What accessories did you add to your PM Mill?

wnchstrtnfldvlle said:
My newest accessory I just purchased is a 6" Grizzly rotary table.

I am trying to establish myself as a gunsmith, and one of the things that I would like to get into is slide cuts for red dot sights. I was under the assumption that I would have to bite the bullet and purchase a CNC mill to handle a job like that. Then I found an internet forum post that outlined how they made it work with a manual mill and the rotary table. Which saved me about 20 thousand dollars, lol.

I've also invested in the factory installed DRO, and a X-axis power feed for my PM-25
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Not sure where you heard a CNC was needed, but a gunsmith friend of mine (he served a traditional apprenticeship) once told me that everything that a mill does, can be done by hand. It will take a lot longer, and requires a lot of skill, but guns have been around far longer than DRO's and CNC machines.
 
wnchstrtnfldvlle said:
I was under the assumption that I would have to bite the bullet and purchase a CNC mill to handle a job like that.
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CNC is great for production work where repetitive parts are made. If you are doing one-offs it's likely to be faster to do manually. Programing, then running a sample in cheap material before commiting to the real thing takes quite a lot of time. Might be OK if you can use the programs over & over.
 
No PM machine but I have an RF30 clone. I added a 3 axis DRO 19 years ago. I modified the x axis by cutting a notch to clear in the base to clear the left hand thrust bearing which bought me 4 additional inches of travel. I made a 5" extension for the crank but haven't used it recently as I have a cabinet on which the controller and keyboard for my Tormach mill sits immediately to the left of the RF30 clone.
 
Geswearf said:
Not sure where you heard a CNC was needed, but a gunsmith friend of mine (he served a traditional apprenticeship) once told me that everything that a mill does, can be done by hand. It will take a lot longer, and requires a lot of skill, but guns have been around far longer than DRO's and CNC machines.
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It's not that I heard it somewhere, just that I was assuming it would be needed for the radius cuts. Just my inexperience with machining, and the planning process.
 
litewings said:
Would you by chance have a link to that post?
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Sorry, it was a random Google search that led me to the post, which in turn led to YouTube where I found a random video showing how they did it. I don't remember any of them.
 
wnchstrtnfldvlle said:
It's not that I heard it somewhere, just that I was assuming it would be needed for the radius cuts. Just my inexperience with machining, and the planning process.
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All of the sights on my hand guns are dovetailed (maybe I should double check this, but for sure, the 1911's were - front and rear). What radius cuts are involved?
 
Geswearf said:
All of the sights on my hand guns are dovetailed (maybe I should double check this, but for sure, the 1911's were - front and rear). What radius cuts are involved?
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When you mill a slide for a red dot, one end of "slot" needs a radius
 
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