A HOME MADE MILLING MACHINE

摘要

This article describes the creation of a bench top milling machine out of a scrap pillar drill. An off the cuff remark from a colleague at work about clearing out his grandfather's shed led to the acquisition of a very old CVA capstan lathe and a belt driven pillar drill. The lathe had the potential to form a solid bed for milling on, giving a respectable 370mm by 250mm of X and Y travel. The pillar drill looked to be sturdy enough to handle at least light cuts with the provision for vertical height adjustment. All that was required was to mount one on top of the other and add a few essentials such as leadscrews and handwheels! The reality turned out to be a fairly major build spanning 2 1/2 years, which provided many learning opportunities along the way. The end result is a machine, which does cut metal and is useable but as with all things there's always room for improvement. I'm sure these will form the basis of future projects but first I want to use it to learn about milling!