The Home Machinist!

Willy, Man you've been through the mill on this one but something that just stands up and grabs me is the picture of your lathe. At one time it was a "Gap Bed" lathe. I'm wondering why it was changed? Do you know the history behind why the gap is filled in? In your picture, looking at the ...

First off, greetings and welcome to the forum. As far as the three methods you mention in your post you did not say what the tolerance range would be but I think you are going to find it very hard if not impossible to attain any smooth finish and close tolerance trying to turn a piece that long as i...

I want to encourage anyone who tries to do something that has never been done! Without people trying something new we would all still be driving horses and buggys. Think about that a bit. Most inventions happened in spite of all the experts telling the person who did it that it could not be done! My...

McGyver, You take a lot for granted when you make statements like this: "That you went on to say how demanding your applications are says you don't understand " What made you think that I would use a three jaw chuck for any precision work! Nothing I said in any of these post could have bee...

John, As you can see from the previous post above eveyone has a different "standard" of what is acceptable. To me .004 is a lot of run out but I do gunsmith work and shoot precision long range guns. 200, 300 and 600 yards. Most off the shelf guns won't even hold the black at 600 yards but ...

Wow, .004 wiggle in a three jaw chuck seems pretty off center IMHO. I indicated my 3 jaw just last week with less than .0005 run using a 5/8" drill rod. I suppose you could true up the jaws if you knew where to take off metal but the only way I can think of to do this is to have some sort of in...

Rob,

If you need a "starting point" to get the motor running just lighly turn both needles in until they stop and back both of them out 1 1/2 turns, This will get you up and running! I've rebuilt too many of these to remember but that is where I always started.

Dave

Thanks for all the tips. Dave J. and Jose had the cure for this one. A little way lube and it cut just fine. First I checked the bearings for run out. None! I sped up the lathe to 600 RPM from 360. (Gear Heads next step) I shortned the cutter hang over to about a half an inch then tried the 416 agai...

Dave J. I'll check the bearings on my G4403G lathe and see if I have any end play. I did check them before I ran the break in but they may be loose now. I've tried HSS with 10 degree back rake and it cut about the same. I've been cutting pretty slow so I'll reduce my tool over hang, speed up a bit, ...

Jeff,

What I have is a 12X36 2HP lathe. Tool overhang may definitly be the issue!

Thanks,

Dave

It's amazing that when you write down everything that you have done you suddenly realize what might be the cause. Here is what I think is going on. I am turning a 5" length on this rod and to do so I have to extend my cutter out to clear the live center bearing that I am using to support the en...

I can't seem to get a repeatable smooth cut on my new lathe! Here is what I have checked. 1. Tool height. I'm right on dead center of the workpiece. (Could the tip be drawing down?) 2. Compound, crosslide and carraige gibbs are all snug. 3. Feedrate for finish cut is .0036 4. Depth of cut is .004 to...