call me cheap...

Jim and Matt helped me get the Tormach on the stand I built. We used the engine hoist from Sculpture and figured out a strategy to get it placed safely. It was a bit of work to get it on there and I owe the two of them for all of their help. I'm glad the stand is sturdy because the mill weighs quite a bit. Today I punched some holes in the stand for cable routing and I sanded it down to prep for paint. I put a quick coat of machine grey on it and then I got to work on the x-axis chip guard (like the one in the Tormach pic above). I should be able to finish this up later tomorrow and put another coat of paint on the stand. I also made some brackets today to mount the monitor and tool tray to the machine. I'll have to get to work on making the large chip trays and getting the lubricant feed system fixed up also. Tormach is kind enough to put a pdf of their tool tray on their website and it imports nicely into Rhino, so I prepped the file so I can cut it as soon as I get the wiring completed. One step closer....

I saved $1,500 by not buying the deluxe stand as pictured above. A lot of people would probably say that I should have just bought the stand and saved myself the effort, but I'm just not wired that way. Call me cheap, call me stupid, tell me that I have no "business sense", but in my opinion this is the type of attitude that has created the kind of people who are disconnected from actually doing something with substance. Anyway, what else was I going to do today, surf the net or maybe waste an entire day doing nothing?

Nah, when it comes to a decision like this, I think I'll choose cutting some metal and welding stuff together so I can get on down the road with a skill or two in my back pocket and a tool that I'll be able to use until I die...