New to the forum and machining.

[Boogieman]

Hi,
Apologies but I'm not sure where to introduce myself so move this if needed.
Thanks for letting me join.
My name's Ben and I live in Brisbane, Queensland, Australia and I just scored a McMillan MM-VO-A1S milling machine. I pick it up in a few weeks and had been doing some research on the topic and this particular machine.
It is very much like this but no light or water and more travel on each axis-
http://www.grizzly.com/products/6-x-26- ... rizzly.com
I'm a helicopter mechanic by trade and a motorcycle enthusiast so I have a good understanding of mechanical concepts but other than some very basic lathe work, I've not done a lot of machining.
I plan to use it for making plates etc. for my bikes to mount brake calipers and foot pegs etc. (My days of hand filing are over) and I have more than enough offers from mates to tie it up with work for a bit.

So I'm keen for any advice on the topic and on my machine.

Cheers
Ben

[Harold_V]

Hey, Ben!
Welcome to the board. Lots of talented and experienced people here to help you with questions that are sure to arise.

Harold

[SteveHGraham]

And if they don't, then I will.

[Patio]

Hi Ben, Welcome to the forum.
I took up machining about 6 years ago, so I am still new too.
I would suggest the "Resource Library" here on the forum. Look up Harolds V post on grinding tooling. It is great and will help with understanding tool geometry. This can be very helpful on smaller home shop machines that don't have the speed or rigidness, that carbide inserts thrive on.
Get some cheap mild steel to practice taking cuts. It will not leave a great finish, but you can learn a lot about feeds and speeds trying to get a good finish on it. A lot of people use aluminum to learn and to do demonstrations, but because of the forgiving nature of the material the knowledge will not transfer easily to tougher metals. Learn to deal with some 304 stainless and most other metals will seem easy.

I could not have learned as much as I have, in the short amount of time, I have been at it, with out the help of the wonderful people on this forum. Just ask a question, and there is bound to be someone with an answer.
The search function works pretty well here too.

[Boogieman]

Thanks for the welcome guys,
I look forward to having a read and learning more. Hopefully I can score a lathe before too long then I'll be knee deep in swarf.

Thanks again

Ben