Simple tooling that i could make

Having just bought a ML4 lathe, I am in need of some other simple tooling, the basics really, scribes, D bits, cutting tools, to keep my setup budget as low as possible, I hope to make them, instead of buying them. But I am a complete novice when it comes to machining on a lathe, so will be good to learn a few bits along the way. If you guys could post a link to some easy build tooling, that would be appreciated, I haven't been able to view the whole site yet, so there's a lot to read

With an ML4 you are probably in the UK. That means it is easy for you to get hold of the Workshop Practice Series of books.

No. 14 Making Small Workshop Tools by Stan Bray would be a good start. An older book by Tubal Cain - the English one - is Simple Workshop Devices. Harold Hall also writes good books. Two you can consider are No. 34 Lathework, A Complete Course and No. 39 Model Engineers' Workshop Projects.
That list will start you off. No doubt others will suggest others, and of course there are plenty of small projects available from the internet.

Dave
The Emerald Isle

Thanks, yes I am in the UK

Haven't even collected the lathe yet, that'll be Wednesday then I need to set it up too but I wanted to get ahead of myself in what I could use as a practice on the lathe

We don't see many Myford lathes over here {USA}. But have seen one or two.
If you were in the USA I could help you out with some cutting tools to get you started..how much is postage to the UK.? regards packrat

Unfortunately some of the help about using a Myford ML4 is somewhat incorrect.
Basically, the 4 along with similar lathes like the Pools and the Britannia- beloved by Tom Walshaw( Tubal Cain) of Darlington and the little Zyto belong to an age prior to WW2 Not quite in the era of fast and loose pulleys and line shafting but near enough.
There's nowt wrong with the old Lathe but it would not be out of place foot propelled with a 'pitman etc!

I've done it- none of this guessy game stuff! I have already suggested that a visit to the South Durham club at Hurworth might be constructive.
Where the ML4 appears in the history book is 'The Amateurs Lathe' by Sparey and if you can be bothered, the 500 and more pages of Advanced Machine Tool Work by Robert H Smith is still on the net, a bit dated about tools but probably better than most.

Those are MY thoughts, others might have other views.
Returning to the lathe itself, modifications were well covered by Martin Cleeve starting in Model Engineer when he acquired a partial ML7 and added the home built modifications which came from his own ML4 etc. That epic starts in Volume 113 when he put two motors onto his lathe. The rest of Cleeve is fabricated sections.

Where does one get 'Cleeve'? Either be in a club or perhaps the local library can oblige. Otherwise, lash out on Sparey or wrap your head in a towel and have a ready supply of aspirins. to read Smith.

I hope this helps and just for the record, I overhauled an early ML which had made lots of Northumbrian bag pipes.

Excuse me, I'm off to feed my dodo

Norm

Thanks for the replies, Packrat, postage to the UK can be extremely expensive, I've just had a Teddy sent from there doesn't weight much but that was $12, I sent over a scuttle I made for the mamod traction engine, and that cost me £35 to send, so I guess its just about the right courier. The lathe I've bought does come with a lot of tooling, some will be worn out, some wont. But I wanted to find some threads on making tools, or even some plans.

Norm i have noted what you said about Hurworth, and when I get the time I will be looking at going. I'll look into the books you suggest, but I'm not a great reader, so sitting down reading a 500 page book that'll fry my head head doesn't appeal. I'm more of an observed learner, I can learn more watching someone for 5minutes, than I can reading a book for an hour

Check out Clicksprings for some simple tooling to make
https://youtu.be/o8Bd8G21Vv8
http://www.clickspringprojects.com/shop-made-tools.html
http://www.stubmandrel.co.uk/workshop/29-d-bits
http://www.homews.co.uk/page463.html

Have a look *** HERE *** Bazmak makes toolmakers clamps, always useful and a nice simple starter project.
John

Thanks for the replies, the brass scribe looks easy enough, need an emery stick, or scotch bright pad to polish though, also while browsing saw one for a pen, I guess that's a tool, after all the pen is meant to be mightier than the sword, and a bump roller, just a few to start with

JC,

It would help if we knew what part of the UK you are in.

I previously owned an ML2 of which basically the ML4 was an updated version, and I will tell you one thing before you get your machine.
DO NOT touch the clamp bolts that compress the head bearings for a closer fit, because the castings are so old and most probably overstressed by now, get things wrong and the top half of the castings will snap off leaving you with a lump of scrap unless you have the facilities to repair it.
I worked out a repair scheme for the rear holder, and that was many years ago, but the lathe is still running like like a good one today once I made and fitted new bronze bearings, but the only way to fix the front was to get a very good cast iron welder to do the job for you, which I had to do. The peelable shims that go into the gap that the bolts close up, as far as I am aware have not been available for many years, and people just didn't fit them any more, allowing the bolts to tighten down too far and so break the castings. Mine were already cracked when I got hold of the machine.

If you need to know any more, just ask, but I won't be available after this weekend for some time.

John

packrat said:

We don't see many Myford lathes over here {USA}. But have seen one or two.
If you were in the USA I could help you out with some cutting tools to get you started..how much is postage to the UK.? regards packrat

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To you members in the UK, are the Myford lathes being made anymore.? I ask because I have copy of the M.E. Lathe Manual by Edgar T. Westbury dated 1958, looking at the photos of the lathe it looks to be a well made small lathe. back in the 1970s or so a importer here {USA-Utah} had a few for sale at a machinery tool show. I was looking for a lathe at the time but was low on cash.

packrat said:

To you members in the UK, are the Myford lathes being made anymore.? I ask because I have copy of the M.E. Lathe Manual by Edgar T. Westbury dated 1958, looking at the photos of the lathe it looks to be a well made small lathe. back in the 1970s or so a importer here {USA-Utah} had a few for sale at a machinery tool show. I was looking for a lathe at the time but was low on cash.

Click to expand...

As far as I know, there is only spares available, and they come at a premium, ie more than the lathe or a new one. Unless someone could enlighten me



I did really well, ie I was lucky!! I set off this morning at 6am, later than I hoped, and due to some unfortunate incident at spaghetti junction, traffic was a nightmare around Birmingham. So eventually arrived at the gentleman's house collected inspected and he even ticked off every thing on the copy of the eBay advert he printed. I loaded up and spent about an hour at his place, discussing the lathe and machining on it. He reworks motors, so the motor had just been serviced two weeks ago apparently

The round journey along with a two hour pitstop with a young man I know, was a total of 643miles, which was done in three blocks, one down there a total of 313miles, one to, which was 245miles and the remainder home, I now have sat on the kitchen table a big lump of cast iron and twirly bits, which I need to get set up in the shed, (after its been cleared out. I don't want to twirl anything now because coming inside the metal is warming up, and the GiB adjusters have gone almost solid, due to expansion. So I've put it in a folded down state ready to install very soon in its final location. More to come but quite pleased with it

John you can help me with one think hopefully, can you provide some images of the back gears, and how they operate, I fear they may have broken the shaft. As when I operate the lever, with a cam, nothing happens, the back gears remain where they are. How does the back gears operate, I'm worried the shaft has snapped, which would mean adjusting the headstock bearing which you warn against.

JC,
The Myford ML2 I owned is still in my friends workshop, unfortunately I won't have time to go round and take some piccies before I am away for a month on holiday, if you are still in trouble then, I will certainly try to help.

BTW, have you checked that the small back gear operating lever isn't loose on it's shaft, and needs retightening?
Another BTW, never engage the back gear to give more pressure to remove the chuck, mine came with teeth missing on the bull gear (the big one nearest the chuck) so I had to make a new one out of steel rather than cast iron. Another one is that maybe the saddle handle for going left/right isn't instinctive, and it has a fast movement on it, so it is very easy to put the tool into the chuck until you get used to it, I superimposed a larger gear between the operating shaft and handle that gave a slower operation plus instinctive movement.
These are just a few things that I can remember about, once I see my old machine, things will come back to me.

Packrat,

New Myford lathes are now being made by RDG under the name of Myford

https://www.myford.co.uk/acatalog/NEW-SUPER-7-LATHE-FITTED-TO-DRO.html


John

I Think- I THINK that I have the manuals such as they are from a French source. There is the classic reference to lathes.co.uk which you should have easily have Googled but I have the brief notes on the ML4 as well as trade references from the past.

If you want this, then I leave it to you to contact me.
Norman

Here is the motherlode of tooling projects, from simple to complex, on Harold Hall's website. This is only the first page of the index, click on the tab at the bottom to see more.
http://www.homews.co.uk/page463.html

Thanks all, I've been tinkering with the lathe today, on the kitchen table, I've got my head around it all now I think and which lever does what, for instance.

1. The back gears wouldn't engage and they were very stiff to operate the lever, looked closer, and found that there was a bolt on top which wasn't related to the headstock bearing, I thought it was so didn't want to upset the bearings. Quick spanner and the back gears engage.

2. The slides were very very stiff, so I backed off the gib adjuster and crosslide from its mount, and also took it off its mounting, cleaned and oiled the thread and sliders, and put that back on, along with the same for the crosslide, and I tightened the GiB adjusters to allow its full travel, without binding, these will have to be readjusted in the shed, (cooler).

3. I couldn't get the half nuts to engage the leads screw, gave a squirt of WD40 and brushed some of the crud off there. Put some oil on the leads screw, and by turning the chuck by hand, got the half nuts to engage and move the saddle. Which leads onto no4.

4. While messing with the above, I heard a grinding sound from the gears, when I looked there was a gap between the two gears near the top of the change gears, so just the edges of the teeth were engaging, creating a horrible noise. Back to the spanner, slackened off the gear adjustor from the back of the bracket and moved it tight up against it, I then fed paper through the gears to leave a small clearance. Tightened it all back up and jobs a good one

5. When I was looking at the lathe, and the motor on the table I thought to myself, that's a really wide set up, it'll take away a lot of bench space, so I moved the motor nearer and thought I'll look for a shorter belt, then I just happened to push it backwards to pick something that was trapped under it. Eureka moment, build a pivot table for the motor mount to rest on, it will decrease the profile free up space on the bench and to boot it'll be a belt tentioner, this will be built into the bench I'm making for the lathe, and will simply be a 18mm ply double laminated, with a 16mm threaded bar, as its pivot, and two adjusting screws, basically a bolt turned upside down and a but either side of the plywood. It should give reasonable amount of adjustment to belt tension as well as holding the motor firm

I'm glad that you are getting sorted and have discovered how to get at the back gear facility.
Surprisingly, this isn't a feature on these Chinese lathes which many have there lowest speeds as 100 or even 130rpm.

Again, replacement of a motor used to be nothing more than 1440rpm motor salvaged out of an old washing machine.
I'm writing on UK situations.

Regards

N

Hi Norman, how do I send you a PM??
Regards Jon

JCSteam said:

Hi Norman, how do I send you a PM??
Regards Jon

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Actually I've got it OK. The really hard job- for me- is to download the bits from the French.

If I can manage, I'll do the bits for the later Myfords so you can get some idea for screwcutting-- etc

Just got back from the Model Exhibition in Doncaster and am knackered

Regards

N

Got on the wrong train this AM and on the way back, some one changed the platform for the train.

All is not bad because a Acute Tool Grinder kit followed me home

Jon,

IMHO, this lathe will give you many years good service if looked after and set up correctly. Mine did about 10 years with me after I rescued it from being thrown away and it has been in my friends possession for more years than that, he restores old racing mo'sickles and it is as accurate now as ever it has been.

There is one major issue with this mark of lathe, the nose thread, and I never actually got to do this mod as I could make my own chuck backplates.
To fit ready made backplates (usually only cost around £15), you need to make an adapter to bring the size of what you have on your lathe to the modern Myford thread. This will allow easy fitting of new and larger chucks and nose fittings.

It is not worth buying one, the link I gave to Packrat above sell a certain adapter, but if it fitted the nose thread on your lathe, it would never be perfect with regards to runout. It needs to be made and fitted onto the original lathe nose thread.

https://www.myford.co.uk/acatalog/1--x-12TPI-TO-1.-1-8--x-12TPI-ADAPTOR-2333.html

Once you have got internal and external threading under you belt, that is then the time to make your own adapter using your lathe to make it so that it runs perfectly true.

Good luck on the rescue and refurb of your lathe.

John