On Fri, 03 Apr 2009 17:41:07 -0400, Wes wrote:

Jim Wilkins wrote:

My lathe came with a longer 5C handwheel closer from a larger lathe. I
made a brass shouldered bushing to fit into the spindle and put a
split shaft clamp and washers on the closer. That plain bearing was
good enough until I cut a coarse thread in 1" stainless. To tighten it
a little more I added a needle thrust bearing. The collet adapter
lacks the guide pin but collets don't turn in it.


Yup, likely I'm going with the handwheel for starts and I've done enough research to not
even try this w/o rolling element bearings at the handwheel side.

Wes


To be fair, the 5C square and hexagonal 5C holders that are sold for use as
fixtures have either a simple toggle clamp or a 20tpi pin-spanner collar for
clamping and they are perfectly adequate for the majority of turning and
milling loads. Not up to holding a milling cutter though. So you might not
need too much force. if the part is more than a few thou off size, that can
make a big difference in the clamping force needed.


Mark Rand
RTFM