What vertical mill to buy?

[Efroeh]

Thanks for the info. I was curious what dimensions for the table would be a good size?

[SteinHDan]

I have a 14" by 25" table (K2CNC KT-2514S) and that has been large enough for all the RC stuff I've wanted to do.

The one I have is no longer sold, but I think there are some good quite cheap alternatives, like this one:
- CNC 6040Z 3-axis, 1500W VFD spindle, 110V/220V





I've not tried it, but the spec looks ok. 1500w spindle is good for milling aluminum. Ball screws are good.

There are lots of reviews on YouTube. I saw these two:
- Review: https://youtu.be/DeRuMZKCiy8
- Cutting aluminum: https://youtu.be/kTIYiZFGcRE

The max cutting size of the 6040 is 60 cm x 40 cm. The table is a little bigger than that, but that is the largest size parts you can make in one go.


There's obviously a lot of really good alternatives in the higher price ranges, but I've not done any research into that. Maybe some of the other forum members can add some visibility into those alternatives.


I use the free Autodesk Fusion 360 to model and generate the G-code. Then I run Mach3 to output to the machine. A Mach3 license was included with my machine. A free alternative to Mach3 is LinuxCNC.



Best regards,
Stein :-)