Suite 6 · the room
One gantry, a wet table, too many chips
The mill is not a showroom. It is a 900-square-foot former pattern shop on Olive, fir-dark in winter, aluminum-bright when the cutter is in the cut. Golfers stand behind a painted line. The vise does not share that line.
The bed you hear from the alley
A 3-axis bed mill with a 12,000-rpm spindle sits against the north wall. We keep the enclosure doors closed because 17-4 chips find socks. CAM lives on a dented tower that still boots. Tooling is four-flute carbide for iron faces, a smaller square-end for groove walls, and a ball-nose we almost never use on a hitting surface — scallops look pretty and play drunk.
Coolant is a flood mix we change on a calendar, not a smell. Pacific humidity already does enough work on raw steel. Heads come in with a tag: alloy guess, year if known, what the golfer thinks the face is doing. We correct the alloy after a file spark, not after a brand stamp.
The wet table
We soak a collar on purpose
After a recut, a head can look jewelry-sharp and still fail the only test that matters in Lane County: a ball sitting in rye paste. We keep a shallow tray of soaked clippings from a muni that will remain unnamed. The machinist hits five balls off that mess, then looks at the groove with a 10× loupe. If the land has already rolled, we recut. If the land held, the ticket gets a stamp and the head goes home.
Indoor mats do not pack grooves. That is why we refuse to call a dry-range spin number a verdict. The wet table is ugly. It is also the honest half of the mill.
Where you stand, and where you do not
Visitors wait on the south side, on a strip of rubber that used to be a loading-dock mat. You can watch the first facing pass through the enclosure window. You cannot lean on the vise. Closed-toe shoes. No scarves near the spindle. Children may watch from the rubber; they may not collect chips. Those edges are still mill-sharp.
Parking is on Olive or the lot behind the brick. Suite 6 is the door with the aluminum end-mill stencil, not the yoga studio. If the gantry is loud, knock twice; Reed or Nia will kill the feed and open.