Hello all,

In the process of restoring the gigantic, ancient turret lathe I
recently aquired, I discovered that it's missing a pin on the
underside of the hex head that is used to index the machine to the
next station.

Basically, all I'm looking for is a peice of something tougher than
the mild steel I've got laying out in my forge, probably 4140 or a
little length of drill rod, that is .500 (preferably .003-.004"
oversized) and 1.4" long. I could go buy it, I'm sure, but the steel
supplier I use is a 45 minute drive each way, and I don't need
anything else right this minute. Don't want to wait until I need
something worth the drive to get it, either- it's the last thing that
needs doing on the turret end, and I want to get it back together so I
don't lose any parts.

If anyone has something that would be suitable, I'd be willing to pay
for it (within reason) and pay for shipping. If anyone is looking for
a little project, I'd be willing to pay a little extra for a pin with
some splines on the bottom inch and a 45 degree chamfer on the
non-spined end. Doesn't have to be aerospace quality, it's just
something for the turret saddle to push on to rotate the head. I'll
be pressing it in, if that matters.

I'll check back here to see if anyone has a little bit of scrap that
they'd be willing to ship, or if you happen to feel like doing a
little 15 minute one-off machining job, contact me at prometheus at
charter.net for dims and to negotiate a price for the it. It won't be
enough to retire off of, but I'm sure it'd at least be enough to buy a
burger or two.

If not, I suppose I can cut it off a hunk of the old punch tooling
I've got hidden under my bench and grind it to shape, but that just
seems like a rediculous amount of work for what this is.

I have a piece of steel that I could give you for free, it is a
Franklin Treefarmer pin. About 1.25" thick. You would pay shipping.

i

On Sun, 30 Sep 2007 04:00:56 -0500, Prometheus wrote:
Hello all,

In the process of restoring the gigantic, ancient turret lathe I
recently aquired, I discovered that it's missing a pin on the
underside of the hex head that is used to index the machine to the
next station.

Basically, all I'm looking for is a peice of something tougher than
the mild steel I've got laying out in my forge, probably 4140 or a
little length of drill rod, that is .500 (preferably .003-.004"
oversized) and 1.4" long. I could go buy it, I'm sure, but the steel
supplier I use is a 45 minute drive each way, and I don't need
anything else right this minute. Don't want to wait until I need
something worth the drive to get it, either- it's the last thing that
needs doing on the turret end, and I want to get it back together so I
don't lose any parts.

If anyone has something that would be suitable, I'd be willing to pay
for it (within reason) and pay for shipping. If anyone is looking for
a little project, I'd be willing to pay a little extra for a pin with
some splines on the bottom inch and a 45 degree chamfer on the
non-spined end. Doesn't have to be aerospace quality, it's just
something for the turret saddle to push on to rotate the head. I'll
be pressing it in, if that matters.

I'll check back here to see if anyone has a little bit of scrap that
they'd be willing to ship, or if you happen to feel like doing a
little 15 minute one-off machining job, contact me at prometheus at
charter.net for dims and to negotiate a price for the it. It won't be
enough to retire off of, but I'm sure it'd at least be enough to buy a
burger or two.

If not, I suppose I can cut it off a hunk of the old punch tooling
I've got hidden under my bench and grind it to shape, but that just
seems like a rediculous amount of work for what this is.

On Sun, 30 Sep 2007 04:00:56 -0500, Prometheus
wrote:


Basically, all I'm looking for is a peice of something tougher than
the mild steel I've got laying out in my forge, probably 4140 or a
little length of drill rod, that is .500 (preferably .003-.004"
oversized) and 1.4" long. I could go buy it, I'm sure, but the steel
supplier I use is a 45 minute drive each way, and I don't need
anything else right this minute.

Order a 1/2" x 1-1/2" alloy steel oversize dowel pin from McMaster.

98385A716
Alloy Steel .001" Oversized Dowel Pin 1/2" Diameter, 1-1/2" Length
In stock at $5.40 per Pack
This product is sold in Packs of 5

98985A721
Alloy Steel .002" Oversized Dowel Pin 1/2" Diameter, 1-1/2" Length
In stock at $10.63 per Pack
This product is sold in Packs of 5

--
Ned Simmons

On Sep 30, 5:00 am, Prometheus wrote:
Hello all,

In the process of restoring the gigantic, ancient turret lathe I
recently aquired, I discovered that it's missing a pin on the
underside of the hex head that is used to index the machine to the
next station.

Basically, all I'm looking for is a peice of something tougher than
the mild steel I've got laying out in my forge, probably 4140 or a
little length of drill rod, that is .500 (preferably .003-.004"
oversized) and 1.4" long. I could go buy it, ...

Is the lathe functional enough to make it out of a 9/16" Grade 5 or 8
bolt?

Jim Wilkins

I have a lot of brand new 1/2" dia.(nominal) S1. It is usually about 10
thou oversize (to account for decarb). If you don't see what you want
here, email me and I'll send a foot of it to you. Or, if you want, I
will turn a 1.4 inches of it to 3 or 4 over a half, just tell me which
size you want. I will do the 1/8" X 45 degree chamfer on both ends,
but you get to do the spline, as needed. This steel is in its "fully
Sphereoidized" condition, so it will file just fine.

Pete Stanaitis
------------------------

Prometheus wrote:
Hello all,

In the process of restoring the gigantic, ancient turret lathe I
recently aquired, I discovered that it's missing a pin on the
underside of the hex head that is used to index the machine to the
next station.

Basically, all I'm looking for is a peice of something tougher than
the mild steel I've got laying out in my forge, probably 4140 or a
little length of drill rod, that is .500 (preferably .003-.004"
oversized) and 1.4" long. I could go buy it, I'm sure, but the steel
supplier I use is a 45 minute drive each way, and I don't need
anything else right this minute. Don't want to wait until I need
something worth the drive to get it, either- it's the last thing that
needs doing on the turret end, and I want to get it back together so I
don't lose any parts.

If anyone has something that would be suitable, I'd be willing to pay
for it (within reason) and pay for shipping. If anyone is looking for
a little project, I'd be willing to pay a little extra for a pin with
some splines on the bottom inch and a 45 degree chamfer on the
non-spined end. Doesn't have to be aerospace quality, it's just
something for the turret saddle to push on to rotate the head. I'll
be pressing it in, if that matters.

I'll check back here to see if anyone has a little bit of scrap that
they'd be willing to ship, or if you happen to feel like doing a
little 15 minute one-off machining job, contact me at prometheus at
charter.net for dims and to negotiate a price for the it. It won't be
enough to retire off of, but I'm sure it'd at least be enough to buy a
burger or two.

If not, I suppose I can cut it off a hunk of the old punch tooling
I've got hidden under my bench and grind it to shape, but that just
seems like a rediculous amount of work for what this is.

On Sun, 30 Sep 2007 09:59:40 -0700, Jim Wilkins
wrote:

On Sep 30, 5:00 am, Prometheus wrote:
Hello all,

In the process of restoring the gigantic, ancient turret lathe I
recently aquired, I discovered that it's missing a pin on the
underside of the hex head that is used to index the machine to the
next station.

Basically, all I'm looking for is a peice of something tougher than
the mild steel I've got laying out in my forge, probably 4140 or a
little length of drill rod, that is .500 (preferably .003-.004"
oversized) and 1.4" long. I could go buy it, ...

Is the lathe functional enough to make it out of a 9/16" Grade 5 or 8
bolt?

Jim Wilkins
Or a Chinese cold chisel from Wal Mart?
Gerry :-)}
London, Canada

On Sun, 30 Sep 2007 12:44:00 -0400, Ned Simmons
wrote:

On Sun, 30 Sep 2007 04:00:56 -0500, Prometheus
wrote:


Basically, all I'm looking for is a peice of something tougher than
the mild steel I've got laying out in my forge, probably 4140 or a
little length of drill rod, that is .500 (preferably .003-.004"
oversized) and 1.4" long. I could go buy it, I'm sure, but the steel
supplier I use is a 45 minute drive each way, and I don't need
anything else right this minute.

Order a 1/2" x 1-1/2" alloy steel oversize dowel pin from McMaster.

98385A716
Alloy Steel .001" Oversized Dowel Pin 1/2" Diameter, 1-1/2" Length
In stock at $5.40 per Pack
This product is sold in Packs of 5

98985A721
Alloy Steel .002" Oversized Dowel Pin 1/2" Diameter, 1-1/2" Length
In stock at $10.63 per Pack
This product is sold in Packs of 5

Perfect! That'll work.

On Sun, 30 Sep 2007 07:19:44 -0500, Ignoramus936
wrote:

I have a piece of steel that I could give you for free, it is a
Franklin Treefarmer pin. About 1.25" thick. You would pay shipping.

I thank you for the offer, but the problem is that I need the part to
fix the lathe that would be able to make the pin... Kind of like when
you've working on your car (assuming you've only got one) and discover
that you need a part when half of the engine is disassembled. You're
either walking to the store, or you can ask around to try and catch a
lift, right? (In this case, walking to the store would be grinding
out a pin with abrasives, and that's a real PITA.)

On Sun, 30 Sep 2007 12:26:37 -0500, spaco
wrote:

I have a lot of brand new 1/2" dia.(nominal) S1. It is usually about 10
thou oversize (to account for decarb). If you don't see what you want
here, email me and I'll send a foot of it to you. Or, if you want, I
will turn a 1.4 inches of it to 3 or 4 over a half, just tell me which
size you want. I will do the 1/8" X 45 degree chamfer on both ends,
but you get to do the spline, as needed. This steel is in its "fully
Sphereoidized" condition, so it will file just fine.

Thanks Pete- though I think I'm just going to order the McMaster Carr
ones- I should have thought of that first, but it completely slipped
my mind that those guys have everything.

That way, there's no worries about hardening, I can just press it in
and go. Though as a point of interest (more interesting to me as the
guy with the torn apart machine, I'm sure) the chamfer I'm talking
about isn't the same as what you've got in mind. In addition to the
shallow one all the way around that you'd expect, there is a flat
chamfer on each pin that goes almost to the center of the pin. All
the flats face towards the center. It's just for clearance, I'm sure,
as the turret head rotates on a truncated cone.

It is rolling along pretty well, though- I cracked open the turret
gearbox this evening, and it's all in working order. Some spots of
surface rust on a few of the teeth, but nothing dramatic. If you were
wondering, the knob on that one is a speed selector (with an odd
pattern to it- all the way in is medium, the middle setting is low,
and all the way out is high, with idle spaces between each.) and the
big lever with the spring clip is to engage the autofeed clutch. If
it feeds in reverse at all, it must be switched on the headstock end
somewhere- the lever that is engaged when the feed stop hits it only
appears to be a brake.

Prometheus wrote:

Thanks Pete- though I think I'm just going to order the McMaster Carr
ones- I should have thought of that first, but it completely slipped
my mind that those guys have everything.


I was looking at McMasters for you yesterday but I didn't see oversized rod.
Pete's idea on the oversized dowel is excellent! UPS on that is likely only
going to be 5 bucks in most of the country.

Wes

On Mon, 01 Oct 2007 08:26:25 -0400, Wes wrote:

Prometheus wrote:

Thanks Pete- though I think I'm just going to order the McMaster Carr
ones- I should have thought of that first, but it completely slipped
my mind that those guys have everything.


I was looking at McMasters for you yesterday but I didn't see oversized rod.
Pete's idea on the oversized dowel is excellent! UPS on that is likely only
going to be 5 bucks in most of the country.

Actually, I got it figured out, and figured I'd share in case anyone
else runs in to one of these type situations, where the lathe needs a
turned part but you've still got a mill availible.

Turns out the hole was a .060" smaller than the visible pin diameter,
so it needed to be turned. I actually used a hitch pin from the
hardware store, cut it off with the notion of trying to very carefully
grind the pin down and then realized that a .500" pin would fit in a
1/2" collet just fine. So I stuck it in the collet, and mounted a
left-hand lathe cutter sideways in the milling vise and turned it to
size using the quill as a feed. Worked pretty good- I got everything
to within .003", which was close enough to push it in with an arbor
press and some effort, and it plenty accurate for something that is
simply a point for the lathe to push against to rotate the turret.

Probably something most of you guys already know to do, but I'm fairly
new to manual milling, having had most of my working experience with
CNC machines.

And, it beat *any* kind of mail- $1.29 at the hardware store.

"Prometheus" wrote in message
...
On Mon, 01 Oct 2007 08:26:25 -0400, Wes wrote:

Prometheus wrote:

Thanks Pete- though I think I'm just going to order the McMaster Carr
ones- I should have thought of that first, but it completely slipped
my mind that those guys have everything.


I was looking at McMasters for you yesterday but I didn't see oversized
rod.
Pete's idea on the oversized dowel is excellent! UPS on that is likely
only
going to be 5 bucks in most of the country.

Actually, I got it figured out, and figured I'd share in case anyone
else runs in to one of these type situations, where the lathe needs a
turned part but you've still got a mill availible.

Turns out the hole was a .060" smaller than the visible pin diameter,
so it needed to be turned. I actually used a hitch pin from the
hardware store, cut it off with the notion of trying to very carefully
grind the pin down and then realized that a .500" pin would fit in a
1/2" collet just fine. So I stuck it in the collet, and mounted a
left-hand lathe cutter sideways in the milling vise and turned it to
size using the quill as a feed. Worked pretty good- I got everything
to within .003", which was close enough to push it in with an arbor
press and some effort, and it plenty accurate for something that is
simply a point for the lathe to push against to rotate the turret.

Probably something most of you guys already know to do, but I'm fairly
new to manual milling, having had most of my working experience with
CNC machines.

There's a lot to be said for rediscovering old tricks. It keeps the mind
fresh. d8-)

--
Ed Huntress

On Oct 3, 3:36 pm, Prometheus wrote:
.... So I stuck it in the collet, and mounted a
left-hand lathe cutter sideways in the milling vise ...

I had to do that a few times when I ran a model shop that didn't had
room for a lathe (They surplused the 13" South Bend just before I took
over). Once a long stringy whirling chip chased me too far back to
reach the switch but otherwise it worked OK.

Jim Wilkins