Woodworker's Journal 2004-28-6, страница 51

Function: Turns spindles

joinery in it, such as mortises, sliding dovetail slots or ordinary grooves.

Covering the mill's headstock and tailstock with a flat panel enables you to use the mill for flattening and tapering stock, or for profiling and ornamenting flat material. Locate a pivot pin in this flat bed and you can use it to cut and profile rounds, like tabletops. Use a template and the mill's follower to cut duplicate parts.

There's more it can do, of course.

The Legacy Ornamental Mill is the biggest, most expensive, and maybe the most versatile of the router-based monsters that I tried.

The 900 model is the smallest of the mills that will do spirals. It'll take

spindles up to 9" in diameter and 48" long. Without a router or bits, the 900 costs more than $1,000. Accessories like additional gears, expanded indexing plates, electiic motors and various vises and supports, can more than double your investment. And then there's the router and all the bits you'll need.

The mill arrived in three cartons. Opened, the boxes yielded aluminum extrusions, steel channels, mysterious ... ahhh ... assemblies, steel gears and countless plastic bags stuffed with cap screws, washers, nuts, doodads and stuff. Iliere's even a small pouch of grease for lubing shafts and bushings during assembly.

Assembly took several hours, and for me involved a couple of do-overs and two calls to Legacy's 800 number (one a Homer Simpson-esque D'ohhh!, the other prompting an overnight shipment of a new part). As daunting as that pile of parts and fasteners looked, assembly was not at all difficult. All the parts fit well; the

action and movements were smooth and precise.

The assembly instructions are very good, though they haven't completely kept up with the continuing evolution of the machine. Videos help you get started, but there is no operating manual. Fortunately, it is pretty intuitive to use. Too, it's the sort of tool that stimulates ideas. One application leads to another.

The machine consists of two nesting beds, bristling with gears and threaded rods and cranks. 'Hie inside bed has the headstock and adjustable tailstock. The outer one supports a carrier for a router, preferably a plunge router. The carrier can be moved from one end of the bed to the other (the X- axis), and from one side to the other (the Y-axis).

Obviously, the router's bit will work whatever blank is susi^ended between the headstock and tailstock.

Tlie inside bed can be set flush and level with the outside one, or dropped as much as 5" below it, or tilted so the

Legacy 900 Ornamental

Legacy Ornamental Mill

Shipping weight: 95 ibs. Phone: 800-279-4570 www. legacy woodworking. com