Member postings for Pete

Hi Hugh,

In my opinion I would be extremely careful and more than a bit paranoid about doing anything as radical as resetting a good quality lathes headstock without exhausting every other possibility I could think of about exactly why your lathe is turning a taper like that. This is again another method that's very much recommended by people who just don't fully understand or appreciate how intricate proper machine tool alignments really are. I barely know enough about it to know good advise from bad. But this is not and never will be a cheap hobby at any level. The equipment, tooling, accessories, and even the room it requires adds up very fast. Even the information, skills, and knowledge required alone to get any good at this is staggering. So your first stop needs to be finding either a new copy from Industrial Press of the 1950's written book called "Machine Tool Reconditioning". And no there hasn't been anything newer than that 1950's book written in the English language. And a brand new version is still going to cost you right around $100.00. And it's also not knowledge that forums like this can provide for free.

Or it's either that new version, or maybe if your lucky you might find one on Ebay. It's also an extremely dry and boring book to read. It's not at all imho optional for what your trying to do. Most of the book goes into great detail about exactly how to rebuild various machine tools to brand new or better alignments. The books contents are even too complex to properly explain here. But over and above the hand scraping information, it will give you the basic knowledge and understanding of good machine tool alignment, and I can say it doesn't start out by beating on spindles as an adjustment method. There's possibly dozens of reasons why your machine could be turning a taper that steep, and unless your lathe was hit really hard, or dropped, then adjusting the headstock is the very last place I'd adjust until I'd checked everything else. Good machine tool rebuilder's start out by doing what's called a " machine tool survey", this is basically a series of tests using mostly a micrometer and DTI to do most of it. Having a very expensive precision straight edge would be another required tool for some of it, but a GOOD micrometer and that DTI can prove a lot. They pretty much follow the German Shlessinger (sp?) developed machine tool tests. And while that information is online if you dig for it, you still very much need the book I mentioned to understand exactly what your results and test numbers mean.

And as a extra bonus, even if you never ever rebuild or adjust any machine tool, the book will completely change your opinion about just how clean or how well lubed you keep your machine tools ways. That alone has more than saved me the cost of the book. I'm certainly not saying it's impossible your headstock needs a realignment, but I am saying it's probably around 99% it doesn't need it.

And for anyone who wants to say I'm wrong? I'd expect you to be a machine tool rebuilder, or have at least read that Machine Tool Rebuilding book so we can use some logic instead of our best guess about this. Hugh asked for some good answers, that's the least he should get.

Pete

Edited By Pete on 07/06/2014 19:37:02

Riffler files are also very much used even today in the custom gunsmithing trade. Mostly as one of the many tools used for getting in and removing excess wood while fitting the metal parts to the wood. It's a process much like hand scraping machine tools for fit and alignment. Larger diameter surgical tubing (the stretchy rubber type) can be used over the end of the file your not using for the double ended style. Good one's today are more than a bit expensive, so it's well worth protecting them. And excellent quality files of any kind are getting more than a bit tough to even find now. There not at all easy to replace. I'd be very suprised if they weren't used in at least some of the other specialty trades today. Pattern making, maybe very small one's for watch making etc.

Pete

Hi Jerry,

Yes I can well understand your point of maybe loosing some hand strength. Sooner or later were all going to go through this. And even the top quality Albrecht chucks will also sooner or later need parts or a bit of maintenance. But to also state a bit of the obvious, the general rule is the cheaper your chucks are then the less precision there built to. That alone makes them far less efficient at transfering the energy into tightening the jaws. Years ago I had a cheap Black and Decker hand drill that would not hold any drill without slipping no matter how much I tried to get it tight. I finally just scrapped the whole drill since it wasn't built to a high enough standard to deserve replacing the chuck. But you haven't said how old or what quality your chucks are.

You did mention a keyless, so even if it was a brand new Albrecht and your hands just aren't strong enough now to properly tighten it, you could if you were a bit careful use a good quality strap wrench on the body. And by good quality I mean one that comes with the proper leather strap. That would provide the most bite and protection. And just like adding a snipe to a chuck key, you would have to be a bit careful about going the wrong way and over tightening. But any of us should be able to estimate how much to tighten a chuck just by feel. It's also been my experience that once a drill has spun in a chuck it's scrap. It's even more likely to spin again for some reason. And the burr raised plus the displaced metal on the drills shank is reason enough to throw it away. They can't be fixed with the equipment most of us own. So for what good quality drills cost today, it's well worth the cost to buy very good quality chucks, or rebuild the worn good quality chucks you might already have.

I doubt it, but just to double check and make sure. You aren't trying to use any solid carbide drills are you? They can and will tend to slip in the normal chuck jaws. They use diamond plating on chuck jaws that are designed for carbide drills to give them some grip. I still have most of my hand strength, and it's a lot slower method. But when I want a very very accurate location and I don't want the drill to wander, I use an ER collet to hold the drill. It's a vastly noticeable improvement, and far more rigid way to hold a drill even comparing it against an Albrecht. Something like that might be worth considering depending on what you have your current drill chucks mounted to. Most drills would break long before they ever slipped in a properly tightened ER collet.

Pete

Ady 1 is more than correct about seeing much or any mention about chuck runout in those old M.E. magazines. But I'm way too lazy to retype it all again. If your interested enough, then please have a read through of what I just posted in the "Square Top Colch / Student" thread in this same sub forum. Since both threads are a bit alike I couldn't make up my mind where to post the information.

Pete

OK, I think that's more than enough about what you should expect from our type of standard 3 jaws.

Just like a lathes ways, the chucks scroll and jaw teeth will slowly wear over time and at varying points depending on the size of work you usually use it on. The jaw tips can also wear from work moving around inside the jaws while the chucks rotating. A shaft with a slightly offset center drilled hole with the tail stock center supporting that end can make the work move around for example. No it's not very much, but the work can and will move. The slots and grooves that the jaws slide on also wear. Depending on the hardness, either the jaws or the chuck itself, or even both parts can also wear. But it's very important to note that even the best chucks in the world have clearances built into them right from the manufacturer. Without that very small but important clearance it would be impossible for the jaws to be adjusted.

So, you have to either regrind your chuck jaws or replace the chuck. New jaws can be bought if your chucks a good one and still being made, but that doesn't address the chuck wear. There is only one single method of chuck regrinding I know of that does provide a proper way, and even more important the proper DIRECTION of pre loading those chuck jaws so they can be accurately ground. And it's certainly NOT shown in that YouTube video. In fact it's physically impossible for that method to work and give you correctly ground jaws. Those plates with the clover shaped design cut in it are the only way I've seen yet that allow the internal jaw tips to be ground straight. Due to those built in clearances every chuck has, the jaws tilt a fraction of a degree in each direction depending on which side of the jaws your using. It's not a manufactuering defect they do this, it's just how the design works. So you have to load those jaws and grind to compensate for that jaw tilt to end up with straight jaw tips that grip there full length.

But there's a bit more to this than it first seems. Unless you go the extra mile and do the very best you can while machining that plate you won't get the best accuracy, and that defeats what your trying to do. That plate really should be at least the same thickness as the jaws protrude from the chuck's face,and have properly bored holes with an excellent bore finish so both sides of each chuck jaw bear evenly on it. Just using simple drilled holes could be enough to slightly shift the jaws. Boring those holes is the minimum in my opinion. Regrinding the jaws in a well made chuck is precision work, and it should be treated as such.

So to back this up even more, your very first step is to tear your chuck down to it's basic parts for a thorough cleaning. On good chucks, you should mark each and every part so during assembly all the parts are returned to there exact same position. That's especially important for the pinions. Any chuck that has that mark means that pinion is the master location that the chuck was originally ground to by using it. And using a bit of logic, your going to need to repeat that chuck dis assembly and again clean it after grinding the jaws. So there's much more to doing this correctly than far too many posters understand.

But if you read what I've tried to point out, you should be able to understand that even top quality chucks aren't and can't be all that accurate. But no matter how expensive or cheap your chucks are, it's very important that the jaw tips are square to the lathe ways. If there not then smaller work can and will flex away from the tool tip.

I hope now you know what took me a very long time to research and learn. And none of this are just my opinions, if you care to research it enough, you'll find the same information I did.

Pete

Edited By Pete on 07/06/2014 15:28:37

No problem Gordon, but I did want to double check as you might have had something I've not run across yet. But one thing you might want to watch for, single point threading put's a fair amount of pressure on the part, so doing something like that without much tightening torque could very easily push the part back into the collet. Just one more little detail to trap us.

Pete

Gordon,

I think you might mean either a ER 25 or ER 32 for your collet size. The main reason I think people have for something like endmill's being pulled out of the ER style collets is they just don't know how high the torque requirement's are. My ER 40's need well over 100 ft lbs of torque on the nut. Almost 130 ft lbs if I remember right. But for tool holding, hand tight or a bit more isn't going to do it. You certainly wouldn't want a razor sharp endmill dropping out of the collet at high rpm.

Pete

Rob,

Yes those are Deckel collet's. As far as I know Deckel still make and sell them. Better be sitting down before reading the price though. I seem to recall there might be some cheaper copies around but can't remember where I saw them for sale. Maybe RDG Tools? And if you haven't seen it yet, going to www.lathes.co.uk and then clicking on the Deckel link will get you a lot of further information. I can't say for sure if those G.A. cutter grinder collets are the same or not. But someone here will know for sure. And it would be hard to find a better mill than yours imo.

Pete

Nigel,

I've got a 3 hp 3 phase mill that's powered with a VFD. Some people seem to use that inverter term though. FWIW, You should see an almost unbelievable difference in smoothness of the motor drive, it will also be quieter, and your surfaces finishes should be much better. But, I don't agree with over driving any machine tooL much past it's factory design limits. Yes it can be done, but is it a good idea? Your bearings, spindle and pulley balance, and even the materials there built from were engineered on good quality lathes to operate at a specified maximum rpm. The higher you go with rpm then the steeper the cost curve gets as far as wear and parts replacement. They build and sell specialized very high rpm rated lathe chucks ranging from hardened steel into I'd imagine some fairly exotic light weight ultra strong aircraft grade materials for very high rpm work. But those specially balanced high rpm steel chucks alone have prices to match. Yes I know you said you were planning on using collets, but I'm trying to show how expensive something like this can become, and how quickly it can start to add up.

Unless you do a great deal of very small work the costs to do this may not be worth it. And an inverter or VFD or any currently available pure electrical method will not give you full motor torque as you lower the rpms. That still requires it to be done mechanically. Whatever you do there's always a trade off that has to be done. IMO, the inverter/VFD is well worth it for the variable speeds, smoother running, better finishes, and maybe a very limited use of the higher speeds once in awhile. But if all your wanting is the high speed for small diameter work, then I think I'd be looking at something like a spindle speeder that will give you a way through gearing to increase the part rpm without increasing your main spindle speeds. And if you really want high speeds, they make very specialized air driven turbines that will do well beyond 50,000 rpm.

I have to think that there's not a quality lathe manufacturer anywhere in the last 50 years that would say it's a good idea to increase the spindle rpm by 25% or more over what they designed there product to do. 4,000 RPM today is actually very slow if you look at what a lot of the newer CNC equipment is capable of. The difference is it's designed from the start to do so.

And I've yet to operate any Super 7, but does yours have a proper roller bearings at both ends of the spindle, or is the front bearing the usual drip fed oil lubed solid type? Burning up a bearing and/or spindle journal could get a bit costly. I'm certainly not trying to say your idea is wrong, but there's a lot more to this than just replacing the motor on your lathe.

Pete

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I haven't yet and may never build a Quorn, but I've studied the book more than a bit, and put a lot of thought into all the machining steps that are involved. Probably today hardened and ground linear shafting would be the best material to use. There's a lot of items that have been invented since Prof. Chaddock wrote the book. But hardened bars or not, the bored castings that slide on those bars aren't hardened and they ARE going to get grinding dust embeded in them. So one way or another it's going to cause wear. The main recommendation is to either use no lube on the bars, or a dry type, so the idea is the grinding dust will just slide off the bars. I'll admit those bare polished bars look pretty nice, but it's a more than poor design for what we have available to us today that Chaddock didn't have. Off road motor cycles, trucks, etc deal with the problem by using rubber like "boots" to keep precision fitting items like the front forks and shocks clean and dust free. If I was building a Quorn I'd still use that hardened linear shafting, but I'd use those off road shaft boots to keep the grinding dust from ever touching and then wearing the parts.

Pete

Edited By Pete on 10/05/2014 19:21:14

I suspect but don't obviously know for sure that this could be one of the Corliss versions that Southworth Engines sell. Your mention of Arnold Throp seems to ring some bells with me as the original designer of there Corliss valved engines. A simple email to Southworth would no doubt get you a proper answer. Sadly Peter Southworth passed away within the last couple of years, but his company was bought and is being run by I believe a old friend of his.

Pete

It depends, if I read your post correctly you said you said you use STUDS that are screwed into the backplate correct? If your lathe chucks aren't the type that use through bolts from the face of the chuck, then there's no way to fasten the chuck to the R/T the way it's set up now. Ideally you'd make a copy of your lathes spindle nose and it's method of attaching chucks. Then bolt that concentric to the R/T first, then you'd use that to attach your chucks. So if it were me? 4 slots will always hold far better than 3.

Pete

More than well put Michael, I guess we all have our own logical and well reasoned thoughts about this. It could be a subject where no one is really 100% right or wrong with there thoughts?

But, since George Thomas has been mentioned at least a couple of times, I hope the following isn't out of line for this thread. I very much wish He was alive today just so I had the chance to at least thank him. He's had a huge affect on what I've learned and exactly how I view this hobby. There's zero doubt in my mind his Model Engineers Workshop Manual is the finest book I've ever read that's been written with this hobby in mind, and in my opinion it should be required reading by any member of this forum. And yes, it IS that good.

But I think it was Bill Bennet? who is still alive and friends with someone I know who also deserves to be thanked for that book. He did from my understanding put a great deal of time and effort into Georges past writings including unfinished work that was never published while assembling everything that was included in it.

Pete

Personaly I'dvery much welcome any criticsm the rivtet counters or not are willing to provide on anything I've built. One should be confident enough in anything they have built to there very best of there abilitys, and you should be able to seperate the worthless comments from the ones who are honetly and really trying to help.

My dad always told me you can even learn something from an Are*hole. He thought it was how not to be an are*hole. But to be honest, just maybe some of us are maybe a bit too thin skinned? They are just 'words' after all. From my understanding, there's some very severe 'rivet counting' in any of the major M.E. exhibitions in the U.K. I haven't read many questioning the judges comments for any of that style of competition.

I'll bet there's very few here that don't look very close at any picture of almost any model and not see a few details they might do different.They just might be not quite honest enough to say so here, but there still thinking it. Builders such as Cherry Hinds, Chris Vine, and more than a few others here including the likes of Graham Meeks, any many many others are a bit different than us mere mortals. But I do think we can all learn at least a little from some of those "rivet counters". I would think at least 90% of them are trying to help in some way. Were all not the best at expressing our honest opinions sometimes. Many times people mean well but are taken totally wrong.

But perfect or not, this Vikers is a very interesting and vey high quality build. I really appreciate the builders efforts and his pictures and posts. I could be incorrect, but due to past comments about other "cannon" bulds in the late 90's and ino the early 2,000's, I think the M.E. magazine is not publishing anything like this any more. We really should appreciate this thread for what it is.

Pete

Edited By Pete on 30/11/2013 12:30:23

Then if it were me? I'd have a check around your general area for any suppliers that carry something in the size range your looking for. It took me a very long time to figure out, but a lot of the cheaper offshore built cutting tools come with just about worthless carbide tips. And again if it were me, I'd make a point of buying any facemill that takes the same HSS indexable tips that Warner in the U.S. makes, and the same for the well known brand name European, Japanese, or North American carbide manufacturers make. They ARE worth the extra they cost.

Pete

Ronan,

Yeah they do, but the tooling manufacturers will also build whatever sells. As I said, just because they make it doesn't mean it's a good idea. I've got that R-8 ER-40 Collet Chuck and Collets, and it will accept tooling that's too large for my mill even though it's got a 3 hp 3 ph motor on it.. But I knew that when I made a point of buying that size, I did want it for both tool holding in the mill, and work holding in the lathe. So it's a bit of a trade off since the ER-32 size would be better suited to my mill. It's made by Bison, a quite well respected Polish tool making company. And I'm sure they'd be honest enough to admit a ER-40 collet system is too large for any mill with an R-8 spindle taper even though they make the tooling to do it.

On my much smaller Emco Compact 5 lathe that does have a MT 2 spindle taper, I bought Emco's collet chuck and collets for it. There listed as a ESX-25 system. About the same as, and I think I recall reading that ER-25 collets will fit. But you also have to consider the extended length the larger collet chucks have, that moves the cutting tool much farther away from the machines spindle bearings, so the lateral forces on any cutting tool with a mill have a greater effect. It's exactly what you don't want. And usually the smaller MT-2 mills are limited enough for any extra Z axis height between the spindle nose and the mills table anyway. I personaly don't think what your loseing in Z height and tool rigidity is worth the few percieved gains your getting with the increased size capabilitys. And that larger tooling starts getting very expensive, very fast as you move up to those larger sizes that you can efficiently use anyway.

Pete

Yes and no Baldric, useing a MT 2 collet chuck removes the ability to use a lathes spindle through hole for longer shafting. And with a bit of thought, you can build a spindle mount set tru type of ER collet chuck, and using some thought that will give you the ability to get to Zero, or as close as you, your machnes bearings, and your measureing equipment will allow.A good 3 jaw should be capable of .001"-.003" runout, To make it worthwhile, a good collet chuck should be better than .001" in my opinion.

Pete

I can assure you that your thoughts are correct. 1" diameter tool shanks are beyond the capabilitys of a R-8 taper mill if your wanting to push things to the cutting tools limits. Yes with light cuts and slow feeds you could probably buy and use the tooling. But the higher costs don't match up with the capabilitys. For a MT 2 taper mill? I'd suggest maybe 1/2" shanked tooling might be a little more logical, cost effective, and useable. With your MT 2, you won't have anywhere close to enough HP to drive a 3" diameter face mill. That's even pushing things according to Bridgeport, they mention 2"-2 1/2" diameter facemills as right around the maximum limits.Just because they build it, doesn't make some of this tooling a great idea to buy and use.

However.................... if you were to treat it like a multi tooth flycutter (and that's what it is) you could with a quality set of HSS or carbide inserts use it as a light finishing tool. You'll just never be able to hogg material off with it.

Pete

I guess I'll need to pre-apologise in case of offending anyone. People sure seem to quickly forget Jasons's always consistent efforts to help everyone here or on any forum He's on no matter what there skill level is. I'm afraid too many took offense at his comments that I think were sincerly meant only to help. Being hyper critical of a persons innocent comments probably isn't much different than being one of those rivet police either. I've seen many instances where a builder was 'praised' for obviously incorrect work just as Jason's mentioned. To be honest, that helps no one, and it's a very poor practice. If you post pictures then you should expect a critical assessment either good or bad. If you disagree? I'd suggest you maybe check Jason's last 200 posts just for starters.

I like the cannon very much, and most of it was more than very well done. If it pleases the owner then that's what's really important. But understanding where there were some detail mistakes made shouldn't ever be a sin to point them out. Being told or telling someone they just did a sh**y job is standard practice in my industry. And in a lot less nicer words than that. I sure don't expect much or any different for anything else in life. And......................I usually put my big boy pants on when I get up in the morning.

Pete

Edited By Pete on 15/10/2013 08:33:04