18″ NexGen Benchtop Mill XY Base – CNC-Ready

Each of our four mill sizes is available as an XY base. You can purchase the base of any of our vertical mills as an XY base if you already own a vertical milling column for use with your lathe. The XY base offers a sturdier base and a larger work area than the lathe. Lathe owners can then swap the headstock and motor/speed control from their lathe to the vertical milling column in approximately 60 seconds.

XY bases have also found their way into the industrial market and are used in various manufacturing setups. These slides have been popular items in the industry to control movement in small production line processes, and the addition of computer control extends the possibilities for automation. If you are taking the vertical milling column and motor/speed control from your manual lathe to add to this XY base to make up a full milling machine, you can also upgrade your milling column to CNC-ready by adding upgrade kit P/N 6740/6745 to add the stepper motor mount.

If You Have a Standard Mill Column Base

Please note that milling column bases made before 1995 must be modified in order to work with this XY base. You can return your older vertical milling column to the factory to be re-machined and used with an XY base rather than purchasing the entire vertical milling machine (Contact us for pricing).

Vertical milling column bases made after 1995 do not need to be modified. This combination saves you the amount of money included in the cost of the vertical mill for the column but gives you the same machine minus the headstock and motor/speed control.

The NexGen CNC-Ready Benchtop Mill XY base is the same base used in our 5800-series NexGen CNC-Ready benchtop mill.

It has stepper motor mounts on each axis, ready for the installation of stepper motors. (Stepper motors not included, see the STEPPER MOTOR page.) Handwheels are included and can be mounted to the end of the stepper motors to maintain manual control when needed.*

*NOTE: CNC-ready machines cannot be operated manually unless double-shaft stepper motors are installed.

Standard Features for the NexGen CNC-Ready Benchtop Mill XY Base

• 18″ Mill Base
• 18″ Extended Mill Table
• NEMA #23 Stepper motor mounts on the X- and Y-axes
• 2″ (51mm) resettable, zero adjustable handwheels on the X- and Y-axes. Each handwheel has laser-engraved aluminum handwheel collars.
• Oil reservoir on the X/Y axes
• Travel: X=8.65″ (220 mm), Y=11.0″ (279 mm)

Optional Y-axis Leadscrew Cover Upgrades for the Mill XY Base

Brass tube cover for the rear of the Y-axis*
Accordion way cover for the front and rear of the Y-axis
Rigid Mill Column Base

*You must purchase the Rigid Mill Column Base (P/N 50055 or 50056) to work with the brass tube cover. The round column base of the 8-direction mill will not fit on this base.