On Thursday I
bought this Grizzly G1006 mill-drill on ebay in
Brooklyn for $1100.
I went to look
at it and paid for it, but I haven't brought
anything home but the vise.
The guy selling
the mill owns a shop that does custom stationery
engraving, with a staff of maybe half a dozen
people. He said they're the largest custom engraving
place on the East coast. They have gigantic
engraving machines and other machinery throughout
the shop, but there's no obvious need for a milling
machine, so he may have gotten this one in trade and
just wants to unload it.?
[They also have
a 10" Atlas lathe for sale. I'll talk about that at
the end].
I downloaded and
printed out the owner's manual for the mill-drill
Thursday night. Grizzly has two manuals online for
this model, one for mills made before 9/09 and one
for mills after, but lthe differences look just
cosmetic. (Grizzly of course has newer mills than
this, but this is all I need. And I paid more for my
mini-mill in 2017!)
The controls are
a little stiff, but there's no play anywhere (not
even in the column height adjustment when the bolts
were loose). I suspect a shot of WD-40 will solve
the stiffness. Also, the left-hand crank handle of
the table is missing. (That may have been because
the power feed was fitted at some point).? I know
big mills have two cranks for the X axis, but I've
never quite understood why that's necessary. At any
rate, that wouldn't be hard to replace.
The thing that
impresses me most (and scares me a little) is the
size of this thing. I expected something bigger than
my mini-mill, but this makes the mini-mill look like
a Lego toy.? And I'm planning to move it from
Brooklyn to my basement shop in Staten Island by
myself in my VW Golf.? This is not as daft as it
sounds -- my shop has a ground level entrance in the
back, and several years ago I bought a replacement
bed for my 11" Logan lathe and moved that into the
shop myself.?
Here's my plan
for moving the mill. I'd love any comments,
especially from people who've done this
themselves. An exploded view of the column and
table area is below. I think if I remove part 405-1,
the Y axis leadscrew (and maybe 415-1, the nut for
that leadscrew) I'd be able to slide the table and
cross-slide off the Y axis dovetail, knocking off a
lot of weight and bulk. Then if I remove the motor
and the parts that stick out on the right side, I
can flop the mill over on the right and safely
separate the base and column from the head. (The
seller has several husky employees that could
probably help with this).? I'm hopeful the head by
itself would weigh only 150 pounds or so.??
When I get the
parts to my shop, I won't have husky employees to
help me, but I will have an engine lift, which is
how I got the replacement bed for my 11" Logan back
up onto its stand.?
But this is all
guesswork, and I have no idea how heavy the
individual parts are. If anyone here has ever taken
a mill-drill apart to move it, please tell me how
you did it.
This mill is
also big enough that I'll have to rearrange my shop.
The mill is currently sitting on (not even bolted
to) the stand you see in the ebay picture, which is
how they've been using it for drilling. This is a
rough construction wooden stand on wheels that's
probably not worth keeping. But I have a 21"x27"
Kennedy rolling tool cabinet in my shop that
currently holds a drill press that I won't need when
I get this mill set up. Years ago I removed the
wheels from the Kennedy, but I still have them if
needed (though I don't see the need for rolling
around a milling machine, even though this one had
apparently been on wheels).
I may have to
make several trips, but they don't seem to be in any
hurry for me to get it out of there.
----------------------
?ATLAS LATHE:?
The same shop
also has an Atlas lathe they want to get rid of.? It
looks about 10" and it has a gearbox. Below is a
quick photo I took while the owner was giving me a
tour of the place.
This lathe
doesn't look like other Atlases I've seen. There's a
cover that closes on the back-gear like a Logan, and
the lathe has a V-way bed. (All rhe Atlases I've
ever aeen, and all the ones pictured on
have flat beds). This lathe also SEEMS to have steel
gears on the outside of the gearbox (though I didn't
test them with a magnet.
The seller
hasn't put this on ebay yet but plans to. If anyone
is interested let me know. Pickup only in
Greenpoint, Brooklyn.?
Mike Taglieri?
