Aligning a mini-lathe

Ok, tried the experiment. The back of the tool had about a 0.015" gap vs the nose touching the workpiece. The finish is a little better, but not mirror smooth. Still has speckles. Since there was 0.5 beers in me, I had to take it slow. Didn't want to post in the don't do this section. The rough difference in diameters is about 0.001. I didn't take a lot of measurements of each. That will have to wait.
 
This was with autofeed. I could just fit the edge of my Mitutoyo steel ruler under the back edge of the tool.
IMG_20200901_175105.jpg
 
Try maxing out the speed. The tool position looks good. Use some WD-40 and feed slow.
 
So max spindle RPM and manual feed slow? I can do that, says the guy that just finished a beer...

Actually, he can't do that and get a good finish. Starting and stopping manual feed on a mini-lathe, isn't a good way to get a nice finish. The lathe just isn't rigid enough. Had markings where ever I stopped feeding. Not nice. Ran it at a higher spindle speed. Max spindle speed had some noises, aka chatter. Backed it off a little, and no chatter. Finish is getting better, but still could be improved.
 
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Apologize for ninja edit. Manual feed was not so good. Lathe isn't tight enough. Need to tighten up the gibs. Had installed in an extended cross slide kit and things are close, but not quite as tight as I usually run it.

High RPM (and autofeed) does improve the finish some. It's a little better.

Waiting for another 6 mm hex key. Need to grind the arm shorter so I can adjust the headstock. Didn't want to mess up my regular key set. Have to disassemble a bit to get to the headstock bolts - and have to reassemble a bunch to be able to turn on the lathe safely.
 
Received my $1.99 6 mm hex wrench and ground it on the belt sander until it was only $1.83. The short part of the L interfered with the lead screw. Have to say they don't make it easy to access these points. I can turn all the headstock bolts now. One was OMG tight, the others were a lot less tight.

Since the tailstock end of the turned workpiece was smaller than the headstock end, I want to rotate the headstock away from me (CCW) correct? How do you suggest this is done? The bolts are (as seen from over head) like:
IMG_20200902_182037.jpg
Have #1 sort of tight, and loosen #2 & #3 a bit and tap at #2 towards #3? Or something entirely different? At the moment all bolts are tight.
 
I think I would leave the rearmost bolt snug, just loosen the two bolts on the right and bump the headstock over a tiny bit and lock it down. Then repeat the cut.
 
mikey said:
I think I would leave the rearmost bolt snug, just loosen the two bolts on the right and bump the headstock over a tiny bit and lock it down. Then repeat the cut.
Click to expand...
@mikey That's a little confusing to me. Do you mean bolt #3 in my drawing, or #1? Not sure what rearmost means in this context. That's why I numbered them in the sketch.
 
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