Little mods making things better. (And other Stuff!)

You will get it sorted out I'm sure. But yeah the last time I stalled the chuck it was because I forgot to engage the tensioner. Another time it was because I had it in back gear with the spindle locked to the pulley set. There was another time... but I can't remember what I'd done that time. These machines keep us on our toes!
 
My motor is a 1/2hp and should be more than enough to keep the chuck turning. Tomorrow I'll try and put some belt dressing on the link belt and see what happens.
 

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With all the efforts to clean the link belt I think I may have ruined it. After cleaning it twice, once with gasoline and second with acetone, the belt did get clean but slips. I can hold the chuck with my hand and pull on a tight belt and it slips thru the pulleys in the headstock. Cleaning probably leached out some much needed binding of the material. I sprayed belt dressing on the belt and now it grabs and doesn't slip. Haven't tried cutting round stock yet but has to be better. A regular fan belt may be in my lathes near future. Seems like my lathe ought to handle a .007" or .008" cut but fear that's not going to happen.
 
So far the worst thing about my lathe is my inability to correct all the slop in the cross slide and compound screw. My lathe is quiet in both the neutral and forward/reverse directions. Even the back gear is very tolerable. Many hours of working on gears and their adjustment along with lubrication has done wonders. Tightening the gibs has helped but is only a temp fix as they seem to go out of adjustment. New brass nuts on the cross slide and compound screws didn't do anything for the slop! Short of making a new compound and cross slide I just don't believe there is much more I can do for this 74 year old lathe. Finding "new" screws would "maybe" make a difference. Maybe it's time to let it go to someone who wants it more than me. After replacing the headstock bushings I don't believe the chuck would be an issue anymore. Take my loss and buy a Mathews Precision Lathe would be a positive step for me in my opinion.
 

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There is no such thing as "perfect." All mechanical things will have some "slop." It is possible to eliminate backlash on screw feeds. But it isn't necessary on a manual lathe. Since cutting forces are always pushing against the screws in the same direction the forces on the screw remain against one side of the thread only. CNC machines move both ways and the cutting forces reverse so they use preloaded ball nuts and ground screws. Costs a lot more and wouldn't make a manual machine any more accurate.
Dovetail slides get worn in the area most used. The areas at the end of their travel is less worn and so you can't adjust the gibs so all play is removed on a worn machine. See scraping videos about how to true slides. A member on this site is an expert, R King. Look @ his videos.
A new lathe will have backlash also!
 
Well if you do give up on it, I'm sure you'll be quite pleased with a new lathe.
But I sure do like these little Atlas lathes. My 10" version seems quite a bit better with a longer, heavier cross slide. It's a couple grand cheaper than a PM machine. I mean to say the cross slide did a world of good.
 
Tomorrow I'll take the gibs off the cross slide and compound slide and polish them with 400 grit oxide layed on glass. I'll also polish the divets in the gibs as well and insure the gib adjustment screws are rounded and polished as well.
 
And my compound slide is basically locked all the time. I loosen one gib screw a little if I need to use it. I wish we'd get some more opinions in your thread here, but it looks to me like your compound slide is extended too far. I keep the front of the compound slide sitting on the front of its mating slide.
 
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