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  1. #1
    Join Date
    Apr 2021
    Location
    victoria
    Age
    63
    Posts
    28

    Default Cross slide dial and tail stock modification

    I had a play today and had a go at making a larger cross slide dial for the lathe to make it easier to read and use.
    First up I had to setup an index wheel with 100 graduations, I made this using a CAD program, printed it up and taped it onto the 3 jaw chuck as a template and then using the tool post with a sharp tool on its side I scribed the marks onto the body of the 3 jaw chuck for future reference. I also made up an index wheel that I can clamp behind the chuck, it has multiple sets of graduations from 100 down. The CAD program made that easy enough. Ideally a locking index plate or some other arrangment would be perfect however for this 1st go a simple pointer and holding the chuck each graduation did the job ok although I did fail to hold the chuck tight enough on a couple of the tail stock marks and they are out a bit - I dont think that will be a critical issue for drilling from the tail stock.
    I didnt want to make a new threaded bush to provide clearance for a bigger dial so I made a sleve and cut away the section where the cross slide comes back to the handwheel. As I dont have a mill it was a hacksaw and file job. I threaded the sleves and fitted grub screws to them to clamp onto the original dial and collar. A small hole drilled to allow access to the dial tension screw to allow the new dial to be zeroed when ever needed. As a first go I made it out of alluminium and hand punched the numbers after marking it out. Not what you would call perfect but it does the job. I can even guestimate fractions of a thou with the bigger scale where as I was hard pressed to just get 1 thou on the small 1" dials.
    That then inspired me to have a go and make a dial for the tail stock for which I had to also allow access to lubricate the back end. I did this in a similar manner to the cross slide, 2 sleves that clamp to the exising parts held in place with grub screws.
    Moving right along I then added a metric scale to the tailstock barrel by using the metric change gears and setting up for a 1mm thread pitch and hand turning the lathe for each mark - all 55 of them, again hand stamping the numbers on the shaft.
    Next I might have a go at adding a dial to the carriage wheel and then from there work out a way to also include metric scales and pointers.
    Any tips and tricks how to do a better job will be greatly appreciated.

    Its amazing the things you can do on a lathe beyond turning lots of chips and shavings

    IMG_8858.jpg Index marks added to the chuck

    IMG_8856.jpg Cross slide dial

    IMG_8860.jpg Tail stock dial

    IMG_8859.jpg tail stock barrel metric scale

    cheers
    TonyB

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Nov 2007
    Location
    melbourne australia
    Posts
    3,228

    Default

    The tailstock dial is a good idea.
    Chris

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Apr 2021
    Location
    victoria
    Age
    63
    Posts
    28

    Default dials on Sheraton 9a

    Over the Christmas break Ive gone a step further with the dials on my Sheraton 9A.
    As you would know the originals are one inch diameter and just over a thumbnail between 0.001" graduations which is hard to read at the best of times let alone if you are wanting to reduce the diameter by 0.001" (0.0005" radius). Further the lathe has no dial on the saddle wheel so its a guessing game how far the saddle moves when you turn the hand wheel - except for the fact that it is 1" per turn.
    To get around all of this I made up new 2" graduated collars that slip over the originals and with a grub screw lock onto the 1" collars for the cross slide and the compound slide. The index collar for the cross slide had to be cut down to allow the cross slide to come back as far as possible. I managed to do that and have lost only 3/16" travel. A mill would have been nice to use to make that bit but I managed with a Dremel cutter mounted in my pedestal drill and rotating the table to get the desired cut needed.
    I also made a 2" dial for the Saddle hand wheel along with a indexing collar that had to have an internal taper to fit on the shaft boss, this is held in place with two grub screws.
    Finally I made a new 1.5" graduated dial and index collar for the tail stock. The trickiest bit I found was lining up and drilling the holes for the tapered pins so they could be easily removed/fitted if needed.
    They may not be OEM standard but they work and are much easier to read and can easily "guestimate" fractions of a thou if needed.

    saddle wheel.jpgcross slide 1.jpgcross slide 2.jpgcompound.jpgtailstock.jpg

    Cheers
    Tony

  4. #4
    Join Date
    Aug 2021
    Location
    Sydney
    Age
    46
    Posts
    116

    Default

    Lovely work. Especially like the saddle wheel dial.

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