Thursday, June 19, 2014

Mill: Large Table Upgrade

I installed the large table from Little Machine Shop on my mill. It's the larger table with LMS' own mills use. Let me say I can't think of anything I can do on the larger table that I couldn't do on the stock table, however, the large table is a lot nicer to work with and makes setup easier. It also has a much more robust Y axis gib which is a lot longer than stock and has two additional set screws to adjust it.

Close up of the Y axis gib set screws.

Installation is pretty easy, and I took the time to drill all the holes for my DRO setup before removing the old table from the mill. I also made my standard modifications to the gibs, as described in a previous post.

All in all, I really like this upgrade and it makes the mill nicer to work with. It surprising how much of a difference a couple extra inches makes. My biggest issue with the upgrade was the poor quality of the Y axis dovetails; there is enough variance that you can feel the handwheel get significantly tighter as you move the table toward the column. Fortunately I don't usually move the table that far toward the column, but it's still something I may try to address later.

The larger table installed. The power feed is visible on its left side.

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