Making lathe chuck jaws

Yes, I think it is possible to make a set of jaws, but I wonder how much time and effort it would take. And, what about heat treating them and doing the final grinding? If you live in some far away place (Africa?) maybe this makes sense. Otherwise, you can buy a 3 jaw 6" chuck like this:

(I own one of them and it is far, far better than anything I could hope to make) for less than you can probably buy jaws for a jawless chuck. Of course if the chuck you are talking about is some expensive chuck in good condition maybe buying a set of jaws from the manufacturer is worth the price. MSC lists a set of 3 outside jaws for a Buck 6" chuck for only $249.24.

A chuck without jaws has another name. Scrap metal.

Assuming you were successful in making new jaws, you'd be in them so damned much time and money a new chuck would look like a bargain.

Yes, it can be done, but should it be done?

Harold

FWIW, I made soft jaws for two of my chucks. Using a CNC mill its not a bad job. Measure three spots on each side of one tooth, fit a circle to the points, then write a program to cut one tooth, index, and do it again. The program runs forever, but do something else in the meantime. My time must not be worth as much as Harold's, I thought it was a nice little project.

Karl

CNC makes the difference.

Trying to do it on a purely manual machine is more difficult.

I *think* that original way they were made was on an index head geared to the X-axis on a milling machine. Probably then hardened and lapped to a spiral threaded plate made on the same setup, just as the scroll plate was made.

Obviously, the curvature of the teeth needs to be a compromise. Each one has to be curved at least as much as the innermost thread which it needs to encounter, which means that it is not as strong in the outer positions, where it only makes contact in the center of the curve. Still, it is stronger than the reversable jaws which I have seen on some small chucks, where the teeth look like:

() () () () ()

instead of:

)) )) )) )) ))

Enjoy, DoN.

Best suggestion yet, I just ordered that chuck. It's in my price range and nothing like a testimonial from an owner. I guess my real problem was a bad ebay search, not all lathe chucks come up under "lathe chuck".

Chuckle!

My time isn't worth much these days, Karl, considering I'm retired, but I can see all to clearly how difficult it would be to make jaws for a chuck without a CNC. As DoN suggests, it makes a huge difference. By the time you've made all the individual cuts manually, you'd have so much time in the jaws that a new chuck would look like a bargain, even if you figured your time at 10¢/ hour.

Do you have any pics of your soft jaws you'd like to share with us?

Harold

Alas, I'm stuck in the sunny Florida Keys, 2000 miles from the shop. Can't take a pic right now

There's a picture of it being machined in the drop box under my files showing how to build a non fogging mister. For some reason, on this SUPER SLOOOOW MODEM CONNECTION, I could get to the text but not the photo.

Zero_Fog_Mister.JPG

Karl

Man, life's a bitch, ain't it?

Thanks, Karl. It worked for me, so I got the general idea, although I'd love to see the teeth better if you can drag yourself away from the sunshine some day.

I'm quite impressed with the fog mister. I used to run a spraymist, but I hated the way it made everything sticky, including the spindle on my Bridgeport. If I ever get finished with my house building project, I wouldn't mind building one of those suckers. Very nice!

Thanks for sharing~

Harold