When it makes sense to spend the $$....

[Swede]

Our hobby is full of choices, which is certainly good. 40 years ago, our world consisted of names like Myford, Bridgeport, Hardinge, Starrett, Monarch, Brown & Sharpe, Atlas, South Bend. Now, we have Import (usually Chinese) imports competing with these honored names. Some of it is decent, and some of it is horrendous junk.

Over the years, I have come to the conclusion that there are certain areas where it is best to shell out a bit more money. The purpose of this thread is to gather opinions on the overall quality of certain import products, and where it might benefit to pass them by and go for a "Western" product.

My shop is loaded with a mix of tools. I have a Chinese VM - it is excellent for the money. But here are tools where I've been very disappointed in the cheaper imports.

Milling cutters: Are expensive! It seems ridiculous to pay $25 for a single 0.250" HSS end mill. Those "20 TICN end mills in a box" for $39 seems to be an irresistable bargain, and to the naked eye, they look (and feel) just fine. I started with them, and wondered why my cuts were terrible, surface finish poor, and why the cutters broke so often. Then I got my hands on a Niagra end mill, and it cut like butter. Since then, I've found that paying the $$ is WORTH it when you've got a part with 30 hours on it sitting in your mill vise. The accuracy and correct geometry of quality cutters makes them desirable for the $$.

Drill bits: Exactly the same as the end mills. I've mounted some cheap drill bits and one could see the end of the drill revolving in a huge circle! These drill bits belong in the hand drilling drawer, at best.

Collets: It's hard to pay $20 for a single Lyndex or $40 for a Hardinge 5C collet when import collets are $4.95. But I've seen the cheapies indicate 0.005" out with a gauge pin installed, when the same pin mounted in a Hardinge collet has essentially 0.000" TIR.

Drill chucks: The import chucks are getting better, but I still think it pays to at least verify accuracy before pulling the trigger. I did find that my SPI Albrecht clone is every bit as good as a real Albrecht, but caveat emptor applies.

Hand Taps: IMO, definitely worth it to spend $$ on good taps like Sossner, OSG, etc. You can easily feel the difference in the torque required.

Where else does it pay one to spend a bit more? The idea is not to bash - I own and enjoy a large number of "import" tools that are every bit as good as the expensive domestic variety. The idea is to be informed on the current state of the art with regards to tools and tooling. Also, where is it a good idea to buy the import tools? Things like parallels, 1-2-3 blocks, many others, are excellent values and good tools.

 

[90LX_Notch]

I agree with what you posted Swede. In a nut shell- anything that cuts or can't be tuned. By tuned I mean you can correct it ie: the "kit" view of imports. It is hard to correct a collet, but a vise can be considered a kit and you can remachine it to where it works.

-Bob

 

[lensman57]

Hi,
I also have a lot of Chinese stuff that have been a cause for dissapointment and some that are really great and a bargain too, well, they were untill all the importers in UK increased their prices by about 30% in Jan.
If You need absolute accuracy and a fine standard of finish I think it still pays to buy US or EU made stuff even though these cost at least three times as much as the Chinese ones, Otherwise save the pennys and buy Chinese, you can always try and fine tune them anyway, I said TrY !!!

regards,

A.G

 

[gbritnell]

Excellent view of the hobby and tooling world were in today.
I for one have like most people do, some import stuff and some domestic.

Machine Tools
As far as a milling machine I have used many types, styles and sizes in my career, some German, some American and some imports. When I got my first real mill it was an Enco mill/drill. This was in the late 70's. I would have liked a Bridgeport or similar but mill but raising a family and other things precluded this from happening. Was it an ideal machine, not at all, but I learned to work around it's weaknesses. I recently purchased a Grizzly mill which I posted here on the board. Without getting into the full explanation why just let me say that I'm quite happy with the quality and finish of the machine.

Milling Cutters
I have a lot of American brand end mills that I have bought over the years, some used and resharpened and some new. The last couple of times Enco had a sale on high speed end mills I bought some as the price was too good to pass up. Well I'm here to tell you that they are generally junk. Case in point, some won't cut right out of the plastic tube. Yeah sure they'll cut but you can feel the machine pounding as it tries to move against the cutter. Second and this is a big one, the shanks are tapered. Now these are supposed to be .375 ground shanks and they vary by .001 to the plus side. I shouldn't say vary I should say taper. The problem is I don't use collets and my holders are ground to take .375 shanks. I will be buying American end mills in the future albeit not as many as I would have.

Drill Bits
They're all American so I can't compare.

Collets and Collet Holders
Don't even get me started on these things, whether American or import. I have tried out so many import chucks and collets that claim .0001 accuracy only to find they're lucky if they can hit .0015. As far as the American stuff it's just too pricey for my budget.

Hand Taps and Dies
Buy quality wherever you can find it. The import dies that I have used are generally very poor quality. At one time you would get Japanese, Polish or Israeli tooling and it was very good but nowadays it's all import. Yes you can buy American taps and dies and I do but they don't go down to the smaller sizes any more, dies that is.

My view of the import tooling is it's very hit and miss. Some fellows have good luck but others don't.

George

 

[MachineTom]

Agree with Swede, some tools that can be improved after purchase, a case in point. One of those EBay 5C indexers cheap, all look the same even the same awful color. It arrives, the spindle is within .001, all that is needed, put a collet in tighten the handle an it just keeps going, there are three set screws holding the handle to the spindle tube, tight as can be, answer drill through on of the setscrew hole, tap, and locktite a setscrew, no more slipping. Second the edges of the base are as cast, no machining at all, so how do you set the indexer square to anything, without using a collet and ground rod. Disassemble the machine and mount to an angle plate off the machined face of the indexer, then mill the edges of the base, so now there is a known surface parallel to the spindle bore. It can now fit in my 6" vise which is the easiest way to mount it. I intended to make mounting notches in the base, but the spacing of the notches could not match the slots in the mill table so I did not do that.

 

[Deanofid]

This is probably going to be a "me too" thread for anyone who actually uses their machines a lot. So, me too! I agree with what Swede says regarding cutting tools.
The example given for milling cutters is even worse against the far east crud when you can get Atrax solid carbide end mills for $8 in 1/4", and they are actually straight, sharp and outlast the cheap junk 10 to 1.
I fell for those "10-endmills-for-$20" thing once. What junk! The finish is horrible compared to good sharp American mills, and you can feel the cheap ones beating the machine.

Drill bits, same thing. Pre-dulled and you can watch the end of the drill bit describe an arc!

I did buy a set of ER collets from a Chinese importer. They did run as advertised... at .0006". Not very good, but that's what I paid for. I also have a set of ER collets from Israel. They are flawless.

Enco used to sell import stuff that came from Poland, Israel, and Macedonia. They were good tools. The far east people can't even match what Macedonia was making 20 years ago.

 

[steamer]

Hey guys.....absolutely......some tools just don't pay to buy otherwise.

End mills for SURE....I always by American and good brand.....taps also.

Be very careful with the import collets...sometimes their hit and most times miss.

Their claims have never been substantiated.....

Dave

 

[rake60]

My experience....

End mills: No doubt worth the extra $$$. The cheap one shatter like glass on contact.

Drill Bits: I go mid-line. Best are expensive, low end will untwist rather than drill.

Hand Taps: The cheap ones will just make you say words that will make you go blind.
(That is according to my Grandma's teachings.)

Drill Chucks: I can't tell a difference.

Machine Tools: I can't afford a USA made machine so I have to buy imports. Just don't buy
one from Enco. If you do and there's a problem with it, you're on your own
until they can find time to free someone up long enough to help you.

Rick

 

[Swede]

It sounds like we have had a lot of similar experiences.

I bought my 8" X 36" knee mill around 1995. It is an ENCO brand, but I had the good fortune of being able to examine a number of machines in person at an ENCO showroom. My plan was to originally buy a mill-drill. As I examined the mill-drills, I felt a little sick at the sad state of the fit, finish, the quality of the castings, the feel of the tables as they moved. I thought "If they can't correct the obvious flaws, how many more are going to crop up on the inside?"

I moved over to examine the knee mills. It was like a different world. All of a sudden, the castings were clean, correct, the tables moved like oiled silk, everything simply felt right. I bought a machine I could hardly afford, but I've thanked the machinery gods a thousand times since then, because that mill has done everything I've asked without any problems at all for 15+ years now.

I have since heard that the Chinese factories that made machinery then were fully capable of making very high quality tools, but intentionally cut corners for the export market to keep costs extremely low. That makes sense from a nation that can make hydrogen bombs and nuclear submarines. You can't make those on a mill-drill! The U.S. importers listened to their customers and demanded that China raise the quality, and over the years, what we get from China has improved immensely.

But things like cutters - not sure what's going on there. All I know is I won't touch them. Ditto import mill vises.

Good import stuff:

- Anything of simple ground steel, like parallels, blocks, angle irons, etc.
- Basic 3-jaw chucks are fine. All they are supposed to do is hold raw stock anyhow.
- Some of the dial indicators are a tremendous value
- The $20 six inch LCD calipers are a bargain

 

[Jeremy_BP]

A while ago enco started having a perpetual sale on Atrax end mills. A while ago I started buying Atrax end mills. The difference in quality between those and my cheap imports is amazing. And as much as I like the price of the chinese cutters, I just can't go back.

 

[moconnor]

Hello All,

When I first started to put my home shop together back in the mid 1980's I started with a worn out South Bend 10K lathe which I refurbished. Once that was operational, I really wanted a milling machine, but back then there were not many choices for a 20-something year-old on an apprentice's salary. After finding 'The Home Shop Machinist' magazine on a book store shelf, I saw the ads for the imported mill-drills and some of the articles that were written about them. I took a chance on one and that was the last import machine tool that I have purchased. I won't repeat all of the typical problems that I had with it, but it was horrible. I eventually sold it and found a Burke Millrite that I was very happy with. Given the current choices, if they were available back then, I probably would have bought a Sieg SX3 and would have been happy with it. Some of the machinery and tooling from the far east these days is of much better quality than what was available when I started putting my shop together, so I may have a different opinion now about these tools if I had started out with better experiences.

In the mid 1990's I started teaching in our local NTMA Vocational School. Due to budgets and the high cost of tooling, many compromises had to be made. The senior instructor who purchased the tooling did a pretty good job of finding the higher quality imports, but did we ever find some junk along the way. Many of the import end mills and drills were not fit to use out of the box and it was frustrating to a beginning student to have a poor quality cutting tool affect the finish that they are trying to learn how to achieve. We would put the brand new end mills out for the first milling project which was a set of 1/2" x 1" parallel bars and also their first experience on a milling machine. These were only roughing cuts as the parallels were sent out for carburizing and finish ground afterward, so the finish wasn't too important. There were always the mistakes at the beginning like running the spindle in reverse and climb milling, so some casualties were to be expected. After this stage of the project was completed, I would re-sharpen all of the 1" and 1/2" endmills on our tool and cutter grinder and they would work a whole lot better. I could never understand why they couldn't get the sharpening correct at the factory. Drill bits were a different story. Many would not even work out of the package. Some would even come with a negative lip relief on the drill point - the corner of the drill point was higher than the lip or in other words, the clearance was actually backwards. Of course these would need to be re-sharpened before using. The one thing they never compromised on was taps and always bought high quality USA or European ones. An import tap of poor quality was doomed in the inexperienced hands of some students.

I was fortunate that after a few years there I was given the opportunity to put together a 640 hour course for a local US automaker's stamping plant to train first-year diemakers and machine repair apprentices in machine tool operation and toolmaking. I actually got my own roll-a-round tool cart just for my students that I was able to fill with made in USA tools and tooling. The coordinator of the apprentices didn't want to see any import tooling. Yes, I was very spoiled in that job, but it was a treat to not have to worry about poor quality tooling.

In my home shop, which has grown and evolved over the years, my view is that I worked too hard to be aggravated by poor quality tools. It is my place for fun and enjoyment and I would rather save and have quality than quantity of tools and so I only buy USA, UK, EU or Japanese tools and tooling if I can. They will last me a lifetime, so I buy the best I can afford and buy them once. Some guys have a sports car, a race car, a boat or enjoy belonging to a country club. I have my shop which is the black hole into which I choose to pour money. Oh well, to each his own.

Regards,
Mike

 

[tornitore45]

Like most of you I started out with imported cutting tools. Specifically end mills. USA cost 3 times as much but cut 3 times as long with no effort. Imported cut smoking and burning before they do not cut at all. In my view USA end mill are cheaper althoug it hurt when you buy the equivalent of all 3 imported at the same time.

As you said before everything that cut better be quality. I have bought indexable inported tool-holder, and they are fine but the inserts gut to be USA, night and day difference.

4 jaw chucks, I can live with import, accuracy is not compromised; finish and feel is another matter.

Anything plain and ground is ok, I got V blok, Angle blocks, round dimensional gages, parallel and angle block with no complains.

Oddly enough, precision instruments like calipers, indicator, height gauges etc are good. Perhaps they undrstand there is very little gray area in that environment. Either the product satisfy a minimum requirement or is junk.

I was very happy with my SPI drill chuck. Usually the arbors are junk.

 

[Blogwitch]

For the last couple of years I have used nothing but far eastern HSS milling cutters, home grown HSS tooling is just too expensive.

I find them perfect for use on almost all the non ferrous materials and even good on leaded steel, giving very good finishes and longevity of life. I have even started to resharpen them as well when they go dull, extending their life even further. I think I have only broken two, small ones, and that was my fault for pushing them beyond what they should cut.

I do use a few Iscar, very expensive carbide cutters, when needed, but I have found, unlike what most people think here, the cheapo Chinese ones work great for me for normal machining work.

John

 

[Deanofid]

John, I sometimes wonder if we get a different grade of Chinese cutting tools here than they ship to the U.K. I wouldn't be surprised if the importers have a number of different quality levels to choose from. We seem to get the dregs here, when talking about certain edged tools, especially in the drill bit and end mill category.

The "10 for $20" end mills I bought were wretched. The $10 dial indicators are quite good. It's strange that they can put together many parts to make a perfectly good DI, but won't take the time to properly sharpen an end mill, or to make it without a taper. It's kind of maddening.

 

[Blogwitch]

Dean,

I buy my cutters direct rather than from UK retailers, they work out much cheaper, but you have to wait for delivery a bit longer.


John

 

[steamboatmodel]

My experience has been similar to Johns. I find quite often that people have the habit that they expect too much from there equipment and push it too hard. I was in one fellows shop and he was complaining about his new Mill and the tooling not being any good. He was doing a pocket in mild steel by plunging down to the full depth then cranking the X axes as fast as he could to the end of the pocket, then moving over the full width of the cutter and cranking back. I debated quickly in my mind as to whether I should agree with him that the Mill was crap and try to by it off him cheap or to show him what he was doing wrong. I ended up showing him how to properly do the job and explained that the speeds and feeds listed in his new Machinery's Handbook were for Industrial machines and production rates not for hobby machines.
Regards,
Gerald.

 

[Ken I]

Similar experience to most.

When a manufacturer takes enough pride in his work to slap a brand name and mark on his product - you can generally trust its better than the "no-name" rubbish. (Plus you can always hunt them down or bad mouth them when all else fails).

I used to think if it looked well made you were probably O.K. but my recent experience with a beautifully made but utterly useless set of (no-name) ER collets & chuck has led me to shelve that theory somewhat.

I recently bought some cheapo centre drills - one looked a little "off colour" (seriously) - on attempting to centredrill aluminium, the end broke off the instant it touched the work - ditto the other end immediately thereafter - the others worked fine.

I returned the bad one to the supplier but the looks I received sugget they think I simply broke it. I've broken plenty of centredrills and I know when its my fault - this was most definitely not me.

Ken

 

[titex]

I personally have never been a fan of chinese cutting tools, or any form of work/tool holding.
I did try a couple of chinese endmills a while back just for a laugh, and it confirmed just what I expected, crap! The endmills that I always use are the following,
OSG, Guhring, Walter/Titex, Clarkson, and Dormer.
I have never used any far eastern collets, but if they are anything like their endmills no, no, it has to be Rohm for me.
Albrecht or Schunk drill chucks and milling chucks.
Workholding I use Bison/Bail on my lathe, 3 jaw sc and 4 jaw independent. [ I would really have liked a Forkhardt but could not justify the sky high cost.]
I have never used any chinese milling vice so I have no opinion on them. but I have a Rohm and a large Gressel.
Quality tools cost a lot more than Chinese/ Far eastern imports, but really there is no comparision. I find that recognized production makes work out cheaper in the long run.
Titex.

 

[Swede]

I ended up showing him how to properly do the job and explained that the speeds and feeds listed in his new Machinery's Handbook were for Industrial machines and production rates not for hobby machines.
Regards,
Gerald.

Gerald, this is very interesting to me.

My first mill experience was on a 3:1 machine back around 1987, when they were fairly new to the market. What a wretched setup. To get any sort of accuracy required light cuts and slow feeds. For example, to knock 0.125" off of a mild steel piece would take maybe 10 separate passes of around 0.010" each with a 1/2" end mill. Tiny, whimpy cuts.

Then I got my big VM. Old habits died very, very hard. All of my cuts initially were so timid, in retrospect it was pathetic. My machining buddy operated the same way.

I gained some experience. One day, I watched a VMC doing it's thing with a 1/2" ball end mill in aluminum, and the feed & speed was shocking, with a glittering stream of thick chips flowing off like a garden hose. In my mind: "That cutter is not hardened plutonium, it is the same HSS cutter I have at home. It can handle it."

So I stuck a big scrap Al chunk in my vise and began some experiments. I found I could cut with feedrates that were at least 500% greater than I had previously. And cutter life improves. Cutters like to take healthy bites, not rub along making metal dust. I showed my buddy and he could not believe it. We operated similar knee mills.

For guys unsure about feeds/speeds - try it with some scrap. Be prepared to sacrifice a cutter, but in my case, nothing broke. The limiting factor is often horsepower, rigidity, tooth loading. You'll hear the bearings beginning to rattle or strain before the cutters physically break. Obviously be careful with a 1/8" end mill, but in general, we home guys tend to machine too slowly.

 

[Mainer]

Things I am going to use all the time -- like the ubiquitous 0-1" micrometer -- I try to get top quality. I also have a 3"-4" well-used Starrett micrometer that I picked from a vendor at an engine show for something like $15.00. Or, it could have been a cheapish import just as well. For the amount of times I use a 3"-4" micrometer, less than the best is plenty good enough.

Collets, drills, taps, endmills, etc. have got to be accurate and work properly, and the best quality costs the most money. I try to buy Hardinge collets -- if you don't insist on a full set of R8 collets, you can afford to get Hardinge for the 6 or so you really will use. If at some future date you need a 19/64" R8 collet, get an inexpensive one.

Good drills are worth it. Good taps are especially worth it. Endmills...the Travers Tool Co. "quality import" endmills are fairly decent, or were the last time I bought some. If you're just learning you ARE going to trash some endmills before you get a feel for what is reasonable. It's a lot less painful to break a $5 import than a $20 Weldon. After you DO learn what you're doing, it becomes worthwhile to buy Weldon, Niagara, etc.