# Starting to make progress



## MikeWi (Jun 8, 2013)

I'm still in the process of aligning my new lathe.  Life and UPS has been getting in the way, but the stand is now bolted to the concrete floor, and  the lathe is mounted on bolts coming up from the bench and resting on nuts/washers for leveling.

I "finished" using Rollie's Dad's method for aligning it horizontally before having to quit for the day.  Over a 17.5" inch run from point to point, I got the alignment to about .00025 larger at the tailstock end.  That's not as exact as it sounds, it's from having to eyeball fractions on my .001 resolution DTI.  I'll switch to a tens DTI to see how accurate that measurement is, but it will have to wait until Monday now.

I still have some questions in spite of everything that I've read (I'm paying attention R King! honest!).


I'm assuming that this is more than good enough for that particular test?  Two collars will follow an attempt at vertical alignment using the RD method.
This method talks about doing the Horiz. alignment first, then the vertical.  Seems to me that I'm more likely to screw up the horiz. alignment this way when I do the vertical.  comments?
placing a machinist's level on the ways  at either end shows that the lathe bed may be bowed upward in the middle.  I can envision the two cabinets having the inner side higher than the outer side, and maybe causing this, but I roughly leveled the base using the 4 outside feet only, and brought the 4 inside to match so this shouldn't be the case.  Am I right in thinking that this should cause a cylinder to be wider in the center as the cutter rises above center?Richard Kings method uses the tailstock against a matching diameter plug in the chuck, and I'll try that as well.

I have to say it was fascinating to be able to watch the DTI move as I raised the  right front foot on the lathe.  I was able to gauge how big an adjustment I was making this way, and it was easy to sneak up on the required twist since I knew how much of a difference a given amount of wrench movement gave.


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## Ray C (Jun 8, 2013)

Mike,

Sounds like great progress...  Although Rich is more suited to answer your questions, I'll take a shot and say that you'll need to do a little "stepwise refinement" and switch back/forth between making horizontal and vertical adjustments until you hone in and nail it.  

Ray


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## Uglydog (Jun 10, 2013)

MikeWi said:


> I have to say it was fascinating to be able to watch the DTI move as I raised the  right front foot on the lathe.  I was able to gauge how big an adjustment I was making this way, and it was easy to sneak up on the required twist since I knew how much of a difference a given amount of wrench movement gave.



Yes, I agree this is much fun!


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