Pimping the mini-lathe

I finished scraping the bed ways, and used the LinuxCNC controlled MAHO MH400E to correct the horrible job the manufacturer did on the tail stock clamping surfaces under the bed. Here is the third episode of the video series.



Digital µm micrometers are surprisingly difficult to use on scraped surfaces. Since the individual scrape marks are a couple of µm deep, you get a fair bit of scatter in your readings.

Glad I choose the little mini-lathe as the first full machine scraping project. It is quite seriously time consuming.
Mark

This episode is a bit disjointed, with some pretty crappy camera work I'm afraid. Some of the footage is a couple of months old, from before I really got into the video thing. Also I filmed making the 30mm lap, as the spindle was a just above the tolerance range for the bearings. Then I forgot to shoot footage of using it. Sorry.

Mark
Thanks for the continuation about your mini lathe . What a great way to get through these winter months.
The 3-D printer is almost like having a in home foundry. Wonder if a printed lap would work ,could print in relief spirals - slits -etc.
Have you ever thought about including a metal piece into the 3-D printed part? As in printing on to a metal piece.

. Cheers
Bob

Hi Bob,

3D printers really are a cool tool. I made this one a few years ago, but it takes a while to "see" printed solutions rather than what you expect. It took me all of 6 minutes to model that lathe dog, another 30 seconds to generate the G code, and then abot an hour to print (while I did other things). Of course, it could still be an complete failure of the torque loads are too high, but I doubt that for turning a test bar.

Good point about the plastic lap. Not sure whether the lapping compound wouldn't just disappear into the plastic. Have to try that when I make a lap for the test bar. Thanks for the idea.

With this style of layered spaghetti printer, you can' print around a metal insert, as the nozzle is only 0.2 above the glass when it starts. What you do is print in hex shaped features to capture metallic nuts. I was too lazy to take the extra minute on that job.
Mark

Hey Bob,

Joules on the madmodder.net forum has already 3D printed a lap to see if it works.
madmodder.net/index.php/topic,13082.0.html
Mark

Mark
I here by give you any patentable rights.:laugh: Use the profits for size increasing ( an heating ) your shop. Any surplus can be. applied to a Vienna MAHO Linux CNC festival this summer.
Bob