# Milling job required Manchester



## John Hall (20 Apr 2022)

I have a piece of mild steel 4”x2”x5” that needs the ends facing off square…
Does anyone have a milling machine in the Manchester area that could do the job, or know of a small engineering company that could do it?


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## Jameshow (20 Apr 2022)

Probably best at one of the old school engineering shops up in the lancs valleys??


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## John Hall (20 Apr 2022)

Just rang a local one…£45 an hour plus vat…


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## clogs (20 Apr 2022)

£45 per hour ....sounds cheap to me.....
I bought a used Bridgeport 10 years ago, not cheap plus the tooling....dread to think how much I've spent getting it set up for general work.........
I'd say worth every penny....prob only 30 mins max...which will include replacing the tooling from the prev job......
and prob £5 pounds of elec at current prices....
I had a small workshop in Stockport.....just the rates alone went up around £1400 in just a few short years.......that's why I binned it, nobody wanted to pay for the jobs....
sorry rant over...
if u lived near me it'd be a freebie....


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## Daniel2 (20 Apr 2022)

I'd second that.
£45 an hour is very reasonable indeed.


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## John Hall (20 Apr 2022)

Think I’ll get my file out…


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## Richard_C (20 Apr 2022)

A skilled machinist doing non standard work (not a semi skilled machine operator) will be paid £15 an hour or so. The employer has to add employers NI, statutory pension contributions and other odd bits so the person costs close to £20 an hour. Then you have to add premises, rent rates and power, machines (depreciation, repair), finance costs, tooling cos it wears out, employer liability insurance, many more small things, allow for the fact that you are not producing 100% of the time, management, quality control, selling time, admin like invoicing, put 20% vat on top of whatever you charge then make a profit.

£45 is pretty much the minimum.

Anyway, how square do you need square to be? If you need tight tolerances a file might not do it unless you are very skilled and very careful.


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## John Hall (20 Apr 2022)

I was hoping a local hobbyist may have one…I’ve got about 1/4” to remove. guess I’m going to have to be very skilled and very careful…plus extra weetabix..


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## TFrench (20 Apr 2022)

I always struggle to know what to charge for machine work. Most of the jobs I take on are for hobbyists who don't want to be hit with a massive bill, but at the same time most people don't realise how much time goes into a job. Let alone how much money I have sunk in machines and tooling (it's terrifying if you even begin to add it up ) 

Couple of weeks ago an old farmer came to me to make a brake adjuster piece for a tractor he's restoring. Simple enough parts, one of them is a flat plate with a square hole that drives a cam. He looks at it and grins like it's a spaceship part and says "bet you can't drill a square hole, boy". Took me minutes to mill it out with a 4mm endmill and square the corners on the filing machine. His mind was blown when he got his bits the next day!


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## Gordon Tarling (21 Apr 2022)

Don't forget that a milling machine is not necessary in order to face or square off the ends, it can easily be done in a 4 jaw chuck on a lathe.

G.


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## Sandyn (21 Apr 2022)

+1 for lathe. I do it for making square end weights for a model making friend, but only in 1" square X 4" steel bar. 
4"x2"x5" will be about 7Kg, so needs a reasonable size lathe. It should only take a few minutes to do if it's reasonably square to start with. . It doesn't need to be set up very accurately in a 4 jaw. It doesn't matter where the centre of the cut is on the end, as long as it's square.


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## John Hall (21 Apr 2022)

I’m seriously considering trying the lathe..I’ve got a Warco 250..but I was wondering about the weight and the fact it’s 125mm long..
It’s for a fixed toolpost


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## deema (21 Apr 2022)

Mount a cutter in the Chuck and secure the part to the carriage or cross slide if you don’t fancy having the billet in the Chuck.


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## John Hall (21 Apr 2022)

I don’t have a cutter suitable, still considering putting it in the chuck…thanks..


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## gog64 (21 Apr 2022)

Well if you wanted to drive all the way to Ross on Wye I’d to it for you for a decent donation to a charity of your choice. @Richard_C ’s analysis of costs for a skilled machinist has me depressed though. Average salary in the UK is £38k and a skilled machinist makes only £31k? No wonder that this country is in such a mess when we value the trained people who actually MAKE things so little.


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## Sandyn (21 Apr 2022)

When I work with large-ish chunks of steel on my Myford, I clamp the steel in the chuck, but not really tight and not all the way in. I then use the tailstock with a centre to push the steel into the chuck. If the chuck is quite tight, but not fully tightened, it makes the steel align with the chuck as you 'force' it in. I then really tighten the chuck on all keyholes. I replace the tailstock centre point with a large centre drill and slowly drill the end to the diameter of the centre drill. The idea is to have a centre hole with a chamfer which is wider than the rotating centre of the tailstock. This allows you to machine all the end, and always have the piece supported at both ends. You might have to shape a tool for doing this. I have never tried anything as heavy as 4X2X5" steel. I would start very slow. That's a big bit of metal to be flying around the workshop. I'm sure you will be able to do it if your chuck can open wide enough.


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## Richard_C (21 Apr 2022)

TFrench said:


> I always struggle to know what to charge for machine work. ...
> 
> Couple of weeks ago an old farmer came to me to make a brake adjuster piece for a tractor he's restoring.



I work for myself in a very different field (just about fully retired now) and also worry about rates. One thing to think about is the perceived value to the customer. Your example - the value isn't the time/materials cost, its the value to the customer because without that part it won't get restored. So you charge fairly but with a view to some profit. I got some work done on the house, new leaded valleys - old ones getting leaky - seemed like a lot of money but in the context of the value of the house it was trivial. Same with getting your car fixed, I keep mine for aeons, value of a car that won't go is zero, the garage rates might seem high but the work turns that zero into £5k - worth.


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## Dalboy (21 Apr 2022)

John Hall said:


> I don’t have a cutter suitable, still considering putting it in the chuck…thanks..


Cutters are not that expensive so by the time you have driven or sent the steel off you could have brought a cutter and use the lathe to mill it


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## John Hall (21 Apr 2022)

Well I bit the bullet and put it in the four jaw…slow speed, small cuts…so far so good…

all done….much easier than I’d over thought it would be …turned out really well..
all part of the learning or turning curve…


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## John Hall (21 Apr 2022)

gog64 said:


> Well if you wanted to drive all the way to Ross on Wye I’d to it for you for a decent donation to a charity of your choice. @Richard_C ’s analysis of costs for a skilled machinist has me depressed though. Average salary in the UK is £38k and a skilled machinist makes only £31k? No wonder that this country is in such a mess when we value the trained people who actually MAKE things so little.


Thanks for the offer…I’ve decided to try it in the four jaw….going well…


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