Member postings for Chris V

Hi all,

I am now the owner of a dedicated Amolco mill complete with its base and compound table.

The mill came with a selection of metric & imperial Myford collets and a collection of allsorted sized milling cutters. All the cutters have a threaded end to their shank.

If I just use the cutters in the collets I know I'm likely to get the cutters creeping downwards during use. So what arrangement would originally have been used to hold threaded shank cutters to prevent this?

Also how useful are the collet closing tubes?

Any idea when exactly these Mills first came onto the market?

I'm new to milling so have ordered Harold Halls book on the subject.

How interesting. So turns out my 10" ex WD spanner I bought specially for the ER20 collets is not too big after all.

Cheers

Chris.

Hi Nick, please forgive my ignorance but once you know the correct tightening torque how would you apply that to the collet practicably? I mean are there such things as adjustable torque spanners?

Cheers

Chris.

Many thanks Russ, they probably were A2 but I cannot recall now where I got them to check.

They're actually round heads so I might order some plain steel C/S screws and be done with.

Cheers

Chris.

Hi all, is using 3 x 6mm stainless steel bolts a bad idea for fixing a 80mm ER32 collet chuck to its backplate?

Just slightly concerned as stainless being more brittle than 'ordinary' steel.

Thanks

Chris.

Thanks Alan, seems like its the way to go,

Cheers

Chris.

Thanks Alan & Howard, yes Arc Euro got back to me and they are indeed supplied in individual little blue boxes.

To be honest I was baulking at the idea of having to make a tray to hold them as I got it into my head I'd need a different size hole for each size collet....and they say you cant beat stupid!

Cheers

Chris.

Thanks Bandersnatch, and

JasonB, Wow that looks impressively tidy! The drawers in our house do look that neat! (-:

Cheers

Chris.

Hello IanT,

Thank you for that, most interesting and informative, and bang on topic. I was making a shopping, well wish list earlier and your comments have certainly helped!

I emailed Arc Euro earlier to ask if the collet sets are supplied in an aluminium case, strangely it doesn't say on their website.

I also notice one can now get (elsewhere) collet's to take up to 25mm for the ER32 holders.

Cheers

Chris.

Thanks for the collet comments guys, yes I agree Mike price seems perfectly reasonable, I can just see how useful they are going to be.

Cheers

Chris.

Thanks Dave & not done it yet.

To be honest I had not considered the larger grinder being a more convenient size so that's helpful indeed and something(else) for me to think about. Likewise the Arc endorsement, I have to date only read good things which is nice. Earlier in the year I bought a 1MT collet chuck from RDG which I was quite happy with till this week I fitted it in my ML1. I was quite surprised by the inacuracy, thinking at first it was likely the lathe, as I'd only got it up and running this week. But I tried it also in my wood lathe and it seems it is indeed the collet chuck. I had thought a MT fitting one would be accurate. Anyways yesterday an eBay Chinese backplate fitting one arrived, hopefully I can make and fit a backplate and it will be more accurate. Think I'll go to Arc in future...and get the bearing nuts as well.

I wonder if retro fitting a bearing nut to the 1MT one will make matters worse?

Cheers

Chris.

Could I ask what the difference is between Stevenson's original collet blocks and any other available, and are the ball bearing caps worth having instead of the plain.

Also anyone bought the Arc Euro trade 6" bench grinder, is it a good machine?

Cheers

Chris.

Thank you Pete, so maybe they should use bronze which is a bit harder, though likely still a bit soft and more expensive.

I will leave my gips as they are, they seem quite happy right now .

Thank you for the offer of assistance, I'm in Somerset though so rather a distance.

Cheers

Chris.

Thanks Pete, I wonder why those Seig owners use brass then, horses for courses I suppose!

Cheers

Chris.

Hi Brian, thank you, I have tried again and sent you a PM with my email too,

Cheers

Chris.

Thank you Brian, have just emailed you.

Thank you Howard, received your email and will reply properly tomorrow.

Cheers

Chris.

Thank you Howard.

Next to my lack of knowledge is lack of time, so telling me exactly what gears I need for a slow feed is great. So far my power feed is not in action but I will look at what changewheels I have. I was kind of hoping to find some period wheels without the keyway but then was put off as had read DP & angles are not all the same. I'm not pretending to know exactly what that means but realise if they are not right the gears will not mesh properly which is all I really need to know right now. I will look for ex ML7 wheels to replace those I might need.

I was aware of mandrel handles and centre height gauges, I will PM you thanks, and look around at height gauge ideas, I certainly need one of those.

I had seen those boat type rocker tool posts available but the small one at arc euro is a 1/8" too big for my 3-1/8" centre height.

Cheers

Chris.

Thank you Martin, any thoughts on suppliers? I can only find the thicker stuff......

Thanks Brian, its been a long time coming but today was a good day. I'm quite sure there's more adjustments and tweaking to do and I'm sure many foibles to contend with, but Iv'e learnt so much already this year, this forum is just great!

Cheers

Chris.

Thank you for the encouragement Howard, yes my ML1 has the lower centre height and 7/8" nose thread.

Having skimmed a bit of brass yesterday I took the plunge and put it to work today, faced off the cast brass bracket in the photo and then bored the centre out to the new size and correctly centred, well better than it was. Then in a case of extreme tapping I cut the 3/4" thread. Really only did it this way as the tap is too big for my 1/2" chuck, but it all went well. Took me hours of course but I had fun doing it.

Last night I was reading a forum thread about gip strips, people having bought Seig mills and replacing the steel strip with brass. I wonder if it might be worth it for my lathe?

Does anyone sell steel shim in narrow strips? I made a few up from brass then dropped one in between the bed ways, thought if I'd used steel a magnet would have got it out, for now its a feature! (-:

Cheers

Chris.

Thank you Brian. That sounds like a really good plan of action! I will indeed try that.

Cheers

Chris.