[StrawberryBoi]

You've all given me some excellent things to consider and chew on.

I should say, my rather pipe-dream machine is something that can cut in 5 axis and is a mill-turn, with spindle hand off and auto-feed for stock of at least 2" diameter. I'd like to take a crack at a swiss-type with am optional bushing.

I'm looking at then a main and sub spindle and a live tool head, turning turret probably, and an ATC on the live tool spindle.

So SO many parts in bespoke servos and transmissions require tight turned tolerances ID and OD and also have parallel, perpendicular, and even off angle milled features for oil flow to bearings, coolant or pneumatic features, hydraulic features... splines, relief features, o-rings and often half or full dovetail, etc.

Many of them require 3+ setups due to double ended features, turning+milling+broaching. Length is a major thing, the length of parts will often be >10x the shaft diameter so turning the primary shaft features is ideal.

I also want to be able to mill larger pieces up to 12"x12"x?". Ultimately the pipe dream is a small all-in-one (slow throughput) lights out production machine. Given depth of cut limits, I really can get away with 1/8" or even smaller milling tools if I have a 5th axis. Internal splines are broached.

The one caveat would be polygon shaft couplings, which would be up to 1.25" depth internal features that are rare so may just be outside the capacity of the machine and that's ok.

For this reason I am leaning towards high speed spindles specs and a total machine that can operate off of a 50A 220/230 plug. I happen to have one of these for my EVSE, but 40A would be good too since it's common for dryers. I would most likely be installing this for years at work though which has full three phase, but taking it home and bricking it due to no three phase...

This puts the machine power budget as <7kW on a standard 40A 220V breaker. (Derated for true continuous limit).

I wouldn't need to be turning and milling at the same time, so I can allocate low wattage on the lathe spindles during milling operations and none on the tool spindle during turning. All three spindles must index.

There is really no reason though that I can't use a Mechatron spindle as a starting point for interface dimensions and tolerances. I can also look at copying their connector (electrical connectors) setup. I come from automotive on the wiring side of my experience, which has very different styles of connectors. All these gland style connectors are totally new to me.

[jannos]

RPM >=?rpm
Power >=?Watts (I see 2.2kW as a common rating, but how much do we actually NEED, at the tool?)



You can use feed and speed calculator.