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Winner Homemade Lathe Build Log

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Andre

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I made a lathe before, it worked great but needs a new spindle and it had lots of problems. So I thought I'd start a new one.
This one will be made of all scraps, I'm using what I have. I know it will be very small and not very strong since the X and Z slides will be made from .092" aluminum plate.
If this is successful, I will make a larger one from .25" steel plate. This one is only a prototype.

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Here is all the scraps cut out to make the X and Z movements.

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Milling the 45* angles with a 90* (metric) countersink. (on a thought, do metric countersinks have metric shanks?)

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All four female sides milled.
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Also milled the male side.
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This is how they will fit together.
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Thanks for checking this out, hopefully more tomorrow.

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I'm gonna be keeping tabs on this. If you can do this, that's a huge accomplishment.
 
I'm gonna be keeping tabs on this. If you can do this, that's a huge accomplishment.

Thank you! Won't be a big lathe but it's a project that might take me into the fall.
 
Drilled holes for the female sides. They got spaced odd and look a little weird so next time I do a row of holes I will keep that mistake in mind. The head banging part is I had to do the other to match!

Edgefound with the tip of the center drill, put the piece up to the flat of one of the flutes and lightly tighten the vise. Then turn the center drill to the left (opposite of cutting direction) and it will move the part in the vise putting it on edge. Then move over half the diameter.
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Drilling clearance holes for the now obsolete .110-50 screws. Luckily there were two taps in the jar of these screws, the thread size doesn't even come up on google.

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Drilled, countersink, and not so well deburred.

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That's it for today.

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I have seen a few threads on building a lathe. This is the first I believe where there is actually building. Cool man. Should be a fun build to follow
 
I have seen a few threads on building a lathe. This is the first I believe where there is actually building. Cool man. Should be a fun build to follow

Thanks, Chuck. Hopefully this goes well.
 
That looks really cool, good luck! Does the design include some kind of Gib and Gib adjustment to take up any slack in the cross slide?
 
That looks really cool, good luck! Does the design include some kind of Gib and Gib adjustment to take up any slack in the cross slide?

Thank you! One side of the female slide will be fixed and the other side will have holes offset 20 thousandths towards the outside, so when I assemble it I can adjust one side of the female dovetail by tightening the .110-50 pitch screws on the loose side, clamping the male dovetail. Is that clear as mud? lol

If that was not clear, one side will be fixed and one will be oversized, but stay loose so I can adjust the tension on the male side.
 
Ah, that makes sense, my ancient lathe is some what similar although it uses a captive screw to push the adjustable half into the dovetail. The bolts on the top are then tightened down to hold it in place. Might be an easier method of fine adjustment than holding them with your hand or a c clamp while you tighten the top bolts?
 
Ah, that makes sense, my ancient lathe is some what similar although it uses a captive screw to push the adjustable half into the dovetail. The bolts on the top are then tightened down to hold it in place. Might be an easier method of fine adjustment than holding them with your hand or a c clamp while you tighten the top bolts?

I don't think it will be a big problem, the way I will make it is not the best (gib will be tilted into the male dovetail until it's nearly worn out), so I'll think about it. Thank you for the suggestion though! The way yours works is the same as a TAIG lathe, if I'm correct.




Today's update,

Drilled, tapped, and assembled one male dovetail to the bottom plate. This time I got the spacing right! Too bad nobody will see this row of screws as they will be on the bottom...

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I put these screws in the spindle of my mill and used a lathe toolbit to flatten the domed screws. Since the screw slot is now thinner than it was before it stripped out a little, so I will replace the damaged ones when the slide is together.

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And filed down the screws flush to the top.

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Even though this stuff is small, it takes a long time to do, especially the hand work. I guess this is why we are hobby machinists.

Thanks for looking.

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