Ever since I saw one at Brookstone's original store in Peterborough, New Hampshire, USA (about three decades ago), I've wanted a Unimat machining system. The original Emco model seems to possibly have been discontinued, and the name (and concept) acquired by a German company called The Cool Tool.
When I found out that Unimat was being sold through ThinkGeek, I thought about it for a while, and then ordered one. What the hell.
It's simply great. My first project (which I can mention now; I couldn't earlier because it was to be a surprise and I know the recipient reads my blog) was to make a d6 (normal six-sided cubical gaming die) out of a meteorite slice I had. And I did it. It took about a week, at maybe three hours a day, in 90°F weather, to get it done. I also found that the Unimat isn't well suited to working on hard metals; for one thing, the motor speed is too slow (6'000 RPM at highest), and for another the plastic machining vise doesn't deal well with hot workpieces. I took care of the first by jigging my Dremel to the Unimat framework, and the second by proceeding despite deforming plastic. 'Sokey, I got a replacement machining vise. My next project is going to be making aluminum jaws for it. :-)
I took some photos of the process, since the Unimat distributor for the Americas was quite interested in both the Dremel fitting and the meteorite working. (He's the one you'll be contacting for spare parts, upgrades, etc.) Also, I'm fairly proud of the job. You can see the photos on my Flickr page. The set starts off with the jigging for the Dremel, but the last few show the meteorite slice and the resultant d6. The meteorite slice is nickel-iron, and 3/16ths (0.1875) of an inch (4.5mm) thick.
