Wednesday, April 21, 2010

Gerald Hynes Taig Accessories on his Mini Mill

Gerald Hynes sent in pictures showing his use of Taig accessories on his import mini mill.

Thought you might be interested to see a couple of fixture plates I made for use on my "non TAIG" milling machines but set-up for mounting many stock TAIG accessories for a variety of clamping options. the fixture plates are drilled and tapped 1/4"-20 on a 1" grid pattern. they mount to the mill with T nuts thru the counterbored holes using 1/4"-20 sockethead bolts. All unused holes in the grids are plugged with short set screws to keeps the chips out of the holes.


The TAIG vise sub-plate is drilled/tapped 10-32 on a 1" grid to allow use of the TAIG vise without modifing the existing counterbored mounting holes. Also since the TAIG vise jaws are mounted on the same spacing they could be removed for direct mounting to the plate. Also the 2 vises can be mounted end to end and with some reconfigration of the jaws allow clamping upto about 5 3/4"! Not bad for a pair of vises under $30 ea ! The beauty of the whole set-up is the ability to move work from the lathe to the mill and back without disturbing the part! Bear in mind that these are not precision plates and are merely made from affordable 6061 bar stock. If needed I can mount a sub-plate and then machine it flat at that position and then mount work to it. Overall though they are very useful devices for most required set-ups. I have sanded them flat on a granite surface plate so the are generally good for the sorts of projects I undertake. I may at some point have a friend flycut them on his bridgeport for a more precise flatness and parallellism. Or at some point I may get my own bridgeport sized CNC knee mill finished and flycut themself! The mill of course is a whole other project!

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