Hey..be careful
- Thread starter GoldCrown
- Start date
PracticeChampion
Well-known member
Really be bad if a high dollar cue was spinning while it happened 
Mine are bolted down and the not very wide tables screwed to the wall. I had a visual of a cue spinning and things falling over, no way of grabbing it unless you want twisted up LoL
Mine are bolted down and the not very wide tables screwed to the wall. I had a visual of a cue spinning and things falling over, no way of grabbing it unless you want twisted up LoL
I have a set up at another location that is bolted. This set up is new… just putting it together. The motor shifted.. had to tighten the belt. Hopefully the damage is minor. I’ll spin it later. As for a high dollar cue that’ll never happen. I have no idea what a high dollar cue looks likeReally be bad if a high dollar cue was spinning while it happened
Mine are bolted down and the not very wide tables screwed to the wall. I had a visual of a cue spinning and things falling over, no way of grabbing it unless you want twisted up LoL
. But better that it happened before I begin turning. Anyway $79 for the part. No bad.Interesting, I always thought this was a possible issue with a few setups I've seen, but I haven't heard of it happening yet.. Hopefully the lathe is still ok.
I just finished welding my lathe table together last week, it's now fully bolted down, with the main reason being I made small ''levelling blocks'', which help make the lathe run true and get rid of any potential bed twist (something I haven't really seen talked about much). Basically the lathe sits on bolt heads, which have been drilled and tapped, and a secondary, smaller bolt, bolts the bed to the larger bolt heads. What you can do then is level the lathe on multiple points, and take measurements as you do so, cut a piece, measure the diameters, and adjust the heights accordingly, which then brings the cutting knife closer in to the workpiece, or further out, until it cuts perfect.
I'm mentioning this so if someone decides to go ahead and bolt down their lathe after seeing your post, that they also consider setting up a similar system, depending on the lathe, to also get better accuracy out of it, because I don't think it's that much extra work.
Hopefully the image I tried attaching below works, if not, I'll try to edit the post and figure it out.
I just finished welding my lathe table together last week, it's now fully bolted down, with the main reason being I made small ''levelling blocks'', which help make the lathe run true and get rid of any potential bed twist (something I haven't really seen talked about much). Basically the lathe sits on bolt heads, which have been drilled and tapped, and a secondary, smaller bolt, bolts the bed to the larger bolt heads. What you can do then is level the lathe on multiple points, and take measurements as you do so, cut a piece, measure the diameters, and adjust the heights accordingly, which then brings the cutting knife closer in to the workpiece, or further out, until it cuts perfect.
I'm mentioning this so if someone decides to go ahead and bolt down their lathe after seeing your post, that they also consider setting up a similar system, depending on the lathe, to also get better accuracy out of it, because I don't think it's that much extra work.
Hopefully the image I tried attaching below works, if not, I'll try to edit the post and figure it out.
My spindle lathes… one is table top the other on a stand. The table top is not moving.
DeeDeeCues
Well-known member
Good setup. I designed and installed multi-million dollar machines that use the same concept. We generally used three bolts next to each other at multiple points. Two would pull the bed down, flanking one that would push up. Many of our machines had beds over 80ft long and maintained under 5thou accuracy at the tool point.
Thanks for posting this setup.
Wouldn't that not be the way to do it. Like the you use the bolts to just level the machine and when cutting your adjusting your tailstock right? Cause if your tailstock is off, your just leveling your machine to an out of whack tailstock right. Or am i missing some info here. I've only set my lathe up twice but that's the way i learned from the web when i first got it.
DeeDeeCues
Well-known member
Just like how you can't assume your tail stock is aligned, you can't assume your bed is completely planar. Of course you have to start with your tailstock aligned in all three axis. You then adjust the bed to make it completely planar, starting with a global planar and adjusting to remove any pitch and roll. If the bed is sturdy enough and machined within acceptable tolerance, you reduce the number of necessary support/adjustment points.
In the old days, and now to a lesser extent, beds and ways were hand scraped on the higher precision machines. Linear roller rails have mostly replaced the practice.
I don't know how others do it, but I was thinking of doing it like this later this week:
I will level my lathe table with a machinist level via 6 adjustable feet, then the lathe guides with a machinist level (using the bolt system mentioned in previous posts), followed by the lathe cross slide using a machinist level again. Ideally they will both read level, realistically I expect that levelling of the cross slide will bring the guides out a little bit, even though I will be using shims and anything possible to minimize this as much as I can... who knows, I might get lucky, but I'll see what the numbers say and make a decision based on that
After that I will put in a thick aluminum/magnesium alloy rod, without using the tailstock, and take extremely thin passes on it, and measure the end diameters with a micrometer to see where I'm even at to begin with. This is then my actual starting point. Of course I will make sure that the diameter/alloy/length of the bar are such, that I'm getting no deflection, while still trying to have the bar as long as possible. The reason for not using a steel bar is the rigidity of the lathe, and since I will only be using it to cut plastic and wood, I think this will work fine.
I will then keep adjusting the levelling bolts until the bar diameters are the same on each end of the workpiece. Once I have all that finished, the actual lathe as level and planar as possible, only then will I start to adjust the tailstock.
Since the tailstock is adjustable and shimmable in every direction, I don't imagine that will be an issue, I want the lathe to be set up and cut as true as possible to begin with, and then I will be playing with the tailstock with a straight bar and a dial indicator, but that's something for next week.
In other words, I agree with what you wrote, and wanted to explain further
.As DeeDee mentioned (thanks for that btw, I appreciate your posts and have learned a lot from them!), assume everything is crooked and work from there
.