MN Metal Shop

Note: We have only one manual lathe and only one mill available for member use. Our sheet metal area is also available. Volunteers are working to bring the CNC metal tools into usable condition.

Lathes

• Clausing-Colchester 6527 13" x 36" Gap Bed Lathe
• LeBlond Regal 13" x 42" Lathe

Milling Machines

• Bridgeport J-Head Mill
• Bridgeport J-Head Variable Speed Mill
• Kearney & Trecker 2H 10" x 50" Horizontal Milling Machine

CNC Tools

• CNC Hitachi-Seiki Lathe
• Matsuura MC-500V Vertical Machining Center CNC Mill
• Cincinnati Sinker EDM
• Birmingham CNC Conversion Mill

Tips

• Select the correct cutting oil for your job

Welding

tips and tricks

• MIG Welding
  • Millermatic 220
  • Lincoln Electric
• TIG Welding
  • Lincoln Electric TIG Welder
• Arc Welding

Plasma Cutting

A GoFab CNC plasma cutting table with a 48" X 96" bed. It can pierce up to 1" but it cuts 5/8" well, however it also depends on the material. For example, Aluminum would not go past 3/8" max.

A plasma cutter has the largest allowance of any metal cutting CNC with a kerf of 1/16" so it is not the best for extreme precision but good for most projects.

Why is the max thickness of aluminum less than that of steel? Aluminum when it oxidizes puffs up which causes the cut edge to be less clean than that of mild steel, the thinker it is, the more pronounced this effect is, so it cuts increasingly poorly. Tts not that it won't cut just that you lose quality as the material's thickness increases more so than other materials. You'll see this kind of cut variation with many metals and you will want to adjust your settings to account for that. GoFab has some settings for different materials to account for this so you don't need to spend time troubleshooting material types.

Drill Press

• Delta Drill Press

Saws

• Horizontal Band Saw
• Vertical Band Saw
• Makita LC1230 12" Metal Cutting Saw

Grinders

• K. O. Lee S718 6" x 19" Surface Grinder
• Pedestal Grinder

Sheet Metal Tools

All of our sheet metal tools have a capacity of - Mild steel: 16ga; Aluminum: 14ga; Stainless Steel: 24ga.

• Finger Brake
  • 48" finger brake with adjustable fingers
  • capacity of 16ga. mild steel and a 24ga. capacity for stainless steel.
  • a maximum angle of 140
  • the throat has a 3" vertical through and a minimum finger width of 2"
• Stomp Shear
  • 48" sheet metal
  • an imperial measured siding stop
  • 16ga. mild steel capacity and a 24ga. capacity stainless steel.
• Roper Whitney No. 58 5-Ton Punch Press
• Floor Mounted Slip Roller
  • 48" wide slip roller
  • 1" minimum radius
  • 16ga. mild steel capacity, and a 24ga. capacity for stainless steel
• Tabletop Slip Roller
  • 12" wide
  • a 3/4" minimum radius

Misc Tools

• Sand Casting

Hand Tools

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