Warco BH600G Modifications (clutch, gears, 3 phase)

Hello all,

I keep saying i will use this forum more however due to work commitments i don't have that much time to get in my workshop and do interesting projects. That said i am currently in the process of machining my own Pre Charge air rifle from scratch so keep your eyes peeled if your into that sort of thing as i will post a build thread soon.

So my Warco BH600G is a very capable lathe however there are a few things i would like to look into changing and hoping people on hear have had similar ideas or indeed solutions. First of all my largest gripe with this lathe is the noise especially at high speed when then feed lever is engaged! My workshop isn't big and is very echoey which only over emphasises the noise this machine makes. Now i have been doing some research into this and have found a few possible solutions. The easiest is plain and simply putting sound deadening in the gear housing, re meshing the gears and using something called open gear oil? Apparently this dramatically reduces the ringing that i am getting so i have ordered some of that as it can't hurt. Then i started to look into the gears them self and considered making some plastic gears out of Delrin? Knowing that its a hard plastic with low friction properties i thought this could be a possibility? My only concern is the torque that the lathe puts out? I didn't know if it would essentially rip it apart as soon as it engages... I then thought about going to a gear specialist and having them machine a selection of helical gears as these are much quieter that conventional spur gears.

Another thought i had was converting the motor to a 3 phase motor with an inverter (not necessarily to make it quieter) but so i have more control over the the speed and being able to change the speed quickly and easily. The only problem with this is the cost and hassle for the small gain i will get. I priced up a system from Newton Tesla and it was around £500, I only paid £900 or slightly less for the whole Lathe! What i don't want to do is chuck a lot of money at the lathe when i could have just gone out and buy a Gear Head lathe that ticks all the boxes. Just wondering if anyone new of a cheaper or easier way?

The final thing i wanted to install was a clutch for screw cutting, again i have seen it done but it was a while ago and links don't work or the contents is no longer there. Just wondering whether this was something that people purchased and installed or made using drawings?

Any help and advise on what i could do would be great,

Regards, Steve

Steve,

I don't know the machine, but; It might be possible to convert the head to Poly-Vee belt drive. [if so ... I'm sure this would be much cheaper than having special helical gears made]

MichaelG.

.

O.K. ... Now I'm confused.

 Just realised it's the feed gearing ... Have a look at using Timing Belts.

... John Stevenson has done a nice adaptation on one of his lathes.

Edited By Michael Gilligan on 01/01/2016 16:46:09

Edited By Michael Gilligan on 01/01/2016 16:55:13

I'd get the change gears meshing right first. Loosen all the pegs off and then cut some photocopy paper into thin strips. work this in between each pair of gears and then tighten up the pegs. Remove paper and try running, the paper should have set the right sort of backlash in the gears.

Also make sure any washers on te pegs are teh correct thickness, if wrong you can get teh sides of teh gears hitting each other or the banjo.

I think Graham Meek has a design for the BH600 clutch

Edited By JasonB on 01/01/2016 16:44:03

Screw cutting clutch described at gwhengineering.co.uk

Just too late to edit my earlier post ...

JS Timing Belt adaptation.

MichaelG.

The large belt head lathes from Taiwan and China such as yours usually have the old traditional type of tumbler reverse, similar to Boxford and Myford.

On the British machines the tumbler reverse bracket is made with a very precise fitting pivot, with no wobbling or slopping about of the bracket that carries the tumbler gears. This ensures that the meshing gears are not pulled out of correct mesh when the spring loaded plunger is dropped onto position in the locating indent.

But the Far Eastern lathes of this type tend to have a very sloppy fitting pivot point that allows the bracket to move in and out and side to side. A clamping screw is also fitted on these to lock the tumbler reverse lever when in position. But the plunger spring pressure can still pull the bracket and so the gears out of square and correct mesh, sometimes resulting in a bit of a racket as these gears around the headstock spindle are spinning the quickest.

A Taiwanese made version of your lathe that I once worked on produced an almighty screech when the tumbler reverse was dropped in position. Clamping or moving the tumbler bracket around would sometimes greatly reduce the noise level. The gears were steel which can sometimes add to the ringing.

If you google graham howe screw cutting clutch you can get Graham Meek's drawings. Or go to

http://modelengineeringwebsite.com/Meek_screwcutting_clutch.html

Edited By Gordon Smith 1 on 01/01/2016 17:38:48

**LINK**

Thank you all for the help! I can't believe how fast you all replied and with fantastic advise! This has to be one of the best forums for help and guidance i have ever used and i can't wait to start contributing more.

I contacted Graham from gwhengineering.co.uk and he has sent me over a pdf with 3d drawings much like the link you posted Gordon. He also gave me a lot of advise with regards to its set up and other modifications here and there.

He also said that the best modification is direct belt drive for the carriage feed, similar to the link that you posted Michael. I think for the moment i am going to re mesh and lubricate the gears as Jason has suggested. I will be doing a belt and clutch conversion however at the moment my workshop is a mess, to many projects on the go I'm half way through a prototype for my air rifle project as well as making an alignment jig for a friend and currently i have spent 2 days trying to fit a DRO to my lathe trying to find a place to mount it so swarf and suds don't get into the scales is proving to be a pain in the arse. I have come to the conclusion that i need to take them off and start again the large scale on the back of the lathe for the longitudinal travel i am happy with but the cross slide is winding me up something chronic. I have got it to repeat accuracy now, before it would get 3/4 of the way then stop counting then start counting. Thing is i am worried about how i have mounted it as it is on the left of the saddle (closest to the chuck) meaning its right in the swarf zone. But if i put it on the right hand side then i can't lock the jib or get to the oil ports.... I think i am going to have another play and if i get stuck i might have to post something on here. I thought it was only going to take a few hours but its actually a very frustrating job.

Steve

Hi Steve, just been reading about your problems and by way of a possible fix I came upon this really neat idea on another forum that will sort the DRO problem, the place to go to is Chester Machine Tools > Forums > Crusader. ....DDT

Brilliant bit of advise! Thanks DDT i will give that a go i think seems straight forward enough and keeps my DRO away from the suds and swarf whilst allowing me to tighten the jib

Steve,

The easiest and quickest to-do clutch.

If your saddle lock is anything like mine was, it's nigh on useless, so do what I did

Geoff - Time to pull finger and get something done.

There was a short series in MEW a few years ago by Anthony Mount covering the issues raised by Steve Cole.

Ray McMahons BH600 clutch.

The very self same lathe now resides in my workshop and Ray's clutch continues to work faithfully.

Happy New Year to all.

Donald Mitchell

Bonnie Scotland.

My head is swimming with ideas now.... i have so much to crack on with tomorrow.

First job is a new cross slide jib screw on the left so i can mount the DRO on the right as suggested by DDT, once the DRO is fully installed and working it's on to the next task....

As suggested by Geoff i like the idea of the upgraded saddle lock with a lever, i will definitely be doing that!

However with regards to the clutch i fail to see how that idea works Geoff? I understand by throwing the lever you can engage and disengage the belt drive to the head however i fail to see how this helps with regards to screw cutting? If i put a saddle stop on the bed and let it screw cut surely all it is going to do is hit the saddle stop and try and push it along the bed or am i missing how it works?

Keep your eyes peeled tomorrow folks as i hope to update with photo's... Ideally i want to keep this thread going to help other members with these style of chines lathes and worth while modifications.

Regards

Steve

P.S; i would be interested in the copies of those articles that Donald mentioned if anyone has them?

Edited By Steve Cole 1 on 04/01/2016 21:05:23

Screw cutting up to a stop is going to be a case of immovable object trying to stop an irresistible force. Something has to give way and if you are lucky it will be a drive belt slipping. If you are unlucky, which is more than likely, you will strip a gear of some teeth, break a drive key, distort a shaft, damage a mechanism, break your half nuts or the leadscrew. All of these are considered bad and so not something to be taken lightly. Due to the high reduction required to reduce the carriage speed for fine screw cutting it has a lot of force trying to move it along the bed. Even using a handle and turning the shaft by hand you may not be able to feel the resistance of a carriage stop. My lathe has a shear pin in the leadscrew drive for when this happens and it is not the easiest thing to access and replace but it is considerably better than damaging something that is not designed to give under load (bust it once by inattention).

Martin

Hi Martin, not sure if our wires got crossed there? I understand that a clutch is there to disengage the feed so it doesn't destroy all the items listed. However, what i meant was i don't see how Geoff's design is going to stop the feed on its own without the operator pulling the lever... I know its a much simpler design than Graham Meeks solution but what i want is for the carriage to hit a stop or a mechanism to disengage the clutch once it has reached the end of the thread. I am probably going to go for the clutch design that is on gwhenginnering.co.uk (Graham Meeks) i really appreciate Geoff's idea however i think that i am going to give Meek's a go.

My current dilemma however is the new Jib for the cross slide. I have marked out drilled and tapped the slide for the jib however in the "how to" on chester machine tool's forum the guy uses an Aluminium Bronze piston/ jib... My question is does it have to be ali bronze as its ridiculously expensive! 1/2" round by 6" long is £43 could i not just use aluminium or Phosphor bronze? I Know it has to be soft enough that it doesn't mark the carriage but hard enough that it doesn't just squish after a couple of uses.

Cheers

Steve

Use a pound coin. It is very similar to aluminium bronze and the only part that needs to be in the correct material is the face in contact. There are plenty of forgeries in circulation so if you use one of those you are not breaking any law if you destroy it.

Martin

Geoff's clutch is just a transmission clutch which like a lot of large industrial lathes allows the motor to keep running but the spindle can be stopped. Smoother starting and stopping and handy if doing production work with lever operated collet chucks. It won't stop you crashing the carrage/tool into the head/work. Stick to the Meek/Hardinge design.

You may want to have a search about for the mods Anthony Mount did to his BH600 they were in one of three mags

Edited By JasonB on 05/01/2016 18:42:31

Hi there, Steve,

I've come late to this thread and I see that you already have lots of recommendations as to reduce the noise generated by your lathe. As I am not familiar with your machine, I have nothing to add to that aspect of the discussion.

However, you could possibly reduce the sound level in your workshop by enhancing the absorption of the sound energy once it gets into the room. If the workshop has large planar wall surfaces of (acoustically) hard material, the sound will bounce around without diminishing - the 'reverberation time' will be long. A simple (very simple) way to put it is that you will hear each milli-Joule of sound energy many times as it bounces to and fro between the walls of the workshop.

The way this problem is handled 'indoors' or in some large public rooms is to have lots of soft furnishings including curtains and wall hangings - not very practical for a workshop, I agree. But you might be able to break up the reflection of the sound by breaking up the even-ness of the walls, e.g. by avoiding the fronts of your wall cupboards all being in the same plane. If you can arrange for the sound reflection to be diffuse, there'll be phase differences and consequent cancellation.

Best regards,

Swarf, Mostly!

P.S.: I'm NOT advocating lining your walls with egg-boxes - they only work if they're filled with some lossy material, e.g. marmalade, not very practical!!!!!!!!!!!!!!