First Turning, Clausing 6316 Lathe

Joe Pitz said:

Thanks JR49,


When I purchased the lathe the owner turned a piece of steel between the chuck and tail stock and the cut was very smooth. I have the same problem with aluminum on my mini lathe, so I am guessing it could be the index and tool holder, I will clean it up and try again.

Thanks

Joe

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Same problem on two different lathes seems awfully coincidental. You said it's aluminum but not what type. I assumed it was 6061, but is it something else? They don't all turn the same.

-frank

Joe Pitz said:

Dave, just to verify, when I run the lathe in the forward direction, looking from the tailstock to the chuck, the chuck is turning in the counter-clockwise direction. I have varied my tool height and changed to other carbide tools and the pattern is the same. I do not have any HSS tooling at the moment.

Thanks

Joe

Click to expand...

Counter clockwise is correct. It really looks like the tool is rubbing, not cutting. Also try slowing the feed way down, maybe start a 0.001 or so per revolution.

Ok everyone I found it, Stuck a dial indicator against a center drill in the collet, runout was .0005. That was not it.
Went and checked the cross slide gibs and the compound gibs, that was not it. But since this is a new lathe to me and the saddle is much heavier than my mini lathe, I did not notice the saddle movement, So by pulling up and down on the cross slide I got .008" up and down play. So by playing around with which bolts tighten the saddle plates I was able to remove the up/down play in the saddle.

Enclosed is a pic of the cut after tightening the saddle.

This was manual feed.

Thanks everyone for the great input, helping this newbie out.

The radius on the insert is 1/64" I am going to purchase 1/32" from now on.

Joe

francist, I now purchase my metal from a local metal yard that sells by the pound, but this piece was picked up at Home Depot, so not sure what type of aluminum this is.

Thanks

Joe