TTS Tool Holders- Collets

RJSakowski said:
For most of the work on the mill, the TTS collet system works well. For those few times when I don't have sufficient clearance, I have my R8 collets to fall back on. The most common situation where I run out of Z is tapping. I made a tap follower that completely sits inside a 3/4" R* collet but the combination of the tap and wrench eat up the Z. My first tap follower consisted of simply a long spring which fit inside a 3/8" R8 collet and a pointed pin. Aside from having to capture the pin when removing the tap, it work well and consumed no extra z.
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You know, everyone makes everything to fit into an R8, there are R8 fly cutters, R8 mill holders, R8 etc... But now that I think about it I have never seen an R8 tap follower (something similar to an R8 collet with a spring loaded point sticking out of it...... hummmmm
 
Now that you mention this, I may need a TTS tap follower!
 
Having a set of 1/32" R8 collets is a big help when you are short on Z! Mostly drill bits...
Plus, it can save you a lot of cranking on the Z when going between mill and drill.
Surprisingly cheap. I don't use these for end mills, I have GOOD German collets for that
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I found another tool holder hiding in a piece of scrap.

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Not sure what I'll do with this yet. It will have to be for something that tolerates runout (fly cutter, tram indicator, drill, etc). Maybe a center drill, but I am not sure how useful that would be, since I would be switching to a drill chuck anyway typically. Tap follower would work, but again that will likely follow a drill chuck anyway.
 
That destroyed holder is perfect to turn back and stick a tap follower in and just use a set screw to keep it in place.
 
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It's not actually destroyed but made from scrap. I like your idea!
(it started life as a hitch pin for a large trailer)
 
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I drew this up in Fusion with the correct dimensions. I have updated the pdf drawing in post #19 in case anyone needs to refer to it in the future
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Yes there should be a through hole but you can make that whatever size works for you.
 
Lol I wasn't trying to insult your work the top end is beautiful I saw the bottom portion and instead of seeing stock surface I thought it was a good holder than had rubbed and crashed while in use. I get it now that I know that's hitch pin surface. You have a blank. Super handy. I need about half a dozen TTS blanks for various projects.
 
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Advil said:
Lol I wasn't trying to insult your work the top end is beautiful I saw the bottom portion and instead of seeing stock surface I thought it was a good holder than had rubbed and crashed while in use. I get it now that I know that's hitch pin surface. You have a blank. Super handy. I need about half a dozen TTS blanks for various projects.
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No worries. Are you gonna make blanks or buy them? I would consider making more but I don't have a collet chuck for my lathe and I don't think I can get concentricity down to .005 or better. As you say, that's fine for a tap follower.
 
The runout of one of my shop made TTS holders is measuring about .0003

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I'm pretty sure my spindle has that much runout so It's hard to say where this error is.
 
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