Myford Rodney Milling attachment. Is it worth it ?

[ParCan]

Hi Guys

I have a Myford ML7 and no more space for a mill or other machinary.
I do have the Milling slide for the lathe which works ok.

I have been offered (for a price) a Myford Rodney Milling attachment which will fit on the Myford bed and is powered by the lathe.

Is this a worthwhile device or just simply to much hassle ?

Thanks.

Alex.

[ParCan]

I guess either no one knows what i'm talking about or it's a waste of time.....

please - any advice would be welcome.

even if it's " go get a propper mill"

[BillTodd]

even if it's " "

go get a propper mill

If you have the space, a separate machine will be far better - by the time you've faffed about fitting the Rodney you probably would have the milling job  done and be ready to do some more turning.

[buffalow bill]

In answer to your question, I have two for you
1, how much money do you have burning that hole in your pocket?
2, How much space do you have to fill with a mill?

A proper mill will be far better!

Bill       

[ParCan]

Hi Guys and Thank you

With tools I have always banked on getting the correct tool for the job, not the lowest cost.
If Budget is not available then I either wait or buy the best I can get for what I have.

Space is at a Premium in my workshop, I have no space for a Mill at the moment which is why the Rodney seems ideal.

I can Currently run to say £400 for a Mill. That should get me a new SEIG but then i'll need toolong which means £400 isn't going to go far. Minimum Collett Chuck + machine vice.

Ideas and suggestions welcome.

Alex.

[lordedmond]

you will be better off by far with a mill its a pita to swap from lathe mode to mill mode

a thought for you no matter which way you jump you will still incur the tooling expense



Stuart

[Rob.Wilson]

Hi Parcan

IF space is at premium in your shop i would go for the milling attachment , as it would take less time to set up than the vertical slide , more rigid set up and would give a better speed rang for milling , also you would have a power feed using the lathe lead screw .

Rob 

[Brass_Machine]

Look at it this way...

If you have the room, I agree with most here and would say, get a proper mill.

However, you have said space is at a premium in your shop. I take it you don't have the room? If that is the case, Rob is absolutely right. A milling attachment is better than the milling slide or no mill mill at all.

Buy it. Use it until you have the room and then sell it to someone else who doesn't have the room.

Eric

[ParCan]

Made the Puddleduck Crossheads today on the milling slide on my lathe.
It (the slide) moved twice, thankfully I got away with it.

From square(ish) metal to completed crossheads was over 3 hours, and that's each.
There has to be a better way !

The slide works but is very limited.
Saying that, by the looks of it the crossheads are about as hard to make as things get with the puddleduck.

The Rodney I'm looking at is £200 from a friend of a friend.
It has some tooling with it and a bunch of cutters which would help no end.

I agree that the hassle of mounting the rodney may outweigh other savings.

Tough call.
Thankyou for all your help and suggestions.

Alex.

[buffalow bill]

Alex,
The Rodney, if in good nick, is at a price that could be passed on at a later date without loosing, and with tooling.
Thinks I would be after it at that price.   

Bill

[caskwith]

Sent you a PM about this.

[caskwith]

Any ideas what the going rate for one of these is? Spotted this recent sale on ebay, seems an extraordinary price to me?

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=140737948781&clk_rvr_id=341699188510&item=140737948781&lgeo=1&vectorid=229508

[ParCan]

Went to look at the Rodney I was offered.

The taper Coupling for the chuck is missing
No draw bar for the Taper Coupling.
The gear that the nylon Sleeve drives has no teeth - it looks like it's been run in the chuck.

And it gets worst

The bearings and bevle gears are shot to bits.
The spindle refused to turn even with a fair ol bit of force.
The 2 bed clamp screws are stripped.

It really is fit for the scrap bin.

Anyway - decision made and pennies saving.
I will buy a propper Mill, looking at the AMA16-VF or even the AMA25-VF from http://www.amadeal.co.uk/

Your advice and comments would as always be more than welcome

Alex.

[mzt]

Got a BF20, much like the AMA25-LV: mine got a smaller table (and I could easily do with the larger one) and MT2 spindle instead of MT3.
The AMA16 looks minimill sized, though improved. I do not think rasing the mill head using that wheel on top of the colum will be much comfortable.

Marcello

[PekkaNF]

How is this going?

I see these for sale from time to time:
http://www.model-engineer.co.uk/classifieds/view_ad.asp?ad=6518
Amolco Milling Attachment

I have no idea if that would be more like it? Sitting at the other end of the lathe ans with it's own power? Saw few pictures of these on old books and judging of picures they get sometimes even some use.

PekkaNF

[andyf]

They seem to get a good review here, Pekka:
http://www.lathes.co.uk/amolco/

Andy

[Fergus OMore]

Both products are no longer being made. This says something!

Again, Martin Cleeve had a ML7- or didn't because he could only afford part of a new one.
He hadn't a mill, nor had he a drilling machine or a double ended grinder until he made them. As for the vertical slide and vice, he made them as well.

As there was no decent book on screwcutting, he made that as well.

When he was made redundant, he made a good living working part time making nuts and bolts to order.

I think that the foregoing answers more than the present question.

[Keith_W]

Hi ParCan,
Room in a Workshop is allways a problem, most of us would be guilty of cramming in that extra machine if we can.
Have a good look at the layout of your Workshop, see what can be modified, altered, shifted etc to get that extra room for a Mill. It does not have to be a large one but having a separate Mill makes life and doing thoes Milling jobs much easier. Scan the Forum and look at the methods people has used to get the room to accomodate one.
If it is just impossible to fit in a Mill then a Milling Attachment for your Lathe is better than nothing, look again at the Forums to see what Members have fitted and made to be able to Mill on a Lathe, use their experiances and modifications to adapt the best attachment for your Lathe.

Regards,
Keith_W.

[nel2lar]

Alex
If it is a milling attachment you can use on the lathe and it doesn't set you back too much, BUY IT. I used a milling attachment on my lathe for many years. Some are very versatile. You would be surprised what you can do with a lathe and a milling attachment.
Nelson Collar

[Meldonmech]

Hi Alex
            I have a Rodney Plus Mill which I had for ages. It is a free standing mill and is identical to the ML7 attachment, but on a fabricated base containing the motor and speed change pulleys. The speed range is 320 to 2750 showing the bearings to be very substantial. The quality of the machine matches Myfords quality, and has proven its worth in machining the gears and pinions for  many mechanisms, plus numerous workshop machinery projects. I have been well satisfied with this 2nd hand machine. The only change to the machine was I had to raise the column 5 inches to enable dividing heads and vices to be accommodated. Buy a machine that has been looked after and I think you will be happy. The Rodney is better than the Amolco. The main thing to consider is forward planning your projects, so that when making components, you can turn several, then mill in batches to reduce lathe/ mill change over hassle.
                         Good Luck   David

[joegib]

I'm coming late to this topic but thought I'd post a few words about the Amolco as I have one (with the Myford ML10 base fitting to suit my lathe).

The Rodney and Amolco each have their strengths and weaknesses:

Work Envelope — The spindle-to-column base dimension is similar: 4" Amolco, 4-3/8" Rodney. The maximum headroom above the cross-slide surface is: Amolco 8.5", Rodney 6". The cross travel is, of course, dependent on how much travel your cross-slide has — my ML10 with 'long' cross-slide has about 6-1/2". So, the practical horizontal envelope is about 6" x 4" with the balance in favour of the Amolco on headroom.

Spindle Speeds —  Rodney: 320-2750, Amolco: 325-1600. Similar speed range except that the Rodney has the advantage at high revs, useful for very small milling cutters. At the low end the Amolco is too fast for operations like gear cutting and slit-sawing in iron/steel. Actually, this was where I thought the Rodney should have the advantage i.e. if it's driven by the lathe spindle, surely it has an even lower speed range employing the lathe's backgear? If not, then the speed ranges are comparable in the low and medium ranges.

Controls — On the Amolco the only control you have is a single vertical leadscrew with graduated dial handwheel to move the head and set cutter depth (not ideal for drilling). On the Rodney you also have a lever quill. With only 6" of headroom (minus chuck, vise and workpiece depth), though, I'm not sure how practical drilling would be on this machine.

Autofeed — As regards the Rodney, there is none. Because it has independent motor drive, the Amolco can use the lathe's leadscrew to provide autofeed across the short axis (4") of the workpiece. This is a definite plus if you've a lot of material to remove via multiple passes.

Quality — Well, the Rodney certainly had the Myford gloss and a premium price to suit! While the Amolco was cheaper, it was 'of good quality construction' to quote Lathes UK. I got good service out of it prior to getting a standalone mill (and may yet again if I have to downsize!).

I agree with the consensus — do all you can to shoehorn a mill into your workshop if you can. But if that's not possible, don't pay silly money for one of these attachments. I wouldn't pay more than £250 tops for either kind.

Joe 

[Miner]

From past reading of more than a few (lot's) of M.E. type books and magazines I have some impressions about that Rodney attachment. Ideally "get a proper mill" would be the correct response. But I've also got a small shop, so I can at least sympathize with you. I started out with a Emco compact 5 with the rear mounted mill. From memory, that Rodney attachment requires mounting and dismounting between uses. That alone would get tiresome very quickly.

It's more money, but if it were me? I'd save my pennies and I'd look at something like the Weiss badged WM-16 or slightly larger. These can be had without the X, Y axis table. Solidly bolt that centered behind your Myford's lathe bed to a large block of steel or cast iron so it's not attached directly to the lathe bed itself. Once it's aligned and correctly trammed to your cross slide, it's then always ready to go. Your still forced to properly align the work or milling vice each time you need to do any milling, but it would be far less set up time than the Rodney attachment, and the Weiss type gives you the modern variable speeds along with a choice of internal spindle taper. I highly recommend NOT buying a MT type spindle taper. R-8 is a far superior milling taper IMHO. I'd think you'll find that far more capable and much more usable than the Rodney unit.

As already mentioned by others, the actual tooling, accessories, etc is going to be the same costs no matter what type of mill you end up buying. So it's really only the initial mill cost that's soon forgotten once you start adding the cutting tools and accessories. That initial mill cost is really only important for today. The Rodney was designed and sold when at that time any small stand alone mill was about 2-3 times the cost of a brand new Myford super 7. Very few M.E. types back then could even dream of affording an actual mill. In fact very few could really afford even that Rodney attachment. Almost all milling was done on the lathe with a vertical milling slide. Were not so locked into those older designs and thinking today.

Pete

[joegib]

Autofeed — As regards the Rodney, there is none. Because it has independent motor drive, the Amolco can use the lathe's leadscrew to provide autofeed across the short axis (4") of the workpiece. This is a definite plus if you've a lot of material to remove via multiple passes.

I need to make a correction here.

On reflection the Rodney can provide autofeed by engaging the leadscrew via the halfnut lever. But this would only be useful at the lowest (milling) spindle speeds. Assuming the changewheels were set up for finest feed (= slowest autofeed traverse), any increase via belt adjustments in lathe spindle speed to raise milling spindle speed, would increase leadscrew RPMs. That, of course, would increase effective traverse speed proportionately. As I say, that might be OK for the lowest speeds but would not be suitable for the slenderest milling cutters used at the highest spindle RPMs. This is in contrast to the Amolco where you can use the finest feed/slowest traverse at all milling spindle speeds.

Just putting the record straight ...

Joe