I was wondering about the tail stock. I will make sure its running right as well. The qctp set i want comes with a mt2 block. I was planning to use it. At work we only machine plastics really, so im very familiar with drill bits binding. Carbon/glass filled nylon will happily snap a one inch drill if you are not on your A-game. Im thinking i will pick up some polypropylene, uhmw, acetal, unfilled nylon, hdpe, some 6061 aluminum, some 360 brass, and some 12l14. All one inch diameter for testing.Make sure to spend some time and effort on the tailstock, too. On this class of machine they are notorious for being problematic -- not aligned properly, unstable base (causing wide variations in position) and so on. I found it most expedient to do some mill work to address the issues mine had, but a lot can be done with shims if you don't have the luxury of a mill sitting next to the lathe. Once aligned, I'm damned if I'm going to set the TS over to cut a taper, but that's just me.....
One alternative (and one I also have done) is to mount a drill chuck on your toolpost. I did it with a chuck that is mounted using a 1/2" thread. I had a boring bar holder that accepts 1/2" diameter shanks so it was -- almost -- a no-brainer. It can be real nice if you start with a small-diameter drill and work your way up, because the tailstock usually has to be moved back partway through the operation to accommodate longer drills. Not the case with a TP mounted chuck. However, that also is when I discovered my problem with the saddle gibs AKA slide plates -- the whole saddle would tip up and back when I applied pressure to the drill. One things leads to another.
BTW, if you're enlarging holes in brass, beware -- conventional drill bits will self-feed, or, worse, try to and then break. This problem is most apparent when using the toolpost-mounted chuck because there's nothing to prevent it from happening. Trust me: I know this for a fact. It's scary to see your drill bit sort of "unwind" when it catches, because you know it's THAT close to just snapping apart from the stress. And since a chuck mounted in the tailstock is just using the taper to hold it in place, it could be pulled out of the tailstock......so the fact that the TS has a feed screw isn't much comfort, either.
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