Grant,
I have had to do this many times before I had a large lathe. First, I assume
you have enough space between centers. Chuck a piece of scrap in your chuck
and turn it to the same diameter of your shaft. Then set up your steady rest
around that piece of scrap so you have the correct pressure on all 3 legs.
Lock the adjustments and move the steady rest to the tail stock end of the
bed. Make certain the carraige is moved first. Chuck your shaft on the left
and suspend the shaft on the right. In the case where your OD is rough, turn
a small area clean close to the chuck. Then turn the shaft around and use
the steady in the machined area. You can go back and forth a couple of times
and then reset the scrap diameter and then the steady, sneaking up on the
problem. Keeping the carraige close to the chuck and using just the
tailstock, center drill the end. If the end of the shaft is not square and
requires facing, simply position the carraige to the right of the steady and
do that first.
Steve


"Grant Erwin" wrote in message
...
I want to center drill a large shaft. The shaft is about 24" long and
is from an old machine tool, but the ends were never drilled for centers.
The shaft is too big to pass through my lathe spindle. I can suss out how
to face the shaft off square, lay out and centerpunch a hole as closely
as I can, and I can then chuck one end of the shaft on the last 1/8" of
the jaws and hold the other end in my hand and gently "pick up" the
centerpunch with a center drill in the tailstock chuck. That way would
get me pretty close, but it would not be exact. I could then mount it
on a center in the tailstock and bring up a steady rest and then remove
the tailstock center and using a tiny boring tool, bore the center, but
how do I know the steady rest isn't just a little bit off?

What is the *actual* procedure for this?

Grant