A new arrival in Arnold's shop

[Maryak]

Arnold,

I have to agree with you about some of the imported drill chucks. Don't know why but they seem to be one thing that lacks quality control and respectable accuracy.

A little tip about "T" nuts if I may. If you make them a little longer and offset the tapped hole close to one end you will, (I hope), find them more versatile as you can get up closer to the ends of the "T" slot with the hold down bolt. I find it especially useful with rotary tables and "T" slotted face plates.

Best Regards
Bob

 

[Omnimill]

Nice job on the T nuts and agree about a decent German drill chuck. I bought a small Rohm but it's not as good as my second hand Albrecht: http://www.albrechtchucks.com/ :-X Oh, and nice job on the stand as well Arnold, I even like the colour!

Vic.

 

[arnoldb]

Thank you Bob - that's a great tip on the T Nuts. I'll be making more, so I'll definitely and blatantly plagiarize your suggestion ;D As to the chucks, I guess I'm lucky with my drill press then; it's chuck is actually very well made and accurate. The only thing that was not accurate on it was the MT2 to Jacobs adapter; I replaced that with a good one and now its fine... Just the reverse of the mill's problems then - they _just_ can't get it right :big:

Thanks Vic ;D. I've heard of the Albrechts ; I'll shop around and see if I can find one locally to check both pricing to compare with the Rohm. As to the stand colour, I have a lot of that colour in stock, as I love it too. Anything that needs painting and shouldn't be off-white, I slap that blue on :big: I'm pretty sure it will even find it's way onto a couple of engines in future!

This morning I noticed this bit of HRS lying around:

It looked just dandy for some machining practice, so I cleaned it up a bit in the lathe, ran a hole through the center and threaded it part-way for M12. Then into the mill it went, and after some machining it came out like this:

I shouldn't have run the hole all the way through though :

With some more holes drilled and tapped for M4, an arbor made from a bit of 16mm silver steel threaded M12 on one end, and 8mm square HSS blank toolbit introduced to the bench grinder and then the oilstone, a fly cutter for the mill was done:

I just had to try it out on a block of aluminium ;D:

Regards, Arnold

 

[zeeprogrammer]

This morning I noticed this bit of HRS lying around:

Rof}

I don't know why. I immediately got a picture of a of a bit of HRS (deer) in the headlights.

 

[Artie]

Arnold that was the very first thinbg that I made on my machine as well. Dont they throw the chips all over? Damn mine makes a mess, though it could be just me.. ;D

 

[arnoldb]

About 6 months ago, I started feeling like it would be nice to have a small lathe to accompany my Myford ML7.

I love the old girl (the ML7), she's done everything I've thrown at her - to the extent of even mild abuse; us newbies can be hard on machine tools. I'd like the ML7 to last me a very long time indeed, but using a machine will wear it, and regularly making small or even tiny parts close to the chuck is the worst for this.

There was a small 5x9 (or 6x9 or 5x10 or 6x10 ?? - well, 140x250 in mm) Chinese lathe standing in a shop here in Windhoek, and I visited a couple of times over many months to assess whether I would spend my money on it, and what it would need done to it to make it worthwhile to buy. From what I could see, a complete strip-down, new gibs all round and a lot of additional fettling to clean up poor workmanship and get rid of burrs - hence a lot of work. Finance was a consideration as well, and after a small windfall, I decided to go for it as I was sure I could do the mechanical modifications needed. When I got to the shop, it was gone - sold a week earlier. No problem; they could order me another one at the same price... So I said "go for it" and forked over the money; in Namibia it's pay-up-front when ordering, unless you have a business and account.

Patience is a virtue... Today it was nearly two months down the line since ordering, and I received a call... "Your lathe's here - you can come and collect it. It's not red though; it's yellow". Well, for me it's to heck with the colour anyway; I'd prefer grey or light blue any time, but colours does not make a machine or machinist worth anything...

I brought this home:

And WHAT A PLEASANT SURPRISE!
According to the paper work, this one was built in March this year, and compared to the other older display lathe I wanted to buy, improved a hell of a lot. All the gibs are close fitting with none of the horrors I've seen in other posts, or indeed on the one I originally wanted to buy. In fact, this little machine somehow has a feeling of quality around it - I have not detected any burrs left on moving parts, and everything works smoothly, and that's even before I'm going to strip it down for a clean-up to remove the factory rust protectant and all of that and lubricate it properly. And it even has zero-able dials right through!
Compared to my Chinese drill press and Milling machine, this lathe shows a vast improvement in build quality.

Its not all moonshine & roses though :big: - it has a very limited set of gearing for thread cutting - metric only and not a big range either. I'll make gear sets as I need them - or use the ML7 for screw cutting. Standard accessories only extends to a 3-jaw chuck with inner & outer jaws and a fixed tailstock center. I need a revolving tailstock center, 4-jaw chuck (go ahead and laugh, but a 4-jaw is indispensable IMHO), and a collet chuck. And a tailstock drill chuck - a hobby lathe is pretty much useless without one : - one of the reasons I bought this lathe is for drilling small holes in workpieces as the ML7 only gets up to about 800RPM and this 'un can do 3000 rpm according to specs.

Overall though, I think I'm going to have a lot of fun with this "little" addition to my shop ;D

Regards, Arnold
Oh and, that spring-loaded "safety" chuck key that came with it is going to get a lesson in aerodynamics...

 

[1Kenny]

Nice one, Arnold. Its always handy to have a little lathe in the shop.

Kenny

 

[cfellows]

Nice looking little lathe, Arnold. You'll have a lot of fun with that. The bed and some of the other parts look almost like a Unimat 3.

Chuck

 

[crab]

Great machines Arnold.I have a 9" southbend and a 6" atlas and use the atlas a lot more than the SB for small parts and set ups.I bought the atlas new in 1969 and have never been sorry I did.I still remember the thrill I got making that first cut.Bill

 

[zeeprogrammer]

Help me out Arnold. Point me to the thread where you're making something with your new lathe!

crab...I just saw your sign-off. I am very honored.
I had to go back and review that part of my life. Thanks for that. Thanks so much. ;D

 

[Blogwitch]

Arnold,

It is so nice to see you taking the next leap of faith up the model engineering ladder, you made great progress with your lathe and bench vice, and I am sure you will make every use of your new pieces of equipment.

If I could just make one suggestion for a next little project for your mill. Make yourself a vice backstop. You will find from the very start, it will be worth more than it's weight in gold, once you learn how to use it to it's full extent. I use mine almost every time I turn the mill on, not much nowadays, but when I did.

BTW, I notice that you didn't buy a standard collet chuck, but if you find you need a few extra collets that you don't possess, then Arc Euro do have a few odd ones that they have on very special offer. Go down the page a little, and if you measure your ones up and they are the same (which they should be) then at least if you do want some, they are there. The only other place that I know that sells them in sets (either metric or Imp.) are Chester UK.

http://www.arceurotrade.co.uk/Catalogue/Clearance-Items

I used that type for many years before ER became market leaders. Now I don't use either, preferring spindle collets instead (they give a lot more throat room).

Keep up the good work


John

 

[Ken I]

Arnold, congratulations on the new arrivals - looking good.

That lathe looks like a vast improvement on my Chinese "no name brand".

Your workrate puts me to shame before - I presume that's going to get worse.

Ken

 

[arnoldb]

Thanks Gents

A month+ down the line, and the little lathe cut its first metal today - at a whim, and to satisfy Carl . It still needs a proper stand and bolting down - I'm over my ears into projects at the moment, and my work life is interfering - I won't complain about that too much as I do need income :big:

Thanks John. I leant some invaluable lessons with just the lathe and the bench vise and drill press (oh, and a couple of files! ;D); A vise backstop is high on my to-do list - as well as soft jaws for the mill vise - there's been many occasions where I needed it. Thank you for the link - in fact I took some of your earlier advice when I built the ER25 collet chuck for the lathe, and recently ordered more ER25 collets in the ranges I found most useful on the mill, as well as a bearing-based closer nut. I'll soon make a new collet chuck for the mill. The non-standard Chinese collet chuck really did it's job so far, but having been spoilt with the bearing closer nut on the lathe, I really want the ease-of-use from it. With my mill's MT4 spindle, spindle collets are a bit scarce, so I'll settle for making my own chuck I also have a brand new set of ER11 collets and 2 closer nuts; I'm still thinking around all the variables and how to use the whole lot together in a "standardisation" of the shop... I have an idea that might be just junk - or might repay itself in the long term...

Ken, I was surprised at the level of improvement on the Chinese lathe - still need a bit of work, but compared to the one I was prepared to buy and what I received, a heck of an improvement. : Ordinary everyday graft puts a bit of a strain on my workrate at the moment... have to pay the bills first :big:

Regards, Arnold