# 5c collet chuck



## COMachinist (Mar 24, 2019)

Hi All
I have a mod “3910-5” 5c chuck made in Polland”did a search and it came back to a Bison with out the yellow medallion  with the buff on it. I thought these were really good chucks? It is mounted on a D1-4 back plate that has less than .0002 run out on the face. It was machined on my PM-12x36t that has 0 spindle run out and only has about 10 hr use. Got it last June 2018. I can see the nose on the chuck with out collet wobbling. I measured it with my .0005 Sterrett DTI and it has .025+ tir inside the tapper. It almost looks like the back surface is  not perfectly perpendicular to the bore of chuck. Any ideas how to get it running true. I thought about clamping a 1” ground drill rod in my set true 3 jaw with less than .0002 run out on a 1” mill. Then turn the mating surface on the back of the chuck, but not real sure about the collet, it is Shars pression collet. I was woundering if it can be sent back and referbished? It is an older used chuck. Perhapes it would be better to just scap it and look for a newer chuck. I realy hate to toss a Bison 400.00 chuck.
CH
PS There is no burs or dings on the surfaces that are critical. Or on the back plate fresh machined and has not been off the spindle


----------



## Cadillac (Mar 24, 2019)

I wouldn’t blame the chuck till you can verify your problems.


----------



## COMachinist (Mar 25, 2019)

Cadillac said:


> I wouldn’t blame the chuck till you can verify your problems.


Well Im not sure what you mean by this statement?  The back plate mounted on the lathe that machined it with no run out. Mount the chuck to it  and the nose of the chuck is .025+ tir. It is so bad you cand see it wobble with out a  DTI. No chips, no burs are at fault. Not the lathe other chucks run true, not the d1-4 back plate. Am I missing some thing, please feel free to explain.
CH


----------



## wrmiller (Mar 25, 2019)

I recently acquired a 5" set-tru collet chuck from PM, along with a collet set. Mine says 'made in Poland' and according to Matt, it is made in the Bison factory but doesn't have the roll-marks nor label.

Anyway, mine runs very true fortunately. Your idea has merit IMO and that would be the next thing I would try. My only concern would be the 5c collet's ability to hold the chuck true to the TGP bar?


----------



## JimDawson (Mar 25, 2019)

I guess I would do what you suggest and clamp it on a 1 inch ground bar.  You need to find out exactly where the problem is at.  It could be that the register surface is not concentric to the bore but 0.025 is a lot, and I would be surprised if that was the problem.  My best guess is the back plate register is not fitting correctly in the chuck.


----------



## COMachinist (Mar 25, 2019)

Well clamping it to a 1” end mill in my zero set 3 jaw and checking the back with the indicator sounds to easy. The collet is an unknown and my feeling is I don’t want to make things worse, If you know what I mean. I have had this chuck for a couple years, and never used it so don’t know much about it. When I got my PM12x36t last summer. It didn’t have a D1-4 back plate so I bought one. Mounted it up and did the skim cuts, and cut the boss to fit the chuck. Tried to get it to trued up which turned out impossiable. So I spun it up at about 200 rpms, and the nose wobble is so bad you can see it. I put a 1” end mill in a Collet and it wobles with the nose. The inside taper has the same TIR as the mill and nose. i didn’t see much runout at the chuck back plate junction. None of my other plainback chucks has over .0015-.002 TIR, with the set true chuck at less tha .001 repeatable from mount to mount up.
CH


----------



## JimDawson (Mar 25, 2019)

I suppose it is possible that the chuck is out as much as you are seeing, but I really can't imagine anything that bad would make it through Bison QA.  In any case, you are going to have to trust something to have a starting point to get some measurements from.  The collet can't be that far off.  Worst case you could turn a ''5C collet'' as a stub arbor and then you know you have a concentric surface to start with.  

With 0.025 runout it should be pretty easy to find the surface that is off.


----------



## Cadillac (Mar 25, 2019)

What I mean by that statement is don’t assume your work is right and the bison chuck is the culprit and go cutting the chuck to match your backplate and then be out that much more. 
 If the chuck is a bison I cannot see it being out .025. Maybe .002 but .025. I don’t think I’ve heard of a lousy 3 jaw having that much. 
 Did you check figment of backplate to spindle prior to machining?
 Did you mark a pin to locate where you made your cuts from? 
 Have you mounted just the backplate and taken readings from every surface. 
  Do you have a flat surface to put chuck on and take some measurements? 
 You want to verify where this amount is off before cutting anything. 
 Can you take a picture of back of bison chuck. Does it have factory grind marks?


----------



## Superburban (Mar 25, 2019)

COMachinist said:


> It almost looks like the back surface is not perfectly perpendicular to the bore of chuck.


Find a way to mount the chuck backwards, with the bore perfect, then you can measure the runout from the bore, on the back of the chuck.

You could take the largest collet you have and turn a bar to fit it, and hang out 4 or 5 inches, then mount the bar in the collet, and then in a regular chuck. Or better yet, if you can purchase, or borrow a ground rod about 1" diameter, and about 6" long.

Or get the biggest mandrel that matches a collet you have, and mount it into the chuck, and then between centers on your lathe.

Do not take any cuts on anything, until you have verified where the runout is, and you can take the assembly apart, and remount the chuck, and get the same runout in the same place. If possible, also with different collets.


----------



## Bob Korves (Mar 26, 2019)

Make quite sure you do not have an issue with the back plate fitting the spindle properly.  The spindle has a male taper, the back plate has a female taper.  The design is so that the two tapers fit together snugly while the flat spindle end of the back plate also mates perfectly with the flat spindle face.  There should be no light showing through a gap between the backing plate and the spindle face with the back plate mounted in place, checking around the entire circumference of the assembly.  There should be complete contact all around the circumference of the flat faces.  Use a bright flashlight from the back side looking for light and check carefully, this is a common problem, and it will cause the back plate to lean one way or another, causing the chuck to wallow around.  If you find that problem, get back to me and I will tell you how to fix it.  Do not try to figure it out alone, or you can make big mistakes while removing a small amount of metal.


----------



## COMachinist (Mar 26, 2019)

Ok. I never ass u me any thing. Hard fact, the spindle has no measurable run out! Hard fact there is no light from around the spindle to back plate joint. Hard fact, there is no light gap between the chuck to back plate from an 850 lumin nitecore flash light. There is no measurable run out on the back plate. Now with these accual measurements on the back plate, lathe spindle and back plate, with multiple quality instruments. I now have the chuck off the back plate and have it in the house heated garage. I plan to use my granite surface plate and Sterrett. .0001 DTI and stand to check back to ground surfaces on the chuck nose and front shoulder. Now if I find the chuck out of parallel should I have the back presicision ground . I don’t think it can be turned true has the chuck is hardended from what I can tell it is about 50-55 Rc by file test. Plus I don’t trust the collets.


----------



## Superburban (Mar 26, 2019)

I think you need a way to measure the bore, more then the face.


----------



## Cadillac (Mar 26, 2019)

Quick way to check back surface. Grab yourself a pair of parallels and measure them to see what they are in parallelism. Get your best pair and layout so they go the same way if not the same end to end. Then put the chuck on them, take your gauge and measure the chuck mounting surface.  Take note of your parallels variances into consideration if not perfect.


----------



## COMachinist (Mar 26, 2019)

Cadillac said:


> Quick way to check back surface. Grab yourself a pair of parallels and measure them to see what they are in parallelism. Get your best pair and layout so they go the same way if not the same end to end. Then put the chuck on them, take your gauge and measure the chuck mounting surface.  Take note of your parallels variances into consideration if not perfect.


Yea I did that just did not take a pic. Every thing is parralle, front to back. I think I found the problem. The bolts used on the chuck to back plate are 5/16” threads and the shank is about 9.they fit tight in the hole on the chuck. When they tighten down one slitely off center and pushing the chuck off center off line with the spindle. This is a front through hole chuck mount and the back plate is threaded. So need a little room in through holes to align before locking it down. My idea is to turn down the shanks of the cap head bolts to 5/16 .3125” for a little room to make the chuck a little adjustable. I could not use my thread in transfer screws to mark the backplate for drilling which I drill to get enough clearance to do the poor-mans set true mount. The chuck holes are a stupid 9.12 mm so the 9mm transfer punch is loose and the 9.5 is to large so the threaded hole in the back plate is a off 3 times. I turned down the tightest bolt and got the T I R down to .005 but ran out of movement. We will see tomorrow about the other 2, another nice 70* day and shop time.
Stay tuned
CH


----------



## Cadillac (Mar 27, 2019)

Seeing how the chuck mounts you will have a better fighting chance if you torque the mounting screws and alternate tightening. So it sounds like you problem is chuck alignment to backplate center. Good to hear your getting it worked out.


----------



## COMachinist (Mar 27, 2019)

Cadillac said:


> Seeing how the chuck mounts you will have a better fighting chance if you torque the mounting screws and alternate tightening. So it sounds like you problem is chuck alignment to backplate center. Good to hear your getting it worked out.


Yes that is the problem. The threaded holes in the back plate are not perfect. I didn’t think about the chuck holes and bolts being a slip fit. Where on regular chucks the clearance of the back plate holes allow the chuck to be aligned some, so pressure don’t misalign the chuck when torqued. So this is my way of getting it aligned. This is the idea I got from Darkzero here.
CH


----------



## mattthemuppet2 (Mar 27, 2019)

I had that issue with the 3 jaw that came with the lathe - the counterbores for the cap screws in the backplate were too tight, so tightening the screws moved the chuck. I ended up redrilling the holes and mounting the screws without counterbores. I also turned the backplate register down so that I true the chuck up by bumping it to center (poor mans set true).


----------



## COMachinist (Mar 29, 2019)

Well the problem is that the counter bores are in the chuck body. So the opion of re boring is not available. Opening up the bores is not a good opion either, i do not want ruin the chuck by breaking in to the scroll mount with a bolt. Basicly front mount chucks suck, they are great for rotary tables but not for a lathe mount. I may just go to a er40 chuck. I don’t use collets that much any way. I use my set true 3 jaw or independent 4 jaw. Just figured I would use it, if it were available for multi parts runs. 
Thanks 
CH


----------



## mattthemuppet2 (Mar 29, 2019)

you can turn down the heads of the bolts if you only need a little bit of clearance. there's usually more than enough "head" to hold things together. Wouldn't take but a moment to find out.


----------



## COMachinist (Mar 29, 2019)

mattthemuppet2 said:


> you can turn down the heads of the bolts if you only need a little bit of clearance. there's usually more than enough "head" to hold things together. Wouldn't take but a moment to find out.


It is not the heads it is the unthreaded shank of the bolt and the hole below the counter sink. The holes are realy tight on thje shank part of the bolt.
CH


----------



## Splat (Apr 16, 2019)

If you bought it new there should be a warranty for at least a year, no?  I would call and explain  you never used the chuck until you needed it and found this problem. That's what I'd try. Don't hurt.


----------



## Firstgear (May 26, 2019)

Superburban said:


> I think you need a way to measure the bore, more then the face.


Who cares about the face, the collet doesn’t mount to the face, it goes in the bore with a taper.....the R/O in the taper is the big deal.....


----------

