Reducing tailstock play

Reducing tailstock play

Post by Fred Holde » Wed, 27 Oct 1999 04:00:00



Hello Bruno,

More lathes have play as you describe that there that do not. Only the very
expensive lathes seem to have the precision machining to eliminate this slop.
What I would suggest, however, is to use your skew chisel laying on its side to
make a detent at the center of the piece to be drilled so that the drill will
seek center. Bring up the tailstock with the drill mounted in it and lock it.
use whatever quill travel you have to get started. Drill as deep as the quill
will let you, then loosen the tailstock clamp and push the whole assembly into
the work. I've done this on sloppy lathes with good results. This all assumes
that you tail center aligns correctly with the axis of rotation.

Otherwise, your a drill chuck to hold the drill and then freehand hold the drill
to do the drilling. You can start off with the drill taper loosely fit into the
tailstock to help you get started straight. I've drilled many, many pieces of
wood for desk pens in this manner on my Record Mini. It also didn't have enough
quill travel, but I could handhold and do fine.

You'll see Richard Raffan use a drill in a wood handle quite often. I have one
that I use to drill the hole for boxes and goblets. Frankly, it is almost as
good as having the tailstock hold the drill on drills up to 3/8" on larger
drills it might be hard to hold them.

Give it a try.

Fred Holder
<http://www.fholder.com/>


Quote:

>What is the recommended way to reduce tailstock play on a lathe that
>has cast iron bed and tailstock ?
>I'm pretty happy with my Jet minilathe except when it comes to drilling
>holes using a Jacob chuck in the tailstock. I guess there are 2
>ways to go about it: You either 1) lock the tailstock and use the quill travel
>to drill the hole, or 2) you lock the quill and push the entire tailstock
>forward.
>1) doesn't quite work for me because the Jet mini uses a short taper
>   so I already have to crank the quill out to have a good lock on the
>   taper. So quill travel is then limited.

>2) is what I want to do and on the few $3,000 lathes I've played with
>   doesn't seem to be a problem.
>   On the Jet mini, (at least on mine) there is a little bit of play
>   between the bed and the tailstock. Seems that the part of the tailstock
>   that goes between the bed is machined a bit too narrow. Maybe a bit
>   less than 1/32nd. I'm not sure because I don't have a guage.

>So anyway, my questions:

>- what material to use for a shim.
>- where to find shim of a particular thickness.
>- how to attach it to the cast iron.

>thanks,

>bruno.

Fred Holder
<http://www.fholder.com/>
 
 
 

Reducing tailstock play

Post by Darrell Feltmat » Thu, 28 Oct 1999 04:00:00


Bruno,
Some of the answers for the drilling oare great but it still is nice to be
able to shim the tail at times. One of my favourites for shim stock is
plastic coated playing cards; durable, cheap, easily cut and accurate for
size; about .01" depending on the pack. For overkill go to the auto parts
store and get some brass shim stock in whatever thickness you need. They
will stock it usually in increments of .002" and .005".

God bless and safe turning
Darrell Feltmate