I am in the market for a 5 axis vertical mill. It will be used for one off tooling and it seems the majority of machines are trunions in this small/medium platform. It seems like a trunion would be inefficient and cumbersome when dealing with thick aluminum billets, and off tooling, and it would eliminate the ability to have excess space on the other end of the machine table for squeezing in other jobs without interrupting what's on the rotary, etc. I've seen a couple of machines that have a more conventional table but a section of the table has a rotary table that is level with the rest of the table including t-slots in the rotary that line up with the rest of the table. This seems like a very versatile design that would give me different options of how the machine would be used. So far the only machines I've found with this configuration are a Hurco VMX42SRTi and a Mori Seiki DMF series machines (DMF180 for example). Are there any other machines with this type of configuration? It appears that there are no smaller conventional vertical mills available that have a dual rotating head that goes to 90 deg or beyond? (Example: Jobs, Breton). Am I correct on this? I want opinions on pros/cons of trunion vs. the incorporated rotary table like I mention in the Mori and Hurco. Also Opinions on Hurco machines in general. I've run Mori's and love them although they are really pricey, I've never been around a Hurco. Also, anyone know of a smaller platform machine that have a dual rotary head that tilts to 90 deg like a Jobs or Breton? When I say small platform I'm talking travels of say 2' minimum in XYZ, preferably a little bigger.
Thanks, Mike.
Thanks, Mike.