Adjusting Lathe Chuck Jaws faster on my atlas lathe

Here are a few simple, quick-to-implement ways to adjust lathe jaws faster:

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Probably not new to a lot of you, but new to me.

Pete Stanaitis

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Reply to
spaco
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snipped-for-privacy@baldwin-telecom.net fired this volley in news:908c1eda-3f15-45b4- snipped-for-privacy@googlegroups.com:

I'm sorry, Pete, but I don't see anything there that a serious machinist or serious amateur machinist would think was reasonable.

With the standard 'tee-handle' chuck wrench on the (Yes, an Atlas) chuck, if you use the 'Portnoy's Complaint Method' (three fingers spinning the wrench), you can move it just as fast as any of those except the dumb idea of driving it with a power drill!

I mean, why? The only time you really need FAST chucking and de-chucking is when you're doing production cut-off work. Then you need a QA chuck, not a scroll chuck!

Lloyd

Reply to
Lloyd E. Sponenburgh

And using a drill on a 4 jaw as well. Maybe the 4 jaw is a hobby grade version - and acts as a 3. 4 jaws should have all 4 independent allowing offsetting and very good centering.

I have a Sheldon 11-44 with 3 and 4 jaw chucks. A wood lathe with 3, 4 and another special 4 jaw.

Martin

Reply to
Martin Eastburn

The question arises, how much does one adjust chuck jaws? I don't believe it is a significant portion of the machining time. and for a four jawed chuck, as the guy shows using a power drive, my experience has been that the majority of the time was spent getting rid of the last few thousands of runout.

Reply to
John B. Slocomb

John B. Slocomb fired this volley in news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com:

One gets the impression that the particular machinist in that article had nothing worthwhile to offer the community, so he documented an abusive technique he never really thought out.

He probably _doesn't_ "get rid of the last few thousandths of runout", so it never occurred to him that his is a bad way to 'adjust' a 4-jaw chuck (or any chuck, for that matter).

I seldom do rapid repeated cutoff work, but I was gifted a nice 3" precision 6-jaw Quick-acting chuck, so when I do such work, it's both fast and pretty accurate.

Kind of a funny story, that. I built a precision crimper for 5/32" o.d. brass tubing for a client for fixing electric igniters into short lengths of that tubing. He was using the assemblies as movie stage 'ammunition' for prop guns in a country where real firearms are prohibited even as movie props.

The chuck became the 'crimper' part, as it would very precisely neck the tubing down with a pretty six-point 'star crimp'. We didn't even have to modify it.. just mounted it in a hollow-framed stand, and clamped a pull handle to the closing ring.

The idea fell through with the movie studios. He later dropped off the beautiful chuck-in-stand with "You want this boat-anchor?" "Well... sure, thanks. I might find SOME use for it."

Lloyd

Reply to
Lloyd E. Sponenburgh

On Friday, February 13, 2015 at 7:09:25 AM UTC-5, Lloyd E. Sponenburgh wrot e:

Yeah, I guess everyone wants to portray journalists who collect information for reporting in trade manuals like this and others as somehow either too detached, crazy, ignorant, corrupt or biased or even worse.

But notice how difficult it would be to be crazy AND corrupt AND biased AND all of that that everyone says and even worse than all that all at the sam e time? That's how you know that the journalist is neither one of them. S o you should believe the report.

Reply to
mogulah

snipped-for-privacy@hotmail.com fired this volley in news: snipped-for-privacy@googlegroups.com:

OOOkkkayy! It scares me that I CAN follow that logic. But I think I'd rather not!

Lloyd

Reply to
Lloyd E. Sponenburgh

Now consider that someone so thoroughly befuddled might be wiring up your electrical service.

Reply to
Jim Wilkins

Well, guys, I feel thoroughly beat up now. But I really don't understand all the vitriolic comments. Maybe I failed to explain WHY I offered these ideas: The main reason for even considering the speed handle and drill ideas is when reversing chuck jaws or when going from a really small chuck opening to a really large chuck opening, particularly with the 4 jaw chuck. Just go out to your shop and time yourself for reversing the jaws on a 8" 4 jaw chuck using the tee handle, then try it with the speed handle.

I have been "spinning the tee handle" for a long time and I am here to tell you that you shouldn't knock the speed handle until you try it.

The drill and speed handle thoughts were never meant to deal with making fine adjustments. But the two little sockets/square stock tools are up to the job.

I probably wouldn't use the drill method myself, but I added it simply because I had seen it somewhere.

Pete Stanaitis

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Reply to
spaco

snipped-for-privacy@baldwin-telecom.net fired this volley in news:f317eede-cc92-4360- snipped-for-privacy@googlegroups.com:

No vitriol! Most of the folks here (except a few crazies in the bozo- bin) don't hate or even despise someone who throws out a bad idea.

But they are entitled to their opinions of how bad an idea it is, and even to speculate about the motivations for offering it.

I, personally, would NEVER suggest that you don't continue to do it, even though I will not.

LLoyd

Reply to
Lloyd E. Sponenburgh

A couple of typos ... s.b. square in 'sqaure piece of stock' and s.b. 3/8 in 'a 2 inch length of 3/9" square stock'

Reply to
James Waldby

Maybe you need to clean your chuck. Mine spin easily with one finger on the tee.

-jsw

Reply to
Jim Wilkins

...

Jeez, Lloyd, that's not very charitable, or helpful. This is REC.C.M, & most of us are amateurs & often have amateurish ideas. Give him a break. Bob

Reply to
Bob Engelhardt

I admit that I have used a speed handle on my big 4-jaw for 30 years.

My chuck is clean, but it is 70 years old. It would just hold the

8-in. brake disks from my 1978 Ford Fiesta. Crank, crank....
Reply to
Ed Huntress

Bob Engelhardt fired this volley in news: snipped-for-privacy@news7.newsguy.com:

I did; I hold no rancor toward the fellow. It's just a bad idea. If the occasional prod from a professional machinist hadn't set me straight on a few things, I'd still be doing things that could damage my workpieces or my equipment.

He's welcome to continue it, and I'm not being uncharitable by saying it is not worthwhile -or even damaging- to do. He did, after all, offer it up as an 'article' giving advice; bad advice. Some other 'amateur' might follow it, and fooey-up a light-duty chuck, thinking he might save eleven seconds of a two-hour machining job.

LLoyd

Reply to
Lloyd E. Sponenburgh

Okay, guys. I hopefully fixed the typos and re arranged the whole page so it would, hopefully, make more sense.

Maybe y'all would rather that I went to OT stuff? That seems real popular here.

Pete Stanaitis

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Reply to
spaco

Like Ed's chuck there's a lot of 70ish and cranky around here.

What do you know about Roman blacksmithing?

-jsw

Reply to
Jim Wilkins

Re: "What do you know about Roman blacksmithing? "

Not a lot. Except that they sure did a lot of it. I do know that they were producing wrought iron all over the parts of the world that they had conq uered. I suppose that ran right up to about 450AD. Producing wrought iron is a lot of work. We make a couple of runs at it each year around here. The reason I say this, is that they wouldn't have g one to all that trouble if they weren't going to make a lot of stuff out of it. The trouble for archeologists is that the iron items don't often survive because of rust.

Can you be more specific with your question? I know several guys who can s upply lot more detail. I do a fair amount of "traditional" blacksmithing. That means, to me, that I mostly make stuff that people would have used ar ound 1870 and before. Many of those items wouldn't have changed a lot from what a Roman blacksmith would have been asked to produce.

When making wrought iron the way they did it, they often got chunks of high er carbon steel here and there in the bloom. Sometimes (all too often) the whole bloom would be of a higher carbon content than needed. These pieces would be saved for edging tools that needed it.

We did a couple of 10 day 24X7 smelts back in about 1992 and 1995 or so whe re we did our best to replicate smelters of the 150 BC period, attempting t o produce wrought iron FOR the blacksmiths of that period. We learned a l ot and got very dirty sifting 8 tons of charcoal for the furnace. I'll bet the Romans did too. OT???

Pete Stanaitis

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Reply to
spaco

Several years ago I watched a show about the unearthing of metal Roman artifacts in England. They had many examples of weapons that had bronze handles and iron alloy blades. An "excellent" sample was shown and almost all of the iron had rusted away, just a thin delicate iron oxide blade was left. Most of the stuff dug up, when in the ground still, would be a bronze handle with a blade made up of rust colored earth with no solid iron left. Eric

Reply to
etpm

I think that the point was "why bother?" Unless, of course, one reverses chuck jaws very frequently. Every five minutes? Once an hour? Once a day? Once a week? Last year sometime?

Reply to
John B. Slocomb

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