On Mon, 19 Mar 2018 12:21:41 -0700, Jeff Liebermann
wrote:

On Mon, 19 Mar 2018 14:13:04 +0700, John B.
wrote:

To be honest I can't think of anything I ever did on a horizontal or
vertical milling machine that would have benefited by having CNC :-)

A lathe, yes, if only turning the balls to put on the ends of a vise
handle, but all the milling I can remember doing was pretty much
straight cuts.

What does the guy plan on doing with the mill?

Small production runs. He's the retired owner of Santa Cruz
Precision:
http://santacruzprecision.com
Some of the machines from the old business are now in his garage.
Most of the stuff he did was designed on a computah using and old
version of SmartCAM.
http://www.smartcamcnc.com
Some of the complex shapes could not have easily been done without the
computer. Same with making multiple parts for short run manufacture.
What inspired this project is that he's getting requests for quotes
from former customers where the profits from 1 or 2 jobs would easily
pay for the CNC conversion. Since the old Bandit CNC controller was
almost dead, it seemed like a good way to go. Right now, we're a bit
stalled due to various personal commitments.

More on the mill:
http://www.buildyouridea.com/cnc/Shizuoka/Shizuoka.html

My payment for doing the computers, electrical and motors is that I
get to use the mill to make custom knives. Something like this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=98ly5-1bhHU (0:00 to 4:30)

I thought that you "knife guys" hand forged the blades. At least that
was what Jesse Clift did when he made what was probably the original
Bowie knife :-)

--
Cheers,

John B.