Totally useless 5C collets

[weston1968]

Are you trying to compare a set of collets you got for $72dollars with a set of collets from Hardinge for $2766 ?
Hardinge makes great 5c collets but you pay for them. I have been a machinist for 70 years and most of the time if parts being made that NEED to be dead concentric you make them out of bigger stock and machine them to size. And if second operation is needed use an expensive collet or bore a soft collet in the lathe. Another option is to buy a set true collet chuck. And dial the collets into how close you need them to run. Some machinist expect collets to run dead true. But sit down and see what it would cost if you made a collet from scratch. Cost of material would probably be more than 2 bucks . Add threading to the od and threading to the Id and heat treating cost and milling the slots.

I purchased a Chinese 8x16 ELS lathe. It is okay, but a Hardinge collet would be wasted on it. I had a few 3C Hardinge on my Logan where they were worth it. The lathe is good to less than .001" TIR and I would be happy with .0006" on the collets. The first batch of cheap collets I got were good to .0006TIR. The ELS made it very attractive for machining small parts with any thread. It is versatile and accurate enough.

 

[cjtoombs]

My findings have been similar to others, some Chinese collets are good, some are not, which not much way of telling before you buy. I've taken to purchasing used good quality collets such as Hardinge, Royal, Precision, etc. They run between around $10 each, plus or minus 5 depending on how big the lot is and how lucky a day you are having. The problem with this method is that acquiring the ones you want often entails buying lots with ones you don't want, which necessitates the trouble of putting them back on eBay and selling them. I did buy a cheap set of 5C square collets, but I did not expect I would need high accuracy out of them, and I also built a set true back for my collet chuck when I got it, just in case.