While fiddling with my RedNeck lathe I came across an interesting problem:
I am trying to clean up the outside of a steel ring: 5.5" OD, 3.25" ID,
0.25" thick.I clamp it in the 4-jaw chuck (inside the hole) and am trying to center it using an indicator. However, the outside edge of the ring is so pitted and irregular that the indicator jumps about to the point where the readings are hard to interpret let alone use to center the work-piece.
Now I do not need great accuracy: The inner hole and the outer edge should be concentric as far as possible but I am not quibbling of a 0.001" or two. Yet this way it is hard to get it confidently within 0.010"!
Clearly the obvious answer to this is "Get a 3-jaw chuck" and I have one already, 4" with two sets of jaws, the only problem is getting the adapter to 1"-8 spindle and turning it down to size. But this may have to happen (in fact if this thing merits further expense it will happen).
However, given what I got now, I wonder how others would approach this problem.