Lathe leveling/parallelism using shop made levelers..

[Firstram]

Terry, that looks very clean and you will enjoy the extra space as well. I have my 1340 Jet mounted in a very similar way. I made a 2 3/8" high solid riser pad for the head stock end and a 1/2-20 bolt adjusted set of 3/4 plates for the tail. Fine thread bolts are a necessity.

I should add that my cabinet is flat faced as well !!

 

[mikey]

Very nicely done and documented, Terry - good job!

While a knee space would have been ideal, you will not find such a thing at Home Depot. Most dedicated factory stands for smaller lathes have such a space but that is not the case here. One thing that you might do at some point is find that you need to move the lathe closer to the front of the bench top if your back starts to complain. Otherwise, I think you're going to be okay.

However it still doesn't alter my feelings that the casting is potentially weak at that point. Cast iron doesn't take much bending stress before it breaks, particularly in thin sections.

Ordinarily, the casting for the locking bolt is a weak link. However, it is now sitting flat on top of a 1/4" thick steel plate for added support underneath. The stress is now transferred to the plate. Moreover, Terry used a spacer nearly as wide as the locking bolt ear up top so that ear is even more well supported. Yeah, it might crack but it is far less likely to happen with this arrangement; you do not need a ton of torque to lock the lathe down. Quite frankly, I think using shims would lead to more stress on the ear because the ear is floating in mid-air when using shims.

You would think that trying to twist/un-twist an induction hardened short bed like this would be difficult but this leveling arrangement makes it quick and easy to do. Given that all lathes move over time, having a fast and precise method of leveling the lathe is sort of a big deal.

Terry, now you need to do a 2-collar test to fine tune the level and check the alignment of your head and tail stock. In about 2-3 weeks, re-check everything and then check periodically.

 

[TerryH]

Very nicely done and documented, Terry - good job!

While a knee space would have been ideal, you will not find such a thing at Home Depot. Most dedicated factory stands for smaller lathes have such a space but that is not the case here. One thing that you might do at some point is find that you need to move the lathe closer to the front of the bench top if your back starts to complain. Otherwise, I think you're going to be okay.



Ordinarily, the casting for the locking bolt is a weak link. However, it is now sitting flat on top of a 1/4" thick steel plate for added support underneath. The stress is now transferred to the plate. Moreover, Terry used a spacer nearly as wide as the locking bolt ear up top so that ear is even more well supported. Yeah, it might crack but it is far less likely to happen with this arrangement; you do not need a ton of torque to lock the lathe down. Quite frankly, I think using shims would lead to more stress on the ear because the ear is floating in mid-air when using shims.

You would think that trying to twist/un-twist an induction hardened short bed like this would be difficult but this leveling arrangement makes it quick and easy to do. Given that all lathes move over time, having a fast and precise method of leveling the lathe is sort of a big deal.

Terry, now you need to do a 2-collar test to fine tune the level and check the alignment of your head and tail stock. In about 2-3 weeks, re-check everything and then check periodically.

Thanks Mike! Next order of business is some disassembly and checking/cleaning/adjusting gibs etc... I want to make sure all the mating surfaces are clean and that there is no gunk anywhere it shouldn't be. It needs a good general lube before I do much actual work on it. It was/is pretty dry. Once I get it back together I intend to do the 2 collar test and verify alignment.

I purposely left the lathe back from the front edge to have a little room there to lay a measuring tool or such. It feels completely comfortable to me but we'll see as I begin to use it. It would have to be really bad for me to move it at this point. lol...

Thanks again for all your help.

 

[GunsOfNavarone]

So that definitely makes short work of leveling, but have you used it to now adjust out bed twist? No doubt that will make that a snap too, I'm more interested in the dance between level and twist. Depending on the trueness of the machine, balancing the two could be a bit of a nightmare....at least that's what I'm seeing.

 

[TerryH]

So that definitely makes short work of leveling, but have you used it to now adjust out bed twist? No doubt that will make that a snap too, I'm more interested in the dance between level and twist. Depending on the trueness of the machine, balancing the two could be a bit of a nightmare....at least that's what I'm seeing.

What one is searching for in this process is for the ways to be coplanar. Level really has nothing to do with it other than making adjustments until the bubble is in the middle is the simplest way to measure that both sides of the bed are in the same plane. You are actually inducing twist or rather offsetting the existing twist to force the ways to be parallel with this process. The bed could theoretically be completely out of level but as long as the ways are parallel to each other the lathe should not cut a taper. Theoretically. I'll do the proper testing in the next few days and report back.

 

[GunsOfNavarone]

Ok, confused. The bottom of your machine, where mine is cast iron, yours seems to have steel there as well as 4 bolts visible inside the casting (holds that plate on?) Is that something the 752 comes with? If not, why did you add that rather than just let the adjustment bolts butt up against cast iron foot? Drilling out the bottom of my casting would be entirely more work than its worth if even accessible...

 

[TerryH]

Ok, confused. The bottom of your machine, where mine is cast iron, yours seems to have steel there as well as 4 bolts visible inside the casting (holds that plate on?) Is that something the 752 comes with? If not, why did you add that rather than just let the adjustment bolts butt up against cast iron foot? Drilling out the bottom of my casting would be entirely more work than its worth if even accessible...

I added 1/4" steel plates to the feet. The plates serve to spread out the forces the leveling bolts exert on the foot. The plates also serve to reinforce the foot and reduce stress at the mounting bolt casting. I drilled the feet and mounted the plates while the lathe was supported on the engine hoist. I placed a 4x4 on my main bench so it would be under the bed as a pivot point and lowered the lathe until the bench was sharing the load with the engine hoist. Then I let first one end and then the other hang over my bench to perform the drilling and bolting.

 

[mikey]

Ok, confused. The bottom of your machine, where mine is cast iron, yours seems to have steel there as well as 4 bolts visible inside the casting (holds that plate on?) Is that something the 752 comes with? If not, why did you add that rather than just let the adjustment bolts butt up against cast iron foot? Drilling out the bottom of my casting would be entirely more work than its worth if even accessible...

Guns, the way Terry attached the plate is very solid but you can get away without drilling the foot of the lathe at all. You can make a plate and drill a hole to pass the locking bolt as he did here, then drill and tap the steel plate for four short socket head cap screws; the heads would bear against the inside edge of the casting to effectively locate the plate. This keeps the steel plate from moving around while still providing full support for the lathe foot and the locking bolt part of the casting. Once the lathe is leveled and locked down, that plate will not move.

This mod is well worth doing. Terry's execution is quite elegant but everything he does is well done. At least now you know that there is a simple way to mount your lathe that will make leveling adjustments relatively painless. Having leveled a lathe with shims myself, multiple times on the same lathe in fact, I highly recommend you consider emulating Terry. This mounting method is found on all the Emco tool room lathes and it is, by far, the simplest and most effective arrangement I have seen.

 

[Creativechipper]

I am starting to think I could use a 2x6 wooden block and put leveling feet on the blocks, x2 blocks one for each end of the lathe? I would use steel plates but dont have the steel nor the tooling.

Do you all think wooden leveling blocks with adjustable feet would be a good work around? Kinda the same as mounting on a wooden bench right?

Something like this https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07CG2Z4J...eV&pd_rd_r=6X8CKRZETE9Y6M30HHEA&pd_rd_w=EWYuC

 

[francist]

2x6 material is likely problematic from the get-go. It's construction grade stuff so not terribly consistent in density and is not a very good cut of wood for stability. If you can only use a wood product right now, maybe consider something like 3/4" MDF which is a lot more resistant to compression. You'd want to seal it though (paint) as it does have a propensity to absorb. Metal really would be better though both for the stiffness as well as fastener attachment.

-frank