Tappering attachment for metal lathes. Here's a pic of one.

That taper bar is limited to 10". You would have to does some modification to make it work for cue work. I moved to cnc for all tapers and never went back.

Jim.

Kent,
The tapering bars for metal lathes are limited in length as has been stated. But there is no reason that you couldn't make one for your self that is longer.
I don't use CNC for anything. I made a 32" taper bar for my SouthBend and I'm quite content with it. Thank you, but that's $3,500/4,000 that I get to keep in my pocket.

Just for the sake of asking, does your carriage travel allow you to cut a 29/30" length?

I set up tapering on my lathe, including shafts. There are great advantages (obviously) to CNC, but while KJ gets to keep his $3,500 in his pocket, I don't have it to begin with.

Kelly

We have that exact taper attachment on the Jet lathe at my day job (R & D). In my 5 years there, I used the taper attachment twice I believe. That particular attachment is not the best design on the part in the right side of the picture. I remember it being very difficult to secure it rigidly enough to the bed so it would not move on the bed. The last time I used it that casting actually broke in half while in use. I don't know if they improved the design since. This was about 2 years ago I believe.

We also have a south bend lathe and in contrast its taper bar is rock solid compared to the Jet.

But disregarding the problem specifically with the Jet taper bar, you are still limited to about 10" of travel in a straight taper (not curved) with any of the off the shelf taper attachments for metal lathes.

How about a picture of your setups KJ and Kelly Guy I need to see some photographic help so my mind can see what I need to build.--Leonard

Newton said:

Thank you all for the feedback.

I'll for sure drop the option if I go for the lathe, specially when I have not seen pictures of the tapper bar it self.
As mentioned, for straight tapper I think I use tailstock offset - if I decide to do tapering on the lathe.

Thank's

Kent

Click to expand...

Kent, if you want to run a taper on your manual lathe its not that hard. I have a boring bar head that adjust side to side with a moris taper on the back for my tail stock. I have a 1/2 live center mounted in the holder and andjust the head back and forth for the taper. You don't realy want to move your tailstock once it is dead nuts center. I guess I am still lazy.

Jim.

Newton said:

Good idea :thumbup2:
I'm almost 99.9% sure on the lathe so hopefully I manage to order it these next day's. Zeroing the tailstock should be fairly straight forward, but I guess you're "extra offset" tailstock could be my first project

Kent

Click to expand...

I have used a boring head while experimenting with cutting points on my lathe. Once you figure out a good way to get it level in the tailstock, they work pretty good. It's a lot easier than offsetting the tailstock IMO. You can pick them up fairly cheap on Ebay for the import versions. I bought mine from this guy, this is the MT3 one, I have the MT2:
http://cgi.ebay.com/MT3-BORING-HEAD...ryZ58251QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

Dave

Kent,
840mm equates to 33" which is plenty to run a taper bar.
And yes, you can offset the tail-stock to do straight tapering. It's adjustable for a reason and it's been done 1,000s of times. A machinist isn't worth his cutting oil if he can't re-true his tail-stock.
However, this will not allow you to cut contours as for a shaft. For this you will need a taper bar system. If you are going to make contour patterns to cut shafts, you might as well make a straight one to do straight tapering as well and leave the tail-stock alone except for supporting and centering the undriven end of the cue.
The key is to disable the cross-feed lead screw so the cross-feed portion of the carriage is allowed to 'float'. It will now be guided by the taper bar. My SouthBend is now a dedicated tapering lathe and yes, I taper both handles and shafts on it. Believe me, the lathe has paid for itself many times over.
Leave the Jet taper bar for someone that needs it. It won't be of any use to you for cue work.

Leonard,
Kelly has already posted pics of his taper bar system and they are quite detailed. A search will get you the info you need. If he would like to do it again, it's certainly his prerogative. I personally see no sense in my posting what has already been posted.

KJ Cues said:

Kelly has already posted pics of his taper bar system and they are quite detailed. A search will get you the info you need. If he would like to do it again, it's certainly his prerogative. I personally see no sense in my posting what has already been posted.

Click to expand...

Actually, I am not sure I have posted pics of my setup. I had occasion to send you a few pics of it when discussing some bracket fabrication. That is probably what you are thinking of. However, you are correct that others have posted some pics of their taper setups...one not terribly long ago.

Kelly

I made my own taper bar for both my shaft and butt machines. I used a 3" wide steel flat plate 31" long . Made to 90 degree brackets to mount to my machines and then started grinding my shaft taper bar until I got close then started filing and sanding until I hit it exactly right. I use a mutli taper on my butt ends but still used the same process.

Here's one I made for my Jet 1340 GHB. The straight taper is just a piece of 5/8" square keystock, bolted at (4) slotted locations.
The compound shaft taper unit is a piece of 1/2"x 1-1/2" UHMW sandwiched between the main mounting plate and a piece of 1/4"x 1" flatbar.
The rest should be self-explanatory.



Hopefully this will help someone. It sure does work good.

Regards,
Frank

Shown upside down to show the tapers. What you don't see is a 1" cam follower mounted to the 1/2" aluminum plate (with adjustable holes for different locations) mounted to the cross-slide.
When switching from the butt taper to the shaft taper all I do is remove and reposition the cam follower in one of the other indexing holes.

JR, you can only show one at a time.
NICE!

Showing the way clamp brackets and risers for mounting the top plate. Sized at both ends to allow for full travel of carriage and tailstock along the ways.

Taper bars are mounted underneath and protected by the whisker. Definetely keeps the chunkies out of the way