I'm getting ready to buy a Taig cnc mill and am at the top end of my budget, nit-picking the last couple of add-ons. My last decision is whether to get one of the drill chucks or the boring bar head, but I'm missing information in the decision making process.
First, my understanding is that the reason to use a drill chuck on a mill is that drilling with a drill bit is faster than endmill or boring bar. It's not as accurate, but the hole is drilled undersize and then finished with a reamer. But is the taig mill strong enough to use anything larger than a little pcb drill in steel or aluminum?
And where does the boring bar become advantageous? Is it back to size of the hole and torque on the spindle? And why not just use a long-reach endmill? Are they still just not as long as a boring bar? Or is the issue more that an endmill on a manual machine would require a rotary table, so the boring bar makes more sense, whereas a CNC could use the endmill in a circle without the trouble? And in the particular boring bar head offered by taig, there's no screw adjustment or anything, it seems to be "tap it, cut a hole, measure the hole". That seems annoying to me; I do enough "cut twice, measure once, repeat" in my woodworking as it is already.
For background, I like to pretend I'll eventually do really accurate stuff, and hole size accuracy will matter, but I'm upgrading from a 3d printer as far as cnc goes, with any metal working done by hand, maybe with a harbor freight drill press for trying to drill holes, so it wouldn't take much to outdo what I'm currently working with anyway. Short term, especially until I build an enclosure and figure out what what coolant pump and such to get, I'll be cutting plastic and wood, and maybe jewelers wax. Medium term, I'll be cutting whatever it is jewelers make duplicatable blanks from (my son does that, but I forget what he said; aluminum maybe?) and small aluminum and hopefully steel parts structural parts. Maybe some one-off finished jewelry pieces. Most of my 3d printed stuff has been functional parts, like doorknob mounting plates, latches, shelving brackets, tablet mounting arms, etc. and I'm tired of engineering around the weak layer boundaries of 3d printed parts. And not being able to use anything outside in the summer or in an engine compartment without worrying about it melting.
First, my understanding is that the reason to use a drill chuck on a mill is that drilling with a drill bit is faster than endmill or boring bar. It's not as accurate, but the hole is drilled undersize and then finished with a reamer. But is the taig mill strong enough to use anything larger than a little pcb drill in steel or aluminum?
And where does the boring bar become advantageous? Is it back to size of the hole and torque on the spindle? And why not just use a long-reach endmill? Are they still just not as long as a boring bar? Or is the issue more that an endmill on a manual machine would require a rotary table, so the boring bar makes more sense, whereas a CNC could use the endmill in a circle without the trouble? And in the particular boring bar head offered by taig, there's no screw adjustment or anything, it seems to be "tap it, cut a hole, measure the hole". That seems annoying to me; I do enough "cut twice, measure once, repeat" in my woodworking as it is already.
For background, I like to pretend I'll eventually do really accurate stuff, and hole size accuracy will matter, but I'm upgrading from a 3d printer as far as cnc goes, with any metal working done by hand, maybe with a harbor freight drill press for trying to drill holes, so it wouldn't take much to outdo what I'm currently working with anyway. Short term, especially until I build an enclosure and figure out what what coolant pump and such to get, I'll be cutting plastic and wood, and maybe jewelers wax. Medium term, I'll be cutting whatever it is jewelers make duplicatable blanks from (my son does that, but I forget what he said; aluminum maybe?) and small aluminum and hopefully steel parts structural parts. Maybe some one-off finished jewelry pieces. Most of my 3d printed stuff has been functional parts, like doorknob mounting plates, latches, shelving brackets, tablet mounting arms, etc. and I'm tired of engineering around the weak layer boundaries of 3d printed parts. And not being able to use anything outside in the summer or in an engine compartment without worrying about it melting.
