I’m restoring/upgrading a small lathe that’s been in my family for three generations. I inherited it last year. It was my grandfather’s and I learned on it. Then my Father's and my Brother's. It’s not the lathe I would buy for myself and certainly not what I’ve been accustom to, but because of its sentimental value I couldn’t bring myself to part with it and it'll be fine for small parts…….but I decided it needed to go through a transformation for my needs. I started a thread over at Hobby Machinist Forum on that if you want the blow by blow. https://www.hobby-machinist.com/threads/new-caretaker-of-two-12-craftsman-lathes.87335/ There are a number of mods and changes that I’ve made and some of course presented the opportunity to utilize some castings. The first casting is a simple machining blank for a DRO Mount. I bought a 32” and 6” iGaging absolute DRO. They are compact, looked like they’d package up nicely, and I figured good enough for what’s it’s for. I decided to mount the DRO scale here. I figured I could mount both axis with one bracket but needed a piece of stock 4” wide by 1.25” thick stock, which I didn’t have, so I quickly made a lost foam pattern on the pin router and cast a couple aluminum machining blanks for the scale mounts. Why two you ask? Because I got two patterns for essentially the same effort as one just in case I changed my mind on features or blew one up machining it. I didn’t need the second. I wouldn’t have gone to the trouble but I get a lot of mileage out of this part. …..it’s nice to be able to put metal where you want it….So after the usual gyrations I had a couple cast machining blanks for the mount. There’s a lot drilling and tapping and little bits and pieces, but it works well and can come off quickly if ever needed. I made an 18-gage sheet metal chip guard to finish it up. I’ll have a few more castings related to the project. Best, Kelly
Nice clean install. I guess you can get away with that thing sticking out the back if you dont have a splash shield, I couldn't
That is the one downside of that location but it was the lesser of evils for me compared to mounting on tail stock or head stock side, and with the remote DRO mounts I made for the tailstock and compound, it would have just made for a cluttered mess. It will have a backsplash. I just haven't made it yet. Those two unused tapped holes you see on the mount are for a removable mechanical stop. I can't remember the last time I needed to travel much pass center on the cross slide but for the rare instances where it may pop up, I'd remove the stop and backsplash or the DRO scale. The stop is just for my absent mindedness and to keep me from crashing my DRO scale into the backsplash. Best, Kelly
I thought about a tail stock dro.. but just havent had the need yet. Seems like everything I do is just hogging out material or doing holes. I remember using those HF calipers. Every time I picked one up the batteries were dead. They didnt truly shutoff if memory serves me.
Not too much need in tailstock but for very quick flat bottom holes at an accurate depth, a drill followed by an end mill plunge works well......but that's the reason for mag mount and 15 second change, or just removing/installing them altogether in a couple minutes. The compound is much higher potential use. Nothing you can't do with dials but a little more convenient for dealing with lash and old eyes. You can mount about anything in them including dial calipers. Calling them HF is a misnomer. They're imports marketed under many different domestic distributors including the name on mine......HF is just one of them.....but for $25 I doubt I can read the dial any closer. Just your basic Chinesium. Best, Kelly
Great work! (am I surprised?) Very cool locally reading DRO. I guess you could even cut up calipers and make them work. Hmmm. Jason: I have some which work well and some which can't keep a battery. Some don't even have the auto shutoff. I need to pay attention to where the good ones came from.
The test was start with them closed, turn it on and hit ZERO. Shut it off. Then slide it open a few inches. Turn it back on! If it reads the new distance you moved, it will eat it's battery as it's never truly turned off. If you flip it back on after you moved it and it still reads zero, it should be safe. Why these idiots designed it this way is beyond me. We always had to remove the batteries every day. Funny how people can make a product and then engineer the usefulness right out of it to the point of failure with future iterations. Usually all to save half a penny! ALL manufacturers foreign and domestic are guilty of doing this dumbshit and I'd like to kick them square in the balls if I could!
Bring it on Bub! I'm an engineer and I studied hard in school to learn how to do dumb shit just to piss off people like you.
Yes, I've seen folks mount up dial calipers and indicators for this purpose too. Using a mounted dial instead of mechanical stop is very common. You don't necessarily have to cut your calipers up. Just depends on how you design the mount, but dial calipers aren't quite as convenient because you can only (re)set the dial to zero, not the scale. The electronic ones you can zero anywhere, and some are also available in absolute you will set and remember an origin even after being zeroed. Let me know when you're done with Jason......I want to get in a few well placed shots too! Best, Kelly
Jason's tough, he can take it. Seriously I have spent a lot of my life ridiculing engineers who failed to think through their designs, or were incapable of grasping what they were doing. A lot of smart engineers have done a lot of great things but 90% of engineers give the rest of us a bad name. My experience was working on large projects with engineering companies, everyone is either an engineer or a designer. My vision is skewed. It's a wonder I can even get metal to melt and go into the hole I want it to go.
Meet the EPU in the F16. These intelligent idiots started with this and built the airplane AROUND it! Forgetting it is a time change part, I always got the job of changing it. Its physically impossible to remove it without damaging the aircraft.
