For my education, is a taper bar something that can be added easily to say a metal lathe, or is it only an option for certain lathes. In other words, how do you taper a cue on a large metal lathe
Tapering
- Thread starter Dannydizzan
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Google DZ cues. He has a outstanding website with a lot of videos and pics. He has a taper bar set up on there.
Cueman has a great book on cue building too.
Jay
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Taper bars are very easy to set up on a larger lathe. I bought a new Enco lathe in 1992 and installed a chuck on the back of the spindle and a full length taper bar the day after I received the lathe. I had less than 15.00 in the taper bar set up and about 1.50 for the rear chuck adapter. I had a spare chuck that I mounted.
That's one of the great benefits of full size machinery, you can build about any and all of the extra stuff you need for the lathe to make life easier for the price of scrap metal.
Dick
as mentioned above, taper bars are relatively easy to add
another option, you can also offset your tailstock to taper,
but im guessing you already know that
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just remember , HALF
if you want a .400 difference from joint to butt,
you offset .200 :thumbup:
i wont tell you about the time i had my head up my hiney and offset .400
total brainfart moment
it was an ugly day with a very skinny cue
LOL @ BHQ, thats just standard practice on my projects to start out that way 
Yes you can make and install a taper bar on a metal lathe, I did for my Clausing 6913. Make two brackets to clamp to the back ways, one very near the head stock and one near the tail-stock, then I used a cold rolled (it has closer tolerances than hot roll) 1/4" by 2" by four foot long bar, you might have to straighten it very slightly, you have to build a carriage for your router and it takes time to work out all the details. I used a spring loaded cam follower bearing to hold the router carriage against the taper bar. Of course the shaft taper is usually a compound taper, so you have to develop the proper taper. It can be done, but if you start from scratch it will take a few days...
Great idea.
Shaft taper would be easier on 2"W by 1/2 thick by 36" UHMW.
Just cut slots every inches or so then bend em to match taper.
Then bolt the thing.
I wish someone made a taper bar that used screws to actually make the adjustments instead of just security.
I would not use the word easy to describe mounting taper bars to a metal lathe. But it certainly can be done. I have sold dozens of taper bar sets, like those that mount on my Deluxe Cue Smith lathes, for people to mount on their metal lathes. What I don't make is the two or three mounting brackets you have to make to mount it to the back of your lathe and your roller bearing holder. I just provide the taper bars and roller bearing. If you have a milling machine you can do it yourself, or get a machinist to make those for you. Just using metal for your straight edge bar is not that good of an idea as almost no off the shelf metal is really straight. I clean the edge of my butt bar and point bar up on a mill to insure straightness. The shaft bar is adjustable to create whatever taper you want.
I saw one lathe where they just mounted the taper bar set up directly to the back of the lathe and mounted their router behind the work piece and cut from the back side. That only required him drilling and tapping three holes in the back of the lathe.
He had an adjustable roller bearing holder with large roller bearing. There is no reason that would not work as good as doing it the normal way, but it would take a little getting used to cutting that way.
I saw one lathe where they just mounted the taper bar set up directly to the back of the lathe and mounted their router behind the work piece and cut from the back side. That only required him drilling and tapping three holes in the back of the lathe.
He had an adjustable roller bearing holder with large roller bearing. There is no reason that would not work as good as doing it the normal way, but it would take a little getting used to cutting that way.
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Hi,
After you mount your unit to the lathe, you must put a pivot dowel on your bar for a calibrated adjustment and slot the mounting holes on the bar. Your cross slide needs to disconnected to the lead screw and a spring mounting the cross slide keep the roller gizmo on the bar.
Rick
Here is a typical home made set up for tapering. I used to use this for butt tapering but now I only use it for the finish step groove for wraps as I use a butt tapering saw machine for tapering and cutting rough wrap grooves.
While you can get the job done using single point or router ( vertical or horizontal mount ) with a lathe set up, the use of saw tapering machines to make shafts, butts, and dowels will deliver end products that require the less sanding thus a more uniform geometry on all your tapers and rods. JMO of coarse. I went through 3 tapering machines and set ups before I was happy using the saw machines. One table saw and one of DECO's multiple taper units and you would be way ahead of the game from a money and dollars spent perspective.
After you mount your unit to the lathe, you must put a pivot dowel on your bar for a calibrated adjustment and slot the mounting holes on the bar. Your cross slide needs to disconnected to the lead screw and a spring mounting the cross slide keep the roller gizmo on the bar.
Rick
Here is a typical home made set up for tapering. I used to use this for butt tapering but now I only use it for the finish step groove for wraps as I use a butt tapering saw machine for tapering and cutting rough wrap grooves.
While you can get the job done using single point or router ( vertical or horizontal mount ) with a lathe set up, the use of saw tapering machines to make shafts, butts, and dowels will deliver end products that require the less sanding thus a more uniform geometry on all your tapers and rods. JMO of coarse. I went through 3 tapering machines and set ups before I was happy using the saw machines. One table saw and one of DECO's multiple taper units and you would be way ahead of the game from a money and dollars spent perspective.
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they do, Deco cue taper bar has both screw adjust and screw locking
No definitely not an "easy" job, lots of measuring figuring and in my case a surprise or two
I clamped the brackets that hold the taper bar to the back of the flat way (opposite the operator) on both ends and long enough to accommodate a 4 ft long bar, which gives me plenty of clearance on both ends for the router carriage. I used hot roll bar at first then switched to cold roll which is much better tolerance. The shaft taper bar was milled on a milling machine.. I made the router carriage also all this would have been much tougher job without the milling machine..