Member postings for Dave Whipp

Thanks everyone.

I did have a search of older posts and did a bit of digging, The Seig SX2P hi torque with R8 spindle is looking like a good candidate so far as the price leaves me a few quid to get some basic tooling.

However I will continue to look at some of the others mentioned...

Just thinking - How much use is a pillar drill in the workshop when you have a lathe and a mill ? If it's going to be pretty much redundant then I could unbolt it from the bench to free up some extra potential room for the mill. ?

Or would it be a poor choice to ditch the pillar drill altogether ? It is fairly tall and I have used it for jobs like drilling broken studs out of car cylinder heads, that I doubt would fit in a bench top mill. (just talked myself out of that idea I think !)

Thanks again - I'm finding this is a very friendly and helpful forum..

Edited By Dave Whipp on 19/05/2020 23:38:39

Just testing the opinion of the forum -

I would like to add a small mill to my workshop, I have a Myford super 7 and have done a little basic milling with it but it's quite limiting what you can do with only 2 axis movement.

Space is at a premium, so floor standing mills are probably out, will have to be a bench model, single phase. If 3 phase then inverter etc will have to count into the budget.

Have seen some mill / drills for sale (machine mart etc) but most seem to come with standard drill chucks which, I understand are not up to much, milling wise. I already have a decent bench drill.

Top budget is £1000, but would like that to include some basic tooling etc in that so I can make use of it without having to spend a load more on "accessories"

I don't mind buying used, but I don't want to take on a worn out restoration project like I did with my lathe, which I'm now very happy with but it took a lot of work.

So any mill pointers / tips recomendations chaps ?

Cheers - Dave.

Just a quick follow up & thanks.

Bought a piece of EN16T bar - machined the square peg OK though I didn't have much luck cutting it with HSS, ended up doing it OK with carbide.

I cut the business end off my existing 1/4" chuck key (sloppy fit) and welded my new EN16T extension onto it. It's working fine and I've given it some use today - no worries about twisting - looks like it will see me out anyway.

Thanks everyone.

Well I do have some M10 12.9 bolts kicking around but they're not long enough so I have ordered some longer ones on ebay. I have also ordered a short piece of EN16T - thanks all. I'll have a bash at making a fresh key with whatever turns up in the post first.

As for my previous home made key made from 100% pure scrapbinium steel - I cut a 6.9mm square peg on one end and the T bar across the top is approx 6" long and fixed in the centre. I tightened it down with one hand and I could feel it start to twist as I nipped it up. Is that overtightening ?

I have resorted to using a 1/4" ratchet & extension bar in the meantime but it's a sloppy fit and it's a PITA to use if you are trying to centre a piece in the 4 jaw.

So thanks all for the advice - especially about the bolts & Allen screws - I'd never really considered repurposing bolts before but it makes sense.

Dave.

That's nice. And it's the sort of design I need with the shank being quite narrow.

However I thought stainless wasn't particularly tough, which is why stainless fasteners are not recomended for safety critical stressed applications on cars. I also thought most stainless bolts are graded as A2 or A4, but isn't 8.8 a regular mild steel bolt if I'm not mistaken ?

12.9 HT bolt sounds more like it though - and I might have one of those kicking around in my odds & sods drawer.... Will have a look later.

So general opinion is that making a chuck key from tool steel is a bit overkill then ?

Thanks - Dave.

OK, thanks, will look into EN16T.

Dave.

Thanks - That's almost identical to the one I already have. Problem is, if you want to remove the chuck jaw for cleaning or just to turn it the other way round, it fouls on the round section of the chuck key as it comes out of the chuck body because it is too large a diameter close to the square key end. You have to partially remove the key and angle it over to one side to allow you to remove the jaw.

I suppose I could buy one of those in the link, remove the T bar, then turn it down to a smaller diameter providing the metal is machinable, or possibly grind it down.

However I thought that making a custom one from scratch might be a quick little side project, and if it requires tool steel then I might learn something along the way. However I don't want to end up spending hours and hours on it.

Dave.

Edited By Dave Whipp on 09/12/2019 00:20:52

Hi All -

I have a 4 jaw chuck (Polish made) that came along with my second hand lathe purchase, however I do not have the correct chuck key for it. From measurement it's a 7mm square key that is required.

Now I do have an imperial chuck key that is a sloppy fit and will sort of do the job but the diameter above the square section is quite large and makes removing the jaws pretty awkward, so I really need a longer and slimmer shank with a 7mm square end. Looking online I could not find a suitably shaped chuck key for sale, so I machined one up from some mild steel bar I had kicking around.

However on first use of tightening the jaws down on a part the square section started to twist, so obviously some stronger material is required.

So my very basic understanding of tool steel (please correct me if I'm wrong) is that it is soft enough to be easily machinable and then by heat treating it becomes much tougher.

However I see there are many different grades available, I'm not sure which would be most suitable for my job - or maybe some other type of steel that does not need heat treatment would be better ?

For information, my only heat source is a bullfinch brazing torch that's running on Propanol (burns a tad hotter than regular propane so I understand). -But I don't have any Oxy, it's Propanol only.

Any pointers or advice gratefully received.

Cheers - Dave.

Hi Robert - You have PM.

If it's for a ML7 and the right price then I might be interested. It's to fit this -

I put a photo in the PM but it got squished.

Dave.

Thanks once again. A simpler job than I thought. (though to be honest I was relishing the challenge of the acme threadcutting) If you don't try , you don't learn....

Thinking about it, if it was to screw onto the thread of the quill it would make fitting and removal a hassle because you'd have to dismantle the assembly each time instead of fitting it all as one unit.

I have ordered some 20mm aluminium to make it from. Will post up some photos when I've finished it, but before that I have some ebay DRO's to fit.

And also thanks for clarification on the need (or not) for drawbars. In my short time working with the morse tapers I haven't had one slip yet. I take it that they are not supposed to be oiled ?

Dave.

Thanks Chris & Hopper.

Lathe is approx 1958 vintage going from the serial number, though it's got a later clutch, a later wide bed saddle and roller bearing races, so it won't win any originality prizes.

So it looks like my ML7 tailstock is in fairly decent shape, apart from the loose handwheel. I won't bother sorting out the C plate, I'll go straight for making a lever arm setup instead, I've found some photos of the ML7 version of the lever arm and it doesn't look that difficult to replicate. The hardest part will be turning the internal Acme thread (I'm a first timer doing screwcutting, though I've watched plenty of youtube videos on it) I assume that it is an Acme thread and not a special Myford one-off thread ?

Regarding drawbars on MT tooling, is it permissible or advisable to mod MT tools by either drilling & tapping them (assuming they're soft enough) - or welding on a nut if not ? None of my MT drills or centres have tapped holes in the back.

Is there a standard thread for MT2 drawbars & tools ?

Dave.

Edited By Dave Whipp on 07/02/2019 21:55:09

Thanks for all the info and opinions. Lever attachment looks mighty fine (But I probably couldn't justify the cost of one, plus a S7 tailstock as well, unless the forum opinion is that my current one is shot.......)

So as to the state of my existing ML7 tailstock - I've taken some measurements tonight.

It is less than 1 thou higher than the headstock (0.02mm) and the bar lifts by 0.025mm when the clamp is applied, so I don't think I have too much to worry about there (or do I ? - I don't have anything to compare it to)

However the handwheel is pretty loose and wobbly, and there is 1/2 a turn of slack in it over most of the travel range. I'm guessing that this is quite a bit more than it should be ?

The only things I have done to the tailstock since I bought the lathe is to fit a new oil nipple, slap on some grey paint and oil it up.

Regarding drawbars - none of my taper tools or attachments have an attachment for one - I assume this would normally be a threaded hole in the end of the taper ?

Opinions gratefully received....

Dave.

Edited By Dave Whipp on 06/02/2019 20:59:27

Edited By Dave Whipp on 06/02/2019 21:17:27

Hi - Looking for a little advice from the more experienced Myford users.

I bought a 1950's Super 7 on ebay a few months ago and after many hours of work I have now got it into pretty good shape (Many new parts, bed scraped flat, 3 phase motor, repainted etc etc.)

However after looking at a lot of photos and old Myford literature it appears that my Super 7 has a ML7 tailstock instead of the correct Super 7 one.

The ML7 tailstock seems to be in reasonable shape although obviously it has some wear and I have put it to some light use without any obvious problems (but I am fairly new to the machining game)

I'm just wondering, is it worth me searching out a used Super 7 tailstock ? The ones I've seen online are not particularly cheap, However if the Super 7 tailstock design is much improved over the ML7 one then I may make the upgrade but if there's not much in it from a practical point of view then I'm not going to change it simply for the fact of having "all original" parts.

Any advice gratefully received.

Thanks - Dave.

Edited By Dave Whipp on 06/02/2019 00:00:24

Many thanks Dennis.

1- Very interesting to know the history. My bright yellow had been sloppily painted on top by the guy who was selling it. I wire brushed it all down as it looked terrible, there was traces of cream / light straw paint underneath the several layers that were there though. Today I painted the inside of the bed red, so that was a nice easy way to harden my bed without even realising

2 - I found that out the hard way and have modified the wide saddle - it now lines up and works well.

3 - I gave up on removing the tube - I was getting very near to thread stripping time with the amount of force I was applying and decided to leave it be before something broke and ended up giving me an even bigger headache. The plastic thimble was loose and a section of the threaded edge had cracked and a chunk was missing, so I have pulled out the plastic remnants and will make a new one from some white nylon, and slot the back so it goes in over the tube.

Thanks - Dave.

Thanks Peter.

Hole in the casting measures 22.1mm or .87 inches.

I don't have the gearbox on my lathe, but I do have plenty of gears. Will have to work that one out later I suppose.

The thread is so fine I could just put a slight taper on, and push the bezel over the plastic with some sealant on it but I'd like to make a proper job of it really. I will have a look at my thread gauge and see if 36 tpi seems a better match than 0.7mm

I have just bought a 5L can of 32 hydraulic oil so should be OK for a while there.

Cold & damp in the UK at the moment - I don't need to worry about the oil being too thin !

Dave.

Thanks for the video link - yes, that will come in handy - thanks.

Light Straw. Yes, I work for BT and there's still plenty of ironwork painted that colour in the exchanges. Maybe that is what my "custard yellow" was intended to replicate ?

However, colour wise, I've settled on Grey & red.

Re. the bearings, yes, will get SKF ones, Hopefully should last me out. Ta.

As for the saddle to bed clearance, Ive gone over it with my 2 thou feeler gauge and I can't get it in anywhere so pretty chuffed about that. There's the odd place I can just about squeeze the 1.5 thou feeler in (the thinnest I have)

I have given up on trying to extract the brass oil dripper tube from the headstock - it is indeed very tight and if I force it more something is going to break. I will attempt to make a replacement plastic "thimble" from nylon bar and slot it at the back to go around the tube, like you say. I am tempted to make it a fraction longer and put an O ring under the bezel. I will have to wait till the lathe is up & running first, so I'll just put some tape over the hole in the meantime.

The thimble has (as far as I can measure) a 22mm X 0.7mm thread. Does that sound right for a Myford of that era - I would have expected imperial measurements ? Or am I measuring badly ?

If so, should I be able to cut such a fine thread on my S7 when I get it running ? I'm a complete newbie to threadcutting though I have watched a fair few youtube videos on the subject.

Dave.

Thanks for the responses.

I removed the saddle assembly and tailstock to lighten the machine for transport home. On inspection the original saddle was obviously massively worn, on closer inspection the oilers were full of hardened grease so no idea when it last had a proper oiling.

I was OK with scraping the bed, but the saddle would need more serious work so I bought a used (late model, wide guide) saddle with virtually zero wear - factory machine marks still very obvious - hardly any visible wear. Should save me a lot of time in the long run.

So I didn't try the saddle to bed fit before the bed scrape, but after many, many hours of tedious scraping I got the bed flat - Well as flat as I can and a whole lot better than it was previously. The main wear on the bed was on the front edge of the front rail, starting around 1 1/2" from the headstock end.

I made myself a carbide scraper, used a thick sheet of float glass as a surface plate and it took around 3 weeks scraping for 2 or 3 hours most evenings until I got even blue spotting all over the top of the bed. Obviously most of the hard scraping work was at the unworn tailstock end, and more on the rear rail than the front.

I decided not to scrape under the headstock, so as to leave the original reference there, thinking that I can shim up the tailstock later if required so the centres match. I realise this isn't 100% perfection but I think I can live with it. I can always revisit this in the future if It throws up noticable errors.

I miked up the verticals measuring from the untouched rear one, not too much wear there but to correct it I welded up a square steel frame, bolted 2 sealed bearing races on the back and a piece of square section aluminium tube on the front. I then stuck some sandpaper (the Klingspor self adhesive backed stuff that bodyshops use, not regular stuff), to the ali extrusion, put plastic pads underneath so not to mark the freshly scraped bed - then slid it backwards and forwards along the bed using the bearings as rollers against the rear vertical, and the sandpaper to clean up the other verticals till they all came in parallel to the rear.

As for the undersides of the rails, after a good clean up I went round with a micrometer and got good readings all the way along. As I was going from narrow to a wide guide I didn't need to check the inner ones.

I had problems when fitting up the apron to the new wide guide saddle, the handwheel wouldn't turn and the split nut wasn't centred on the leadscrew. Turns out the bolt holes in the later saddles are approx 2mm further inboard than the early one, so I have had to slot out the holes and make up some custom washers. That's all working nicely now, no tight spots taking the saddle end to end. I just used the shim stacks that came with the later saddle I bought, they seemed loose before I oiled it up so I tried peeling off one shim, refitted them and it clamped up solid, so I have put the shims back and all free again, now I have oiled it I cannot detect any play by hand.

A question though - If I was to check with feeler gauges, what sort of clearance should I expect between saddle & bed in a perfect world ?

I'm currently working on the headstock assembly at the moment - all looks good so far except the rear bearings have also had a dose of grease instead of oil although they seem fine by hand. I am seriously considering the taper roller conversion (what do you chaps think ?) - but I'll need to get it running first so I can machine the collars to suit.

There's also the drip oiler. I unscrewed the sight glass whilst stripping for clean up & paint - Unfortunately the white plastic insert behind it has cracked, I would be amazed if they are still available, but although I could make a replacement I cannot get the brass drip tube out, and that holds it in place. Does anyone know how the brass tube fits to the headstock casting ? I'm guessing it's on a taper. ?

At the moment I have used a bolt, a large washer and a big nut as a spacer to put some tension on it, given it a good dose of plus gas but still no joy. I have tightened the bolt down as far as I dare, but I don't want to do any damage.

I'm leaving it under tension overnight - well you never know.

Was thinking of applying some gentle heat but then if I understand correctly brass expands more than cast iron so that's probably going to make it tighter ?

Any suggestions / ideas welcome.

Cheers - Dave.

Edited By Dave Whipp on 03/12/2018 23:56:14

Edited By Dave Whipp on 03/12/2018 23:58:03

Thanks Hugh - the tip about painting & marking the spindle gear sounds useful - Ta. I shall look into it.

Since I have stripped and inspected my ebay purchase I think my P.O. has assembled my S7 from a pile of various well worn S7 and ML7 parts, slapped on a coat of regular grey house paint, plus the custard yellow, and whacked it on ebay. When I stripped the paint down from all the parts, some were grey, some were green and some parts blue. Also several bolts / screws very loose, some bolts too long for their holes in the castings.

Anyway I now have the bed & saddle together in a homemade steel tray on a concrete bench and it's looking much better. Many hours of tedious graft has got the bed scraped as flat as I can get without a full size proper surface plate (I used a piece of 12mm thick plate float glass instead - not ideal but the best under the circumstances). I also bought a late wide bed saddle with virtually no wear marks to go on it, the original was well worn. Vertical bed ways jig sanded parallell to the rear untouched vertical.

Cross slide and top slide turned out to be ML7 not super 7 so I have bought S7 replacements Will scrape and check them before fitment,

Early MK1 drum clutch unit appears to be seized and as there's no new parts available I have bought a complete used MK 2 clutch assembly instead to future proof the machine.

Shows the dangers of buying unseen online, however I'm getting there one step at a time. Glad I had a previous ML3 to tinker with over the last few years.

I know I could have gone for a brand new far eastern generic lathe for what I've spent but -

Will I still be able to buy spares for it in 5 - 10 years time?

Co2 / miles / green credentials ?

No challenge or learning or personal satisfaction in it's refurbishment.

No history

No UK pride.

Dave.

Edited By Dave Whipp on 01/12/2018 00:28:40

Thanks all once again. Grey & Red it is going to be.

It's not going to be a show piece, it's only brush painted, but after having hand scraped the bed, bought a new "wide" saddle & apron, converting to metric, putting a 3 phase motor on etc etc - I thought as I will probably be spending many hours in front of it in the future it might as well be easy on the eye, which it certainly wasn't before.

The stomach churning yellow would have seriously affected the accuracy of the machined parts.

Dave.