# A Taper Attachment For The Craftsman Lathe



## ML_Woy (Jul 18, 2015)

After watching  video #71 from Tublicane, I decided to build a taper attachment for my lathe. I took some measurements from his attachment, turned on the CADD program, produced a drawing and began "making chips". Here are some pictures of the finished product. Not perfect but good enough for my shop.

Enjoy


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## wa5cab (Jul 18, 2015)

ML,

That looks nice.


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## T Bredehoft (Jul 18, 2015)

Your lathe resembles my Clausing MK2 enough for me to consider making one myself.  How do you manage the slide effect on the compound?


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## brino (Jul 18, 2015)

Very nicely done!
What's your first project for it?

-brino


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## schor (Jul 18, 2015)

Nice job, I've been thinking of making one, I need to do an mt4 taper for my horizontal.


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## ML_Woy (Jul 19, 2015)

T Bredehoft said:


> Your lathe resembles my Clausing MK2 enough for me to consider making one myself.  How do you manage the slide effect on the compound?


The chip cover and the brass cross-feed nut are removed and the drawbar is connected to the cross slide by making a pin that passes through the hole that the cross-feed nut attached to on the cross slide. There is a small screw also in a pre-drilled hole in the Craftsman cross slide. A guide is machined to attach to the carriage dovetail. It is held in place with a set screw. This keeps the drawbar from rotating on the pin which holds it to the cross slide. On the other end a pin is inserted in one of the many holes in the cross bar which hooks to a car which rides on the "angle arm". As the carriage travels on the lathe ways, the cross slide moves in or out on your preset taper. Look at Tublicane's #71 video and he explains it a lot better than I can. I made mine much longer than the one he shows. The attachment points to the lathe ways are easy to make if you have flat ways. I used a double clamp method to make sure the attachment arms did not rotate. The depth of the clamping surface is only about one half of an inch.


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## ML_Woy (Jul 19, 2015)

schor said:


> Nice job, I've been thinking of making one, I need to do an mt4 taper for my horizontal.


That is the exact reason I built mine as I needed to make a Morse taper to center my lathe chuck on my rotary table and a taper to hold my collet attachment in my tail stock. First project will be to make a Marlin spike for my brother.


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## Terrywerm (Jul 19, 2015)

Nice job on the taper attachment. I also see that I am not the only one that uses an old cookie sheet for catching the majority of chips under the lathe.


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## Round in circles (Jul 21, 2015)

ML that is brilliant . I haven't seen Tubal's tube clip on it though I have looked at a lot.
Would you be so kind and send me your plans or put up a link to them please?

The chip cover and the nut driving the cross slide are removed
I get the remove the chip cover .

But to my poor brain & thinking  the nut driving the cross slide is the nut that holds the hand wheel to the screw thread , do you mean " Make it so that the operating screw thread  of the cross slide is removed or disconnected from the half nut of the cross slide so the cross slide can slide freely  back & forth when pushed / pulled  by the arm on the sliding block of the taper attachment ?


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## wa5cab (Jul 21, 2015)

Sorry, but I actually wrote that sentence (not ML), and I disagree.  The special nut that retains the cross-feed crank does have a slight effect on the total backlash in the cross-feed as tightening it removes the end float of the jam nut.  But if you remove the special nut and turn the crank without pulling on the crank (which would pull it off of the cross feed screw), the cross feed will work just as it normally does, albeit a little sloppily.  Also, there is no half-nut in the cross feed system.  The only half nuts (AKA split-nuts) are the pair on the back side of the carriage apron that engage the lead screw to traverse the carriage under power. 

However, I will change the sentence to read "The chip cover and the brass cross feed nut are removed."  My original was perhaps a bit verbose.


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## Round in circles (Jul 22, 2015)

Thanks Robert .
I'll try have a play later on today after  I've been to my physio session at hospital to see what's involved on my Sphere .(I'll take plenty of photo's ) I've a sneaky suspicion that the hand wheel ( which you call a crank ?? ) is pinned to the cross shaft on my lathe with a parallel pin which is almost ded level with the metal of the die cast alloy wheel's boss making it's going to be  a pigs ear to get out .


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## Silverbullet (Jul 22, 2015)

Dern you guys always adding to my project list. Things just keep going on the list but not to many being made yet. Seems like I'm gona have to work till I'm at least a hundred years old , god I love this , just wish I had more money and room . Nice job on your taper attachment , I think it will do everything you need for years to come. Hey it hands value to your lathe too. I've gotten use to offsetting the tail stock for tapers, this will be easier.


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## wa5cab (Jul 23, 2015)

David,

It has been a while since I saw photos of your Sphere.  It might have a hand wheel pinned to the cross feed screw instead of a crank and a Woodruff key.  But although the Atlas 9" and early 10" did have a small wheel or knob for driving the compound, and an intermediate size handwheel on the cross feed, from 10D (and equivalent 12") on, they have had cranks in both locations.  And both the wheels and the cranks float on the shafts between two nuts and are kept from rotating by a Woodruff key.


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## thomas s (Jul 23, 2015)

Nice thanks for posting.


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## Round in circles (Jul 23, 2015)

I think I've  got it sussed Robert ,  now all I need is the plans  . 
 Bakelite cover removed , leaves a threaded hole




 The securing/locating screw that holds the cross feed driving brass nut will leave a second locating hole for the taper attachment . ( Arragh I didn't check to see if it is threaded in its own right ) 




The cross feed brass driver nut





 When started to look at depth in to taking the hand wheel off  , under all the  crud that i thought may be a blind pin it had a well worn slotted grub screw running into one side of a champhered hole in the operating shaft .

The only feathered /keyed thing on the shaft is the power cross feed gear . There must be a good 3/32 th of end float  in the shaft including including movement  where the brass driving nut is anchored to the cross feed body .  I've  turned a thick steel washer down to reduce as much as I dare by putting it between the hand wheel boss and the index reference collar .


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## wa5cab (Jul 25, 2015)

David,

OK.  Your cross-feed screw is different from the later (meaning at least 10 F on) Atlas.  On them, the outer end of the cross feed screw is threaded 3/8"-24 from the outer end up and into where the dial sits.  There is a thin pattern nut (AKA jam nut) between the crank (on yours, handwheel) and the dial and a nut on the outer end of the screw.  The crank is prevented from turning on the screw by a woodruff key.  And by differential adjustment of the two nuts, you can reduce the end float of the screw essentially to zero.

And the hole that the round head screw securing the cross-feed nut to the cross slide goes through is not threaded.  Threads are in the nut.


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## AB2ZI (Jul 30, 2015)

terrywerm said:


> Nice job on the taper attachment. I also see that I am not the only one that uses an old cookie sheet for catching the majority of chips under the lathe.



Ha!  Me too!  Mine's more of a pizza tray... Round but works (for the most part).

Kevin


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## The Liberal Arts Garage (Oct 12, 2015)

Commercial baking sheet. ------ $2.00 yardsale just right...........BLJHB.


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