Collet Chuck

Hi 

Sorry I can't identify it for you, but it looks like a fairly standard sort of spring collet, trouble is all sorts of companies made them, presumably in sizes to suit themselves. Crawford all seem too big but what about Ward, Herbert or Sharpe & Browne to name a few. Have you tried sending your sketch to some of the tooling suppliers (apart from Warco) to see if they know of anything that will fit. Trouble is you need to find an old school tooling supplier rather than a new school -" can't help without the part number" outlet.

Keith

It might be worth spending some (a lot) of time browsing through the Hardinge on line catalogue  http://www.shophardinge.com. If it isn't in there then I think it will be a case of buying some bar and starting making them.

You've got the outside shape already, and a chuck to try them in for fit, so with care that should be achievable. Then fit the collet holder to the lathe, insert the blank collet and drill/bore to the size you need in the holder. That should give you the best chance for concentricity to your holder. Repeat for all the sizes you want and then rig a simple holding device to allow indexing to 3 positions 120 deg apart and slit with a slitting saw. 

There have been a number of article in MEW over the years about making collets of various styles and they all boil down to pretty much the same sequence. All say leave the collets soft as there is too much danger of distortion during hardening, and anyway in normal hobby shop use they'll last a long time anyway. Probably get a better grip on a hardened shank such as a milling cutter as well.

Keith

In our part of the world these collets are called F-type. However, a collet with shaft dia of 25 mm has a total length of 77 mm and a nose dia. 27 mm. The cone angle is 32 deg.

The given dimensions seem to be converted from metric ones?

So I suspect it is really a 'special'.

Greetings, Hansrudolf

 

There's still a lot of those old turret lathe bits about, it was all very well made.

Edited By ady on 27/10/2011 21:59:58