Topics

81

Show"N"Tell ( Your Machines) / LATHE CUSTOM & HOMEMADE

« on: September 06, 2008, 02:10:43 PM »

POST#1 of 3
Here is a homemade lathe I acquired 10 years ago. I was going to convert it to CNC but just can't destroy
the efforts of the local machinist who made it after retiring. He never got to use it much as he went off  to
machinist heaven rather quickly post retirement. Complete base size is 27" x 17".
Other than the purchased Boston gears, all was entirely made on a Logan lathe. Flat material is precision ground
stock and and came complete with a lot of homemade attachments. Although small in size it is built very well,
accurate, and can do some heavy cutting ( 1/8" cuts in 12L ) along with 4 to 80 thread cutting capability.
What is unique is that there is an auto carriage dis-engagement which is easily set and works nicely.
Most of all it is very,very quite when operating.

HEAD: 1/2" BORE, 3/4"x16 TPI nose, 1/2 hp motor, 4" max OD turning   Overall Length: 21"
TAIL: #1MT  also has an attachment for a lever operated drilling or boring
SPINDLE SPEEDS: 1300, 650, 490, 325 with additional  2:1 reduction to each using backgears.

Don't know if it was made from some plans or just the guys ideas but I haven't seen equivilant at any of the shows.
Post #2 & #3 are pictures of the head and tail along with some of the attachments like carriage stop, stady rest, milling attachment,
turret / indexible tool post.
 
Hope You Enjoy  ( wife won't let me put it in the dining room hutch ) 
RICH

82

Show"N"Tell ( What you have made with your CNC machine.) / 1/12 SCALE MILLING MACHINE PARTS

« on: August 31, 2008, 05:12:20 PM »

POST #1 - MILLING MACHINE
Here are some pictures of parts for a 1/12 scale model of a milling machinie. There are over 50 pieces to made
many of which are threading, taper turning, crowned pulleys, etc. Will CNC as much as possible utiliziing Lazcam, the Wizards,
etc to produce the gcode for as many parts as possible. Of course some manual coding also.You just can't beat CNC when duplication comes into play. The little three ball handles can be a pain in the neck even when all the cutters are already made but not so with CNC. So until the model is done you just get to look at some of the parts.
Other model work which is complete can be seen in POST#2 to 4 in this thread.
RICH

83

Show"N"Tell ( What you have made with your CNC machine.) / GEAR CUTTING TOOL - POST#2

« on: August 24, 2008, 10:44:24 AM »

The following pictures show a brass test cutter and the tool steel cutter meshed into the teeth of a cut 20 tooth 48 pitch gear.
Also the basic dimenesions used in later setup. The last picture shows tempering of the gear cutter. Picture color is off some as it's just a nice
dark straw color. Dimensions for the gear came form a spread sheet I created. You can get away with using a end mill of close size to the
tooth radius ( depends on what you want) but I wanted to see what my engraving machine could via multiple profile passes.
RICH

84

Show"N"Tell ( What you have made with your CNC machine.) / GEAR CUTTING TOOL

« on: August 24, 2008, 10:30:37 AM »

Attached pictures show one of a few gear cutters made on my engraving machine.The
gear was drawn in CAD and the g-code for the cutter generated via DXF export. The temper of the 1/4" tool blank was removed for cutting by a carbide die grinding tool.Then the bit was mounted in an adapter inside a R8 fixture allowing it to be rotated 10 deg to put a relief on the bit. After cutting of the profile it was hardened and tempered. A modified fly cutter holder allows for positioning the gear cutter face on the axis of the spindle. The gear cutting tool was measured / checked for dimensions and noted allowing for easy setup in the Atlas mill for later cutting of the teeth . You'll need to look my second post for additonal pictures of the cut gear and info.
RICH

85

General Mach Discussion / HOW TO PICK-UP A THREAD - CNC THREADING

« on: July 21, 2008, 10:03:10 PM »

Hi All,
How do you pick-up a thread and re-run a threading program to take a few more passes over the threads?
The piece is already done, removed from the chuck and of course the motor was stopped.
The CNC lathe has a single slotted disc and steppers. Just need some general guidance if it's even possible.

I have no problem doing this on my manual lathe. Just never had to do it on a CNC lathe.

RICH

86

General Mach Discussion / BACKPLOTTING - CONVERT G CODE TO DXF

« on: July 13, 2008, 09:11:29 PM »

Have you ever wanted to convert G code back to a dxf file easily?

There is a slick free program you can download from CNC ZONE archives . I fooled around with a few files and it worked well.
One thing I did with the text file of the code was to remove some of the starting g codes for the lathe or mill and remove sub-routines
where your only cutting deeper.

Here is the link:
http://www.cnczone.com/modules/Downloads/userfile.php?id=22

If you use Autocadd you may want to check out this site for backplotting G code directly into Autocadd.
I have not tried any of them.   

http://www.wjbzone.com

If you know of something for "free" which works, please post.

RICH

87

Show"N"Tell ( What you have made with your CNC machine.) / SHERLINE ROTARY TABLE MOTOR MOUNTING

« on: July 06, 2008, 04:39:28 PM »

Nothing fancy. Just showing how a stepper motor was mounted to a Sherline rotary table.
The square adapter under the table allows for easy insertion into a vise and provides for centering of the table to the block.
The adapter can be remove and holes in the adapter ( can't see them ) allow for mounting to a sine and right angle plate.
The stepper motor mount was made from a scrapped assembly "save good junk". Will change out stepper with one having dual shafts so it can be used manually.
RICH

88

Show"N"Tell ( Your Machines) / RICH'S ATLAS CNC CONVERSION

« on: July 01, 2008, 10:04:26 PM »

This is a 38 year old Atlas Clausing Vertical Mill which I rebuilt and converted to CNC 4 years ago.
Six speed ranges / 24"x 6" table / 15" x 5.25"  cross travel / MT 2 taper in spindle.
The guard is removed to show stepper mounting. A handle extension was made for the quick feed
( in-out to engage fine feed) and a 85 in oz stepper was mounted directly to the fine feed, thus total manual
operation is still available. Motor side of the x and y axis have double contact bearings in the bearing blocks
with a single contact bearing in the other bearing block. Nuts at handle ends provide for preloading adjustment of the bearings.
200 in oz Superior Electric steppers on the X and y axis. Three axis digital display along with an indicator for quill movement. Not much room for the ball nut as shown by the picture. Ball screws 16mm -5mm lead with adjustable ball nut by Techno Inc. A 1 HP DC motor with variable speed controller still waites for me to installation.
Overall dim of 36"x 40" x 70" provide for a nice homeshop mill.