My slager 12x36 lathe

[Trion]

Good point!
Note to self: Don't jump to conclusions before you've thought things through properly!
Bte. the smallest piece I have turnet at that speed is about 40mm diameter, I'm not sure if that's small by your scale.

[NickG]

3mm dia is small for me but I know some people over on HMEM are doing 1/2 and 1/4 scale versions of elmers "Tiny" - now that is small!

Nick

[Trion]

Finally things are settling down. Christmas has been celebrated and I'm back from my trip to visit family in Germany. I have got to say this; everyone has heard of the bombing attempt of the flight from Amsterdam to Detroit, right? We were in Schiphol, Amsterdams airport, at the very same day as the flight left for Detroit. We might even have seen the guy who did it!!
Now, beeing from a small town in Norway, I never thought I'd get this close to terrorism. But what can one do about it? Next time we go through security, I won't be surprised if I'm asked to dress butt naked..

Anyways, back to the garage, which today had a chilling -1 degree celsius (30.2 fahrenheit)


But considering the complete lack of insulation and the chilling outside temperatures, it's really not that bad!
(I wouldn't have known the outside temperature, if I hadn't been driving my mothers car. Which again was caused by me beeing an idiot and not having the proper amount of glycol in my Passat's coolant system. Let's just say I opened the hood, squeezed the radiator hose, and it was frozen solid.. Luckily, there seems to have been no damage )
PS: 10 invisible points to the person who guesses what car the picture was taken in!


Other good news... My chrismas gifts! You wouldn't believe my girlfirend, she went shopping with her father to the local high quality tool store, and they both bought me christmas presents there!
So I got three new lovely looking Domer drills! MK2 shank, same as the lathe tailstock, ofcourse!


A 10mm H7 reamer, 90 degree countersink and a pair of thin welding gloves for my TIG welder



Enough off topic..


Finally some pictures of my ball turner project, awaiting milling. This is the upside, and the big lump is going to be milled for the tool holder.


Downside




Happy new year to you all!
Jon

[NickG]

Wow, I thought it was cold here! 

[ksouers]

PS: 10 invisible points to the person who guesses what car the picture was taken in!

First guess is a Fiat.
Second is an Alfa.

Third: It couldn't really be a Ferrari, could it?

[NickG]

not alfa or ferrari - speedo doesn't go up far enough 

[Trion]

Nick: Good point!

ksouers: I see you are guessing on the brand of the display, but would I really be driving a ferrari on bumpy snow covered roads?
It's not a Fiat or an Alfa either. No... It's a Mercedes A-class, the worst car ever built!

[wanabemachinist]

based on the pictures you have shown of your lathe, I have a 1978 Luc cut 11X36 which is identical to yours. The only difference I see is the forward/reverse switch. most likely the castings came from one factory and rebadged by many different companys over a few years. Mine is shown as being made in Taiwan which is pretty common for lathes of this type

[Trion]

Hi, good to hear about someone else with the same machine. I'm not surprised that the machines were rebadged, back then it was much more difficult to discover that kind of things. I have seen a few other slager machines, amongst others a drill press, but only in Norway. When I google the brand, I can't find anything but my own posts
Regarding the lathe, Do you reccomend any improvements, or know of any weaknesses I should look out for? Would be nice to see pictures of your machine

[wanabemachinist]

I have only just got mine so I am getting adjusted to it and making some tool holders and boring bar holders. From my past life I have a lot of cemented carbide tool bits so I need a few holders. Shimming these tool bits in the 4 way holder supplied on the machine is getting boring.  At this point I have no idea about posting pictures as I have just joined this site

[Stilldrillin]

I have only just got mine so I am getting adjusted to it and making some tool holders and boring bar holders. From my past life I have a lot of cemented carbide tool bits so I need a few holders. Shimming these tool bits in the 4 way holder supplied on the machine is getting boring.  At this point I have no idea about posting pictures as I have just joined this site

Have a look here mate..... 

http://madmodder.net/index.php?topic=607.0

David D

[Trion]

Minor update: I have bought myself a new external tool holder, to complete my collection for TPMR inserts. Until now I never had a tool which actually was made for external turning, somehow all the other external ones were for facing!


And ofcourse with a few new inserts aswell

[gt2ride]

Trion  Here is my Trans World Steel lathe.  It looks the same as your lathe.  I bought it new in 83. It also came with the little red tool box.  I have also replaced the V belt with a segmented belt.
This is my favor lathe to cut single point threads.  I have ten other lathes from SB  Boxford  LeBlond  and more.  That says a lot for this lathe. I have the manual also but there is not a lot to it.

gt2ride from Leavenworth Kansas US

[Trion]

Nice lathe there! I'm astonished to hear that you like it that good. I have noticed that there is quite a bit of runout on the threading bar, but I'm not sure how much that affects the threading.
I can detect a few differences between our machines though. Your handles have a cover over the dials, and your cross slide has T-slots over the surface, while mine is plain. I am considering drililng a few mounting holes on the cross slide for a ball turner of new design.

What make is yuor 5C collet holder?

[gt2ride]

The cover on the handles provide duel calibration.  They are mm and in.   The T slots are nice.  I can mount a ball turner or a grinder with no problem. 
The collet holder is home made.  Just made an adapter and used a draw bar. 
I cut a lot of 2-56 threads on the lathe.  Set the crossfeed to 0 and use the compond to feed.  Engage the half nut then use the belt tighten handle to clutch. When I get to the end clutch and back out with the crossfeed.  I can cut at a lot higher speed.

[Trion]

Thanks. Will try that one day when I get some spare time!

Today I got myself a bit more metal to work on. I got several shorter bits laying in the background, and these three monsters. The smallest one is 40, middle is 80 and the biggest is Ø120mm, they are all aluminium

[Trion]

About time for a small update here aswell.
Recently, the lathe has only been oiled and used. The ball turner plans have been scrapped, I want to make something much neater and sturdier. But yesterday I managed to make one of those small things that make a lathe easier to use:


My version of a carriage end stop. I see already that it can definetely be improved. The clamping really isn't much to brag about, but it works if one is being careful. The dial indicator mount could also be improved, as it now only relies on the bore being a bit smaller than 8,00mm. It would also be very nice to have a micrometer screw, to be able to accurately adjust the stop. But it works for now and is better than nothing

[Trion]

The X-axis graduation on my lathe is useless. One full revolution equals 14,25mm of travel, making each line 0,143mm apart. This has annoyed me for quite some time and made me feel that I could not get any kind of precision on the X-axis. On a side note, the Y-axis is graduated 0,02mm per line and is very useful.

So yesterday morning I had an idea, what if I could use my spare digital caliper something like this


On the shaper I cut a groove for the thin end of the caliper to rest in.


And back on the shaper I started making the holder for the caliper top, but my shaper vise is too flimsy so every 5 minutes I took a too large cut and pushed the part out of the vise. So I moved over to the mill and got the job done in a matter of few minutes


I also tapped a M6 hole in the lathe saddle, and there we are



I recall someone saying I should check out what my lathe could do by turning a bar held in the chuck and measure the taper. My last attempt with brass was inconclusive, so I tried again with some steel. The first test was done with my regular TPMR carbide tool and several passes to avoid springing in the bar. The second attempt was made with a fresh ground HSS tool and also had a few passes to make sure everything was in order.


For those struggling to read my hand writing:
First bar, carbide tooling:
Length  -  Diameter
0  -  15,31
20 -  15,31
40 -  15,33
60 -  15,34
80 -  15,37

Second bar, HSS tool:
Length  -  Diameter
0  -  17,79
20 -  17,81
40 -  17,83
60 -  17,84
80 -  17,86

I feel these results are not good enough for what I would like to manage, but being a newbie I would much appreciate feedback from more experienced machinists. Is this normal for a manual lathe with very little usage? Is there a way to make the lathe turn straighter?

[Bogstandard]

To get a more accurate result, instead of using steel, use ali or brass, that will cut a lot easier and won't flex as much.

With your new gotten long bit of ali (40mm), cut off 6" (150mm) and mount that in your chuck. Using a razor sharp HSS cutting tool (carbide is actually blunt in comparison) and do a clean up skim.

Then put a cut on of say a couple of thou (0,05mm), slow power cut from the end to near your chuck. Then measure up. That should show you how tapered you are cutting.

I always use brass for my test bar, as that cuts even easier than ali.


Bogs

[GerryB]

G.Day Trion,
I like the way you are going about setting up your Machines.
One thing you may find useful is a piece of kit that we used many moons ago.
It was a Dumbbell shaped hunk of Mild Steel about a foot long and  (Originally) 2' in dia.
One end had a 1'' Dia protuberance about 2" which was held in the chuck.
The unit was then spun at a slow rate and a very light cut was taken on one of the 2 ends.
Then without moving the setting of the cutter a cut was made on the other end.
These 2 ends were now measured and adjustments made to correct any fault.
After adjustments were made a further trial cut was made on the Dumbbell.
No support was given to the end of the Dumbbell as this would have upset the results.
The whole operation was trial and effort but it worked quite well.
The Foreman then hid the Dumbbell in his office.
You could make your own Dumbbell be securing two discs on a 1" or 25mm dia. steel bar about 12" long.
The wheels can be of a material of your choice but of course must be secure.
Remember that one wheel has to be about 2" in from one end.
Hope this is helpful.
GerryB

[Trion]

Thanks for the reply guys, really like the dumbbell idea! Will keep this in mind when i progress, but I'm afraid I'm coming a bit short on the tooling end.
This is what I am struggling with when it comes to machines and tooling. The necessary tool for the operation is rarely or never in my collection. Say in the case of the lathe, a proper machinist level would be good. Not to mention a set of larger micrometers, to be able to measure parts larger than 25mm

Bogs, can I use a ~25mm brass bar, or should it be as large as 40mm?

[Bogstandard]

Trion,

That would be just fine. But take everything very steady, fine cuts and DON'T lean on or even touch the machine as it is cutting. Just press the lever at the start and release it at the end.

That will tell you if your head is cutting tapered or not.

Later, when you get some more tooling, you will be able to bring your tailstock into play, and then by turning a piece between centres, the tailstock can be brought into perfect alignment.

Don't rush things when aligning a machine tool, just take it smoothly and steady and the machine will tell you if it is out of alignment or not, just by doing little checks like above.

Bogs

[toolman]

G'Day Trion,
Greetings from down under. (Melbourne)
Congratulations on your work so far.
I own a similar 12x36 lathe, mine is badged as a Honden, it is a gap bed, imperial version with a 3MT tailstock, it was built in Nov 1990 but sat unused in storage  for 20 years until I purchased it in April 2010. To date it has been fitted with a 1.5 Hp D.C. variable speed motor, Easson ES8 DRO & AXA toolpost.
I used one of these lathes in a previous job 15 years ago and found it to be a sturdy, accurate machine, however, they do have their issues, mainly lubrication related.
If you remove the front cover of the screw cutting gearbox (5 cap screws) you will see that the gears and bushes at the input end receive virtually no lubrication, my intention is add a reservoir and series of pipes to each gear, in the mean time I remove the cover about once a week and manually oil everything (I have rebuilt the gearbox on a similar lathe and would rather not do it again).
The other area of concern is the bronze gear between the worm on the power feed shaft and  the apron (see photo), it is nicely hidden away and normally receives no lubrication and eventually fails, my intention is to add an oil cup and pipe. In the short term I leave the threading dial off and oil it daily.
My lathe as received had incredibly noisy tumbler gears due to excessive clearance and as I use the it at night in a home workshop this was a real problem, the solution was to turn up new gear mountings with the center spigot  .015" eccentric which allowed the gears to be rotated into correct clearance, this reduced the noise by about 90%.
Another mod to improve surface finish was to add a 50 tooth gear to the gearbox input and run a 30/127 x 120/50 gear train, this gives a lowest feed rate of  .0014"/rev rather than the standard .0028"/rev (not exactly toolroom standards but an improvement). Fitting the DRO was a time consuming exercise, but makes the machine so much more user friendly and productive I can't recommend it highly enough.
I hope I haven't focused on negative aspects too much as that was not my intention (I wouldn't have bought one if I thought they were that bad).
Regards and keep on turning,
Martin (Toolman)

[krv3000]

well all i can say is oooooo 

[Trion]

Thanks bogs, will keep that in mind! I actually have a centre for the spindle end and one for the tailstock. I even got a few lathe dogs too. When I have figured out the headstock alignment, I'll turn my focus towards this.

toolman, nice lathe you got there. Looks so much tidier than mine! Why AXA toolpost? I thought BXA was the recommended size for that type of machine.
I like the lubrication tips, just had a look a the bronze gear on the power feed, looked completely dry!
I'm not sure what you mean by removing the cover of the screw cutting gearbox. On mine you can take of a "lid" and there are small holes you can drip oil onto the gears. I have also thought about a lubrication system, doesn't really have to be anything fancier than a couple of pneumatic fittings and some hoses. But, that is a project further down the road.
When speaking of tumbler gears, are you talking about the back gears for low spindle speed? Those make a bit of noise on mine too, but not comparable to the feed gears. At full speed the whining sound is almost unbearable, so I'm very hesitant to use feed on small diameter parts. I might have to look into that some day!
I am no expereinced machinist, but I have allways thought that the feed selection was very good on my machine. At the lowest feed setting it literally takes forever to cut something. I use the second lowest feed when parting of with a HSS tool.