new to metal lathes

[kpswans]

I am looking into machineing grade 2 titanium from what I have read low speed around 600rpm, and water based full syn. coolant must be used along with carbide bits. The items i will be machining would be less than 4" length and 1" diameter

I was looking at the grizzly 60745 would this be enough to do the job?

[John Evans]

You must be kidding ! Aluminum that size with HSS tooling you might do ,titaniun don't think you have a chance.

[kpswans]

what machines do you suggest I am a woodworker by profession never really gotten to involved with machineing other than making moulder knife.

[John Evans]

Try someting in the 12X36 size that weighs 800-1000 , That will have enough mass and be ridged enough to use carbide tooling. In your area a South Bend Heavy 10 should be avilable or a 13" SB ,forget the SB 9" stuff. Or a 11-12" Sheldon or Logan ,those will have some mass and were good machines and will be cheaper the the green bear to boot.

[kpswans]

Is it a hp thing or a ridgity thing that I can't use the mini lathes how much should these southbend heavy 10's go for? And are most of them 3-phase

[John Evans]

Both !! SB heavy 10 in your area I would expect $1000-1500 depending on condition and tooling included, out here double that. 3 phase is no issue as long as 220-240 single is available,you can use a static-rotory or VFD. As I said Logan or Sheldon also and I would much rather have a 11-12 " Logan over the antique design SB. I ran a 12" Logan with a 2 HP motor with a static converter with no issues. But be sure to buy a lathe with a QC gearbox whatever you look at.

[kpswans]

Thanks appreciate the insight I was looking into making titanium nails but I'm not sure there will be enough profit to be worth while I see them go for $60 but the cost of titanium is almost 40.

[Harold_V]

If you have little to no experience in machining, especially titanium, you'd most likely find yourself well over your head. Titanium is amongst the most difficult of all metals to machine. Not a great way to learn to cut metals, but I expect that the guy who can machine titanium successfully can accomplish almost any task. Maybe even catch a fly with chopsticks.

Harold

[Carm]

".....titaniun don't think you have a chance."

John, HSS was used on Ti before carbide existed, the hardest part was breaking a chip, usually just interrupted the feed.
Not saying a green hand with a peashooter won't have trouble.

[rudd]

I just looked up what a "titanium nail" is. Nothing to do with fastening materials together, that's sure. Someone is knocking those out on a machining center, you'd have way more than 60 bux in labor in one of them on a manual machine, even one that could handle the job.
The one time I turned titanium - let's see, slow speed and rigidity? 20" Lodge and Shipley from around 1912. Turned some wedding bands no problems. Well, I did have one problem in hitting size, the one I made for my wife-to-be must have been a bit too large, it somehow kept slipping off when she went out of town...
thankfully, she is now someone else's problem.

[Downwindtracker2]

LOL