G8689

I had this mill before and it worked great. I was able to a lot with this beast. The pinion and worm feed broke so I decided to a get a new one... I think the QC on this is better than harbor freight, and at a better price point than LMS or Micro. Buy this one if you like milling for a hobby. Word of advice this is pretty much a copy of a chinese mill so i would suggest that all buyers replace the 3mt collets/ gears to either steal ones... or if you are like me... convert it into a belted gear system and make it have no moving parts like an ssd... also the torsion arm kinda sucks and i would attach a SUV strut gas piston to help compensation for the z axis struggle of dragging the head up and down.... the skies are the limit for diy engineers making custom pcb board to making a tesla turbo for a car... (haha my scion tc)... cheers and be creative.

Great product. It does need some TLC out of the box. Such as gib adjustment and a decent Digital Read Out. It's not accurate by most machining standards but you can get really good results with it if you're patient and get used to the way it is operated. With a DRO you can probably maintain a .002" or so tolerance with this tiny mill which is excellent for small hobby and home based projects. It cuts steel, titanium and stainless but it does take a long time to get through this stuff. It's best uses are for small polymer and aluminum projects. If you need or desire a more accurate/stronger/faster mini mill, check out littlemachineshop.com. They have excellent quality little machines and accessories for all mini mills at decent prices.

Not USA made, too much play in dial. Customer support is pretty good.

like all grizzly tools this one is very well built with power to spare. its very sturdy and easy to operate. the spped controls gives you the abilty to make any parts you need flawlessly

The mill does what i need to do now,but might need a bigger one later on.

Got mine up and running in about three hours from delivery. Manageable with a two wheeler and a belt. I was able to get it on my table without help from the two wheeler, using the table as a pivot. I have a larger lathe mill and got this as an excuse for a more precision drill press, then started to look at it for a mill. My major issue is the chuck was not as concentric as needed, and tends to drive one side of the cutters harder, making a hard to soft noise. Switching out the chuck seemed to smooth out the process, so I substituted another chuck which works better. I have most of the tooling and like the MT3 set up because it matches my other machine. My big MT3 machine btw has my collet holder captive! Giving credence to the R8 comment, but my other machine holds everything from 1/8 to 1", so is fine. It takes some force on this one to pop the draw bar, I am using a 16oz brass hammer. I made a couple of replacement x and z knobs to steady the table. The long slide stop hit my vise and a circular knurled knob seems to work better with less torque. The table is very narrow, so get a small footprint vise etc. Finish with sharp cutters and light feeds is very nice. The variable speed is great to use. Noise is moderate with the stock gear package. Numerous after market upgrades are available from other vendors, I am evaluating one now. For layout work this is a base machine, if you add DRO and auto feed, it could be a money maker. Cast and hardened and ground parts are shop quality, and controls feel precise, but with plenty of backlash, so always approach from the same direction. I tried some light climb milling in aluminum, and didn't get any problems. I had the cutter stall at slow speed at a breakthrough point, which beats breaking a plastic gear a bunch. The hp is rated what my other mill is, but with much less torque. Top rpm though is another 1,000. motor is physically about 1/4 the size though. Happy and trying new things. Update after a couple of weeks. I tried several trial cuts in 1/4" aluminum and they give a nice texture especially with small cutters. I put in a 1/2 inch at a low speed, and promptly tore a gear out. I've been doing this with a bigger machine for five years, but was incredulous that it took so little pressure. I got the machine for drilling mostly and as a project for after market upgrades. I assumed I could make an actual part for something before an overhaul. So, no excuse for housing plastic gears in a 100 lb cast iron machine. If you buy one to cut metal with cutters over 1/4 inch, plan to buy the belt drive.

Great for small projects.

Nice, well built