I've been playing with the idea of making a taper attachment for PM1440 for a while, but because most of the stuff I do is within the range of the compound I have just been using that. Well, a buddy of mine asked me to make some longer tapers yesterday and he's willing to pay a fair rate, so I move that up to "next project" status.
I don't really want to remove the back splash from the lathe, so here is my thought. Put the pivot support near the head with the pivot center as close to exactly halfway between the bed and the splash guard. The back not the one over the chuck. Then make two or three swing ends. Maybe one at about 8 inches for short steep tapers, one at 20 inches,and one at the full end of the bed for really long tapers. My thought is that both ends of the linear rail can be held in a pinch collar so the swing end can just be machined straight. Loosen the collars. Adjust the position, and lock it in place. I know it may be a bit fiddley, but nothing a brass hammer can't be used to adjust. If I need to use a different swing end bracket I can unbolt the collar from the bracket it is on, remove the linear rod and replace it with a longer or shorter one, and slide the collar and mount on to line up with the desired swing end bracket. The best part is that as long as I record everything in my notebook I don't have to make everything at once. Just the part I need right now. I could of course just use 1 swing end bracket, and have three sets of mounting holes, but I think if I have to do much of this work I'd like to leave the brackets in place, and just remove the bracket on the cross slide and the linear rail and its mounts when not in use. It would make setups much faster when I need it, and I don't think the adjustable and pivot brackets would be in the way when the rail is off. They might catch some chips, but that's about it.