a Palmgren 250 or Myford 7 milling attachment for a lathe?

quinnbrian

quinnbrian

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I'm looking at buying a milling attachment for my South Bend heavy 10. Can't find a South Bend model , but have come up with these two a Palmgren 250 , or a factory Myford 7 model.
My question , which one is the better of the two? I know your limited on what you can do with one of these little milling attachments. But thinking it would work for cutting keyways....etc
Thanks for looking.
 
I'd go with the Palmgren. Had one, useful tool for different jobs, then I got a mill/drill. There are occasionally times when I wish I'd kept the Palmgren.
 
I was never at all impressed with the quality of build, of the Palmgren unit. Kinda rough.

I think the Myford unit might be a bit small on your lathe though.

Tough call.

A bud of mine bought a Boxford copy of a SB9 at an auction a long while back. The Boxford made clone of the South Bend milling attachment was a pretty skookum piece of kit.

Can you get by with just using an angle plate until you can find a SB unit?

Cheers
Trev
 
That is an option. Mount your compound to an angle plate, which in turn is mounted to the cross slide. Three axes of movement, plus rotation.

I think that Palmgren has gone"international". I have a Palmgren vise which isn't the quality that they used to build.
 
I think you may be right, but they were never really high end to begin with either, IMO.

Last Palmgren milling attachment I had anything to do with had the vise stripped off it and stuck on a drill press table. The rest of it wasn't missed much...

There is (was?) an outfit out there that sells casting kits to machine your own, if you have access to one to borrow, or better yet, a milling machine to use.

IIRC, Popular Mechanics had a set of plans available for one too, that was all bolted together flat stock, which seems an economical way to improve the capabilities without frying the bank account. Many of the PM plans are available around the web. They used to publish ALL sorts of great stuff, not just the consumer dreck they print now.

Cheers
Trev
 
I had the PM plans. You're right - in the old days, they published all sorts of really useful diy material.
 
Well I drove an hour to go see.... The Palmgren had been piece together from two or more units and the Myford was too small. He had a Palmgren on his lathe that was as it should have been.... But that wasn't for sale. The. He proceeded to tell me he could get $250.00 U.S. On eBay for the parts built one....fill your boots!! By the way.... He didn't tell the the Palmgren was built out of parts, until I start asking question.How did something so small... Go so wrong. I guess it time to build one myself.
By the way, When I talk to him last night he offer to take EMT and ship it.... Now that would have been interesting!!
 
http://www.statecollegecentral.com/metallathe/MLA-5.html

Should get you in under $200 delivered to you, for the castings set. Way cheaper if you have (or are) someone near the border that can pick up from a box on the US side. But if you are in the sticks, having the package delivered as two, to get below the 20 pounds weight limit, is a reasonable expense.
Another option is to order the plans, and order some sawn blocks of cast iron stock to make it from, through a Canadian source. A lot more work, but the costs might be lower.

Another option would be to troll through some of the hobby machining sites and post a WTB in their Classifieds.

I am going to go out onna limb and think that you have learned a few of the questions worth asking, yeah? Crappy deal to get almost suckered.

Here. Another link to fill your head with ideas! :) http://www.lathes.co.uk/boxford/page4.html


Cheers
Trev
 
Last edited:
trevj said:
http://www.statecollegecentral.com/metallathe/MLA-5.html

Should get you in under $200 delivered to you, for the castings set. Way cheaper if you have (or are) someone near the border that can pick up from a box on the US side. But if you are in the sticks, having the package delivered as two, to get below the 20 pounds weight limit, is a reasonable expense.
Another option is to order the plans, and order some sawn blocks of cast iron stock to make it from, through a Canadian source. A lot more work, but the costs might be lower.

Another option would be to troll through some of the hobby machining sites and post a WTB in their Classifieds.

I am going to go out onna limb and think that you have learned a few of the questions worth asking, yeah? Crappy deal to get almost suckered.

Here. Another link to fill your head with ideas! :) http://www.lathes.co.uk/boxford/page4.html



Cheers
Trev
Click to expand...

Thanks Trev
I've looked at one of those kits before, good idea!! I've got a Couple sets of plans / drawings on how to build one.
When I get home on Friday I'll take another look at building one.
Cheers
Brian
 
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