12x36 Parting From The Rear

[Getaway]

I have a Craftsman Commercial 12x36. I don't know why I have never tried this before. This really works GREAT. With just a little trimming of the parting blade holder 2" diameter should fit just fine.

 

[shawn]

so does it really work pretty good. robert directed me to a file section on the atlas yahoo group that had a file of accessories. one of which had a fixture that goes in the place of your cross slide for production work.. and it had the parting tool and post in the rear... well im going to have to try it now!

 

[aliva]

Is there some sort of advantage in parting this way?

 

[shawn]

There seems to be.. and if you can run in reverse with the tool upside down, I hear it makes a world of difference. . And you can run at higher speeds. But so far, I have only heard this from guys with smaller lathes. Minis, bench models and such.. I think the big ones are so darn rigid that it doesn't matter.

 

[aliva]

I have 12x36 lathe and my cross slide won't go far enough to part from the rear, besides that I like to watch what my parting blade is doing. It looks like the view from the rear might be obscured.But if it works for you go for it. Again I don't see any advantage other than saying it can be done.

 

[shawn]

I have a 12"craftsman atlas . And it works much better to part in reverse with the tool upside down... but I can't get my tool post far enough to the back either.. so haven't tried it.. I guess the physics of it pulling up is better than it pushing down and causing flex in the carriage parts... Ive always had a hard time parting.. I ground my tool correctly.. set the height correct.. and so on.. even went really slow.. but turn it over and bam! No speed change, no digging in, no catching.

 

[Bamban]

This is what I use in my 1236 lathe. Set it once, sharpen tool if needed, insert and tighten blade back, no fiddling around like you would with the blades at an angle, getting it back on center.

http://www.eccentricengineering.com.au/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=31&Itemid=45

 

[rbertalotto]

Huge advantage when parting in the rear on the smaller lathes with the parting tool upside down. The force is "away" from the cutting edge rather than down on the cutting tool. I can part in this way easily twice as fast as I can conventionally on my Jet 12X36. Try it....You'll like it!

And if your compound doesn't go far enough back, drill and tap your cross slide to permanently mount a parting tool. Makes life so much easier.

 

[Getaway]

Just for clarification you don't run lathe in reverse when parting from the rear you just turn the parting tool upside down. I'm afraid to try to make any cuts running the lathe in reverse with a screwed on chuck. If I could I would just turn the tool holder upside down in the front position and run the lathe in reverse. To gain the extra room I turned the compound slide parallel with the cross slide and trimmed a little off the front of the tool holder. Try it I think you will see a huge difference.