I think this is off the HF 7 inch lathe , I'm thinking of putting it on my 6 inch Chraftsman . So my question has anyone put one on their sixer ?
http://www.wttool.com/index/page/pr...+Mini+Lathes?gclid=CKC5jenzqM0CFcVbfgodAB8Lkg
Yes I put a Myford total size approx 2.25 x 2 .25 x 1.75 inches high four way on my Sphere /Atlas as . I emailed the seller to see if they knew the centre height to the bed measurement and the top of the cross slide measurement . It came to just below being three hacksaw blade thicknesses below dead centre when adding in a 5/16 tool steel bank , so I purchased it . Had to put it in the four jaw chuck and use a Morse taper drill to open up the centre blot hole as it was tiny compared to the width of my cross slide slot .
It was about as much good as a chocolate teapot. the area of the base seemed insufficient to stop the tool pushing it round when taking any cut of more then 6 thou. On investigation I discovered that some hero had use the wrong thing to tighten the original lamp post tool holder . they, used a high tensile hex headed bolt and as a result had pulled up a mole hole on the mounting face of the cross slide .
Once I'd filed & scraped it flat , checked for true with engineers blue , the tool post still tended to slide round especially if I was trying to turn a hole or an internal thread where the leverage of the tool is amplified due to the length of the tool .
I made up a " T " nut that fitted the whole length & width of the mounting slot , used a high tensile centre stud & nut to try and get things really tight but it still turned ... resulting in me having conical holes .
In the end I gave up the idea of fitting the Myford tool post and went for a big as possible QCTP . My bank account said " OUCH!" .
Once set up on the new anchor plate etc that came withe new QCTP it made a tremendous difference .. I suspect that the greater surface area of the new QCTP's base allowed a much better friction grip on the cross slide . As I have an early cross slide I also had to extend the flat mounting surface about an inch towards the hand wheel end so if needs be I can rotate the QCTP without it fouling the slide body , by grinding , filing & scraping the new extended flat surface. It took about 25 min including engineers blue grade scraping , using a 12 " hacksaw blade with the teeth ground off to give a nice sharp square scraping edge .
Now the only slight problem I had was that most of the set screws in the new QCTP were made of liquorice , several rounded out as I tightened them on the cutting tools. So I changed all of them out for T grade set screws which is the highest grade of high tensile steel set screw I can get here in Great Britain The boring bar tool holder also got all new high tensile screws all round for I sheared one of the clamping bolts .
TIP ..If you go for a QCTP get as many extra tool holders at the same time .... that you can reasonably afford , an extra six or more is not unreasonable and I'll guarantee that it won't be long before you're hankering for even more .
