Tool post for Myford ML10 lathe

To mill small jobs you can use a Myford vertical slide bolted on in place of the topslide, with a small Myford vice to hold small jobs. Bigger jobs can be clamped straight to the vertical slide. You hold the milling cutter in the three jaw chuck. It's very much a compromise situation but ok for small occasional work.

Before you start using the vertical slide for milling on the M10 find some way of clamping the saddle as it does not have a saddle clamp.

Jeremy, let us know where in the world you are. (County/nearest big town) There may be someone locally willing to help get you started.

Hi Jeremy, Guys,

Whilst I've done some very very light milling using the lathe, I cannot recommend it, particularly on an ML10 !

I've a virtually unused S7 vertical slide sat in a cupboard doing nothing.

I do not regard hss tooling as old fashioned,I use hss,brazed on carbide,insert cardide,and I have some synthetic diamond ,superb for flycutting ali cylinder heads.And I kept up with the latest methods,tooling,and machine tools until I retired as a production/procurement engineer. In my training I started on plain lathes (Lorch),a Boxford,A 8 in Willson and a Ward 2A capstan, One of my memories was that four way toolposts were a pain in the backside,all the operators had aquired a tin full of shim,at least the stores had supply of shim,plus a guillotine to chop up thicker material,there were a few carbide brazed tools for the willson,none for the small lathes and capstan.At home I had an EW,A myford 7 came along ten years later and the last thing I wanted was a fourway toolpost,and made a couple of Drummond type tool holders similar to a Norman,these transferred to my S7,and lasted for 25 years,until I bought a Dickson type toolholder set .and then toolchanging and setting was so much easier and it saved time which became important as I aquired some outside work,I already had a genuine Dickson toolholder son my Colchesters,Now not many lathes for our hobby new or used are better than a Boxford and cannot really take advantage of modern carbide,and hss in many respects is better ,and cheaper than inserts .I think the replaceable tip has come in as the modern generation it appears cannot manage to use a grinding wheel and be able to grind a lathe tool or drill bit.Brought about by a least two generations who have never had any workshop training at school or college. Hss has really improved since my training I have some with colbalt,which are really good ,far better than the older Eclipse toolbits,though they are harder to grind,Regarding quenching Hss when grinding,for a start do NOT grind them until they get to red heat,grind and dumk them in water frequently,avoid taking to where it goes blue,brown is ok, Many text books state do not quench as it causes cracking in 60 years I have never had a tool crack,many of these authors have taken info from earlier books those earlier books were written in the same way ,ie what I have read rather than from actual experience, the very earliest Hss in around pre WW 1 days may have cracked and the myth carried on. Grinding wheels should be selected for hss use,if they wear away quickly then the grit bond is too soft,of course with correct wheel as the grit glazes or some grooving occurrs then the wheel should be dressed, a good wheel for hss should NEVER be used for any other material ie soft steel ,ali or brass , and the larger the wheel the better I use 8 inch wheels ,this reduces the hollow ground effect and makes the cutting edge stronger.If you have a sturdy industrial lathe with a good speed range and a large motor then carbide tips have their advantages,high metal removal rate ,built in chip breakers,less tool wear with tough material eg high no en steels and stainless.though say on a long shaft where I have spent a lot of time machining various diameters,if say two short journals are required for a precise bearing fit with a few tenths tolerance then i would finish turn these with a high speed tool. I previously mentioned Dickson tooling,I have had this type of tooling on several lathes,certainly speeds up tool seting and tool changing and works well on general purpose work but when used for heavy cuts and some parting off, the tool holders are nowhere near as rigid as a four way tool post and can be seen to deflect despite putting a length of tube on the wrench ( we all loose some strength its called aging)

It's interesting you should say that, as I think the Dickson clone QCTP is the best value for money I've spent on the lathe and mill combined. So much so, that I kept it for the bigger machine that replaced the mini-lathe I bought it for.

The most important thing for a QCTP is to have enough holders to keep ALL of the tools you might use ready to drop onto it; when even a simple part uses 3 tools(turn and face, break edges, part off) it very quickly pays for itself.

How is inefficient use of time less important for a hobbiest than in production, as the hobby(whatever the tools are used for) is making parts not pretty piles of swarf?

Agree completely with Nicholas Wheeler 1. I have recently fitted the wedge type holder. You can only have one tool at a time in it. But I am trying to get into the habit of, removing the tool after each op done. No cut arms that way. Move lever , lift tool, job done.

Steve.

I am located in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. It would be great if there was a member cclose to me which could show me the ins and outs of this unit.

Edited By Jeremy Smith 2 on 09/02/2020 14:29:43

Thanks for letting us Know Jeremy, I am in the middle of the UK so can't just pop round...….

The ML10 is a fairly small lathe, and even the ML7, a bigger sister, could only withstand light cuts when milling. The vertical slide will tend to shift if you try to overdo things.

You can do good work with it, but do recognise its limitations.

You have LOTS of pleasure ahead of you!

Howard.

Can't find the stupid book but one of mine is clearer - it refers to micro-cracking. It's not that the tool obviously breaks like shattered pottery, rather the surface is invisibly damaged and thus wears faster. Basically, hot quenched HSS tools don't stay sharp as long as they would if gently cooled.

I got the impression the difference is only worth worrying about in mass-production, where getting tools to last 5% longer on average would translate into appreciable savings. For everybody else, difficult to tell the difference between hot and cold quenched tools.

HSS is tough stuff and a good performer on all but the hardest materials. I reckon the main thing to avoid is gross overheating - once HSS hardness is destroyed by excessively hot cutting or grinding, it's very difficult to get it back.

Dave

+1 for views of NW 1 but I find it also pays to think of the total time that the job may take as being made up of the time to change the tool and also the time taken to make the cut. For smallish work requiring several tool changes then I use a QCTP and find it adequate and quick. But the QCTP overhangs the side of the topslide and lacks the rigidity needed to take heavy cuts. I wonder if the real limitation with using the QCTP is the topslide itself - which tilts sideways under load because of the overhang.

So for biggish work requiring a lot of metal to be removed on a smallish (Myford) lathe then I switch to an earlier idea and find the taken to switch is more than compensated for by the ability to take much.heavier cuts.

My earlier system is based on the "Simple Toolholders" advocated by Dr Robert Rose in a short series of articles in ME. Vol 138 (1972). These toolholders are just short lengths of BMS with a slot milled in one side to hold a HSS toolbit. Imagine one side of a 4 way toolpost "detached" as it were, from it's fellows, and with very short screws. The article advocates one makes a holder for each tool likely to be used. The toolbits are held in the holders, complete with their dedicated packing, by short grub screws. The holders are held on the topslide by the "Clog" toolpost supplied with the lathe. The holders are quick and easy to make, cost virtually nothing and, because they are held almost centrally on the topslide, they are very rigid and make heavy cuts easy. Considering the simplicity and cheapness, I think this is a good system which could easily be adapted to holding tipped tools.

Not everyone will have access to the articles but if they are available, they are well worth reading, perhaps Neil could reprint them.

Rod

Hey everyone, thought i would revive this! Just finished building the table for my ml10. Getting excited.

Just to clear up one point. The ML10 does have a saddle clamp - it's located at the top of the apron immediately under the cross slide and above the half nut lever, and has a small tee bar through the head. You can tighten it with finger pressure but because it's out if sight it's easy to forget to release it. It's effective and I use it every time I do any milling, plus some other ops. You'll soon find out how big a cut you can take by experience.

About 20 years ago l made a 3-way toolpost for my ML10.

l think the design was by Dave Lammas, and it had once been published in ME.

l didn't use the casting, but fabricated mine from 1/4" steel plate, all screwed together with counter-sunk socket screws.

Armed with 3 indexable-insert tools, l never looked back, and no "barked" knuckles as was common with the 4-way type.

Quite the best, simple accessory, l ever made for my lathe.

Hi Jeremy. Wonder how you got on with the tool post. This is some pictures of mine. This is for a Myford super 7b . So not sure if the tool centre height will be the same as yours. I had to have 4mm surface ground from my top slide & then the toolholders I also machined down by 4mm. I did those in the lathe. I then made a sleeve nut out of stainless & a sleeve tube out of Aluminium. I must say it has been a very good conversion to do. Anyway here are the pics.

Steve.

Edited By Steviegtr on 18/02/2020 23:15:57

Jeremy, further on the Dave Lammas "3-way toolpost", l have since located the original article in ME.

lt appeared in Vol. 155, issue No.3758, dated 2nd August 1985.

l feel sure that any model-engineering club, near to where you live, would be able to help you with sight of a copy.

My recollection is that l made mine rather smaller than specified (that was for a larger machine than the ML10) and I cut it up from 1/4" BDMS plate, to make a sort of 3-layer "sandwich".

l have just removed mine from the lathe and found that the middle "slice", for the slot bit that accommodates the tools, was made from two layers of the quarter inch plate, to achieve the half-inch gap.

Three counter-sunk socket-cap screws held it all together, and the 3 tools, with some necessary packing, are each secured in place by two 4BA socket cap screws.

The three tools (indexable insert type) that l have fitted are Right-hand knife tool, Left-hand ditto, and a round-nosed tool. They do most of the jobs l need.

l hope this is of some use, however slight.

Good luck with your ML10, its a wonderful little machine.

I finally have the ml10 up and running, and realized that the elephant’s foot tool holder works great, but is a lot of fiddling around with during use!

Any other recommendations? I tried a four way tool post and found it to be too big and a pain to use. Does anyone here have photos of their setups, or links to fitting a quick change nodel to their unit??