Thread: holes in tool rest

only the one photo for the moment

Kristy

I have looked a some photos of toolrests and see that mine has a hole drilled in each end near the top. Any ideas why? The lathe was possibly used for metal spinning and the holes were used to gain leverage for the tools.

I will post some photos directly. Also whoever had it last placed a bit of ply between the bed and the toorest base. I'm guessing that this will hamper the nice sliding movement? Probably. You should be able to remove it.

If you want a higher toolrest do you just undo the screw and slide the stem higher? Yes.

Do you need to adjust the hight of the toolrest frequently? Depends on the job you are doing. Bowl work requires more movement than spindle work.

Well, all it took was one phonecall!! After speaking to someone thismorning, and afterwards feeling like a complete fool, fool, fool!!!, I have now ascertained that infact this is not a morse taper but has a parallell shaft which puts the skids on things. When I had the fella in town look at it he obviously didn't look at it properly, and I, in my complete innocence beleived him!

So, apparently it's not easy to get the parts for the parrallel shaft. Now I'm not even sure what I need. HHEEEELLLLLPPPP!!! I guess I can get a couple of shafts machined to suit morse taper but this may cost half of what another small lathe is worth.

Does anyone have any suggestions on what I can do????

This is obviously why it didn't have the centres and why it was so cheap!!!!! At least I got the tools though I guess.

Dissallusioned Kristy

At this stage, some people would cut their losses, put it back together & stick an advert in the paper.

The holes in the toolrest look too small, and don't have the proper orientation, for metal spinning posts. On another woodturning forum, a question was posed about a single similar hole in the toolrest of a Powermatic 3520B (aka Mustard Monster). The member's query to the manufacturer disclosed that it was used for hanging the part to dry after painting. Seems a peculiar way to do it, though; could just anchor it by the unpainted portion of the tool post.

The cylindrical hole in the spindle(s) seems odd. The shaft might not need replacement. If there's enough material remaining, a Morse taper socket could be reamed in the existing shaft. It takes a specialized reamer, but a qualified machinist should be able to advise you on choices. If this is the only shortcoming, I recommend exploring this possibility before giving up.

Joe

why do you need a morse taper?

By cracky, Kristy, looks like you have a JOB on your hands. Shure it's worth it? Then later when you want to use a chuck of some sort, will you have to go thru the whole thing again? It would be a shame to put out all that work/money into something that is limited to only one or two things. Go for it---Get a nice mini/midi & spend your time learning. Jet isn't by far the only good lathe on the market. Check out "Grizzly" lathes. I've got one [1495] & couldn't be any happier with a Jet or other model. I've looked at the larger Jet & can find a lot of reasons I like the Grizzly 10 times better. I think you'll be a lot happier starting with something that is ready to go & advance on. Just my opinion.

But Kristy you need to be aware of what is under each label because, sometimes, 1 lathe may be sold under many brand names and Grizzly is like that - macho name stuck on an import. Same with Jet, innit?

Whatever you finally end up doing. there are some very knowledgeable blokes and blokesses here (not me) who are kind and do share constructively.

Getting an internal morse taper turned may be expensive he said thinking of when he had a No2 Morse Taper turned, but that was 30 years ago. i don't know what the price would be these days. (Don't ask why, it was a brain pfft).

Another possible reson for the holes in the tool-rest... some previous owner decided they wanted a longer tool-rest so sinmply bolted a piece of angle iron over the lip. I've seen it done before.

I'll repeat what Echnidna asked: why do you want a morse taper?

I'll admit they make life easier, but there are often cheaper workarounds for the lack of one. Just ask any GMC lathe owner.

Originally Posted by Skew ChiDAMN!!

Another possible reson for the holes in the tool-rest... some previous owner decided they wanted a longer tool-rest so sinmply bolted a piece of angle iron over the lip. I've seen it done before.
I'll repeat what Echnidna asked: why do you want a morse taper?

I'll admit they make life easier, but there are often cheaper workarounds for the lack of one. Just ask any GMC lathe owner.

I have to agree with Skew about the holes. My response was posted as the pic was being posted.

Hi Kristy,

Is the spindle threaded to take a chuck? If so it may be possible to buy a chuck that fits and a morse taper insert to accept MT fittings. I know that Axminster do such a thing over here in th UK but not sure about out there in Oz.

The other alternative, (although i'm sure you've already done this) is to see if you can find any parallel shaft fittings.

Hope this helps,

Richard

I've got a GMC lathe and the screw-on point works pretty darn all right. The only problem is the thread is not Morse, so cannot fit chucks etc.
A Morse taper probably wouldn't be needed unless you're using a drill chuck.

Originally Posted by funkychicken

I've got a GMC lathe and the screw-on point works pretty darn all right. The only problem is the thread is not Morse, so cannot fit chucks etc.

Not quite sure what you mean by this, however you can buy "untapped" thread inserts for Teknatool chucks and tap them to suit your lathe's headstock thread. No problems mounting the chuck then!

Once you have a chuck, it's possible to mount jacob's chucks, pen mandrels, etc in the chuck and do almost as good a job as a morse taper. I wouldn't want to do any deep drilling that way, though.

Or, for a pen mandrel, you could make up an adapter to thread onto the headstock, like a nut with a plate welded over one end, and drill/tap the centre of the plate to match the threaded the end of the mandrel (when the morse taper is removed)

As I said before, there are workarounds.