Gallery, Projects and General > Oooops!
Novice question Re lathe
Fergus OMore:
I think that you are dead right and dead wrong :doh:
You have a set of brazed carbide tools or so I assume. At some point, they would be sharp but the question is how sharp are they now- which is what really matters. You have been using stainless steel which is a quick way to blunt whatever tooling you possess. Somehow, I doubt that you have facilities to recondition them as you will need diamond wheels and possibly finish the last bit of the work using diamond laps. So where do you go from there?
Frankly, if it was me, I'd either change my material or change my tooling. I'd probably do both but if you are stuck with stainless, I'd head off to buy the correct carbide inserts and tools and swop them when they got blunt.
Me, I'm a mean old Sassenach- and use almost entirely high speed steel tooling on ordinary steel or cast iron.
Oh and for the record, I've made a set of pipes- Northumbrian of course!
So re-think please and let me help sort out my missus with her sopranino saxophone, eh?
hopefuldave:
I worked for q well known UK importer who insisted those.brazed carbide tools were Just What A Novice Needs ( high profit margin...), they are in fact the machining equivalent of the Chocolate Fireguard...
Straight from the box, the edge geometry is unlike any tool I've known, they need sharpening and honing before use, once ready and used the edges crumble and.shatter in no time.... Decent (non-Chinese) indexable tooling is.worth the money, the Chinese stuff is really one-use disposable, in my humble opinion - great for taking the skin off an iron casting, but swap to HSS for finish / accurate cuts.
vtsteam:
If you're a beginner, I think it's helpful to start out with the basics before moving on to specialized stuff.
High speed steel lathe tool blanks are inexpensive, and by grinding your tools instead of buying inserts or ready made tools you will learn a lot about what is needed for different materials and cuts. If you goof up sharpening HSS, you can adjust it until it works better.
Mild steel is all you need, for practice blanks rather than stainless, and it will teach you a lot. True, it isn't easy to get a fine finish on some of the lesser grades, but that kind of difficulty is a blessing in disguise because it allows you to see improvement when it happens. You will learn a lot about feeds and speeds and chatter, etc. as you try to improve the finish on practice bars. These things are all important to experience first hand. It gives you the background to understand by feel almost, what is needed. It is very much more instructive than looking up inserts in a catalog.
High speed steel lathe tools can be made very sharp. It's not necessarily a lesser choice. HSS may not have the wearing qualities of carbide, but is easily re-sharpened and to a high degree. It is true that for some uses carbide is a better choice. But for most everyday use for common steels brass and aluminum HSS is an excellent choice. I think it is ideal for learning, inexpensive and flexible in application.
The first week I started eleven years ago after months of building a lathe and having a lot of expectations and anticipation, I had trouble getting anything but a rough edge on work and was appalled at what I had vs what I hoped it would be. Don't get discouraged by that. It happens to everybody -- particularly with a small lathe. I gradually learned to sharpen better, adjust speeds and feeds, increase work holding stiffness, too, by many small changes to what I was doing -- long overhangs of thin stock don't work well. Turning work between centers helped greatly for some things, etc. etc.
You need to learn your lathe and its capabilities, and don't worry too much if you can't at first get the same results you see in photographs online and in magazines. You will eventually get there as you improve your methods and understanding. Experience is the best teacher.
One place I found helpful for my initial sharpening of tools back then (and is still online today) was Varmint Al's website. He shows lots of interesting stuff for a newcomer and a first lathe. The diamond toolholder also mentioned above is nice (but pricey) if you are trying to achieve a nice finish with relatively easy tool grinding.
Whatever you choose, don't worry too much. You will work it all out in time! :thumbup:
piper1:
Thank you so much for the constructive replies, i really do appreciate the time you have given to me by explaining some of the fundamental points .
I do realise that the more i get to know my machine the clearer and easier things will become.
I think that one of the best ways for me to learn how to operate a lath apart enrolling on a machine course is to try and find some one who is local to me and willing to show some of the basic points of getting started.
Thank you once again
sparky961:
Piper,
I bought my first mill/drill in around 2002, thinking I'd be running production parts and making money with the shiny machine I knew very little about. (I see lots of nodding heads out there, so read on) Fast forward to the future, where I'm now solely responsible for the machining operations of a fairly large metal fabrication business. Now, I'll be the first to admit that most of what I do isn't that complex, mostly drilling, tapping, and some profile milling. But the important parts is what happened in between, or maybe rather what didn't happen.
I've had neither formal nor informal instruction. I have had quite a few failures of my own, and learned from many hundreds that other people have made. But I'm entirely self taught, which is exactly the mentality that I believe one needs if they want to become successful with machining as a hobby or career. I remember going to the public library, while those were still fairly early days in terms of the Internet, and sitting at one of the basement tables hand copying some sketches of how to grind various tools. The 3-ring binder of paper that went with me got heavier and heavier as I added this and that article in my relentless pursuit to having both skill and confidence in transforming "unyielding" lumps of steel into the parts floating around in my imagination.
You need to be respectful of your machines but not afraid of them. You need to be observant and constantly adjusting this and that while seeing what kind of effect your changes have. You need to ask questions on respectable forums like this one, and learn to "separate the wheat from the chaff" when you get replies.
You're well on your way to figuring things out if you manage to stay engaged and focused on getting through every challenge that's tossed your way without trying to take the easy way out.
The worst possible attitude that one could take is to think that someone else is going to teach them how to do things. No, you need to teach yourself, using the multitude of resources at your fingertips.
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