Itty bitty end mills?

JimDawson said:
I use a Harbor Freight pencil air grinder for a high speed spindle for end mills down to 0.005. Has a 1/8 collet. All you have to do is hang it off of your quill. Really tiny endmills require high speed and a really stable setup.

I don't know if you could hand crank a machine with a tiny endmill, I've never tried it. Would require a really steady hand. HSS is much more forgiving than carbide.
Click to expand...

This has me wondering if I could rig up my Dremel somehow. That would have the speed, not sure how I could securely mount it to work with the mill though...
 
The problem with a Dremel is the nose bearing mount sucks. They flop around like a fish out of water. I did look at a Roto-Zip to use as a small spindle, they are a bit better than a Dremel. It would be possible to mount one of those up.

The Dremel handpiece is pretty stable, but from what I understand the drive system is prone to failure. There are some other options out there, Foredom comes to mind.
 
Well, talk about a co-inky-dink ... here we are talking about adding a higher speed auxiliary spindle to a milling machine, and lo and behold ... this just popped up on the local Craigslist:
phoenix.craigslist.org

4 HP water cooled spindle and controller - tools - by owner - sale

This is a brand new water cooled high speed spindle system. 4 HP the Inverter is a made by FULING...
phoenix.craigslist.org
OK ... might be a bit of overkill. But maybe somebody here can find a new home for it.
Disclaimer - absolutely No connection with seller and no further info about the spindle. Just saw it while browsing Craigs.
 
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