in Winnipeg on Thursday; this as a nightmare. Everything was frozen and given the mass had nearly zero chance to warm up in the short time I was indoors. I was worried that the DRO LCD may have frozen in transport; but appears to have sustained no damage at all.
I didn't have much trouble taking the mill apart; it hurt to pull the pre-installed DRO kit off the mill but I wasn't interested in risking breaking anything while moving the components. The air-spring in the column was fairly exciting to remove, it's got a lot of stored energy. Knowing that it was there; I raised the column as far as it would go, but there was still ~3-4 inches of spring-back. I didn't bother keeping track of the fasteners as I went, it seemed very obvious where everything was supposed to go so as I removed parts they went into the included toolbox or some plastic storage tubs to ensure they stayed together.
I got everything unloaded and into the house; each component was fairly easy to manage alone by hand; but my partner offered to help and my back thanks her deeply.
I ended up busy with work on Friday, so the assemblies sat and warmed up in my basement for the day. My basement is fairly dry right now (thanks Canadian winter!) and there was very little sweating or condensation. I left the components up on absorbent shop towels and all were dry except the base casting. (which had maybe 1-2 tablespoons of water in the shop towels.)
Saturday and today I got the mill into it's location, machine has built back up, I did the electrical work, scrubbed the protective grease and table protection film off, then went through reinstalling and aligning the DRO. The mill has made a handful of test cuts and I need to get through tramming. I opted to get one of the PM-30MV's with the factory installed DRO, I was going to after-market one but ended up deciding last minute that I simply wasn't going to have time to get to sorting a kit out myself for a few months. I'm glad I did end up going this route, as it makes the machine significantly quicker to use right away (for me!)
I weighed most of the components as I went; I've got to go back and detail my measurements and come up with some way to present that data. (I'll start a new post on this when I have time!) I think I missed weighing the saddle itself (though I think I can infer it's weight from some of the assemblies.. Next time I have it apart I'll try to get a better measurement of everything again!)
So far; VERY happy with the whole process and excited to get the machine working on projects in the coming weeks!
Now; the "horror" of needing tooling.
I was NOT expecting to have the mill in my possession this early in the year, let alone setup and hours away from being ready to make parts! When I initially emailed Precision Matthews to get the shipping quote; they mentioned that they were expecting stock to arrive "late January" and then expected (guessed) that shipping would end up taking a few weeks to arrange + execute. Given how quickly everything happened, I'm actually a little stumped on when I'm actually going to get a chance to USE the mill as I'll be busy with work for the next 6-9 weeks.
After my PM-30MV shipped, the various freight companies along the way ran into the snowstorm in Ontario in early January, then a back-logged CBSA took 6 days to actually release the shipment. All said and done it left the Precision Matthews warehouse on Wed, Jan 12 2022 and was put into the back of my truck in the afternoon on Jan 20'th.
I picked the crate up at the freight terminal, the staff were super helpful and loaded the mill into the back of my truck with a forklift. Very impressed with the overall process. Everyone was very professional, accommodating and wonderfully helpful to answer any questions I had.
I had to strip the mill down to components to move it into my basement, there was no hope in moving the mill in one piece without hiring a rigger so I took the afternoon off of work Thursday and had arranged with a friend to borrow his garage. Given the -25 weather in Winnipeg on Thursday; this as a nightmare. Everything was frozen and given the mass had nearly zero chance to warm up in the short time I was indoors. I was worried that the DRO LCD may have frozen in transport; but appears to have sustained no damage at all.
I didn't have much trouble taking the mill apart; it hurt to pull the pre-installed DRO kit off the mill but I wasn't interested in risking breaking anything while moving the components. The air-spring in the column was fairly exciting to remove, it's got a lot of stored energy. Knowing that it was there; I raised the column as far as it would go, but there was still ~3-4 inches of spring-back. I didn't bother keeping track of the fasteners as I went, it seemed very obvious where everything was supposed to go so as I removed parts they went into the included toolbox or some plastic storage tubs to ensure they stayed together.
I got everything unloaded and into the house; each component was fairly easy to manage alone by hand; but my partner offered to help and my back thanks her deeply.
I ended up busy with work on Friday, so the assemblies sat and warmed up in my basement for the day. My basement is fairly dry right now (thanks Canadian winter!) and there was very little sweating or condensation. I left the components up on absorbent shop towels and all were dry except the base casting. (which had maybe 1-2 tablespoons of water in the shop towels.)
Saturday and today I got the mill into it's location, machine has built back up, I did the electrical work, scrubbed the protective grease and table protection film off, then went through reinstalling and aligning the DRO. The mill has made a handful of test cuts and I need to get through tramming. I opted to get one of the PM-30MV's with the factory installed DRO, I was going to after-market one but ended up deciding last minute that I simply wasn't going to have time to get to sorting a kit out myself for a few months. I'm glad I did end up going this route, as it makes the machine significantly quicker to use right away (for me!)
I weighed most of the components as I went; I've got to go back and detail my measurements and come up with some way to present that data. (I'll start a new post on this when I have time!) I think I missed weighing the saddle itself (though I think I can infer it's weight from some of the assemblies.. Next time I have it apart I'll try to get a better measurement of everything again!)
So far; VERY happy with the whole process and excited to get the machine working on projects in the coming weeks!
Now; the "horror" of needing tooling.
Congratulations!!! I will be going though a similar process hopefully within the next 4 weeks. Considering the XC600 with a belt conversion, but the PM PM-25 might be a better option when its all said and done.
Further, I will also have to disassemble the machine to bring it down to my basement, I would be interested in seeing your numbers on the weights of each of the major "chunks".
Thanks again,
Steve
Further, I will also have to disassemble the machine to bring it down to my basement, I would be interested in seeing your numbers on the weights of each of the major "chunks".
Thanks again,
Steve
Unless you already know what you want, my advice is to buy only the obvious - a vise, a collet or two or a set, a few endmills (just 1/4 & 1/2 - or 6mm and 12mm both in hss and carbide), and then get what you find you need as your usage grows. Otherwise you end up buying a ton of stuff you will never use or is the wrong size. I know it's hard to resist, but that's my advice just the same.
