New machine day

Almost as good as Christmas and twice as good as a birthday unless they coincide. My Rong-Fu clone is a great machine to start with. Good work envelope, fairly well powered and often more ridgid than many other mini-mills for the same price. It's biggest downfall perhaps is its ability to retain spindle location on the round column when the head clamp is loosened in order to lower or raise the head. When doing concentric operations this can be a pain.

Knee-mills like Bridgeports and their clones are a premium if you can find one. Alternatives are likewise rare and overpriced. A machine came available on Trademe that had great potential as a second machine. Initially I had concerns about its likeness to a jig-borer which can handle light milling operations. However the differences were also obvious. Like a bigger version of a Myford VMB it has wide dovetails on the column and the ability to lock them. The spindle is considerably beefier with double row angular contact and ball bearings. The table is also beefier with far greater range of operation making this machine more like a mill.

While I'd like the advantage of tilting the head there are few operations that call for it where tilting the work is not sufficient. On the plus side my MT3 tooling is all ready to use. After a good clean and changing the motor out for a similar speed 2hp single phase its ready to use for quarter the price of more popular machines.