Collet holders and collets we use in our machines.

[Dave Smith]

I thought it might be a good subject to explore all the different collets and holders we use in our machines or have been collecting for use. I know there are a lot of collets and sizes but there must be a lot of questions that each of us may get answered. I was looking for anyone that used the small Balas/sandvik c2 collets and I finally found a couple holders on e-bay last week finally. does anyone else use this type? I also use 5c collets in my hardinge and all the mt tapers, I use r8s on my vertical mills, and my hendey/norton uses brown and sharp #9, I also have many others. is anyone looking for special collets? I know that in my older machinery manual that it lists a lot of special collets used on older machines and gives dimentions to identify them. does anyone know if there is modern book that IDs all the newer ones? --thanks for all input---Dave

 

[Starlight Tools]

I have both ER40 and 5C collets for my lathe, but I find that I use the 5C most of the time and have been slowly adding to the sizes I have on hand. It is great to be able to hold hex and square stock and those are available for the 5C. Also the expanding mandrels are handy. The collet chuck for my lathe is a Bison with D1-4 mount that direct mounts to the spindle and is very accurate. I can often take a workpiece from the lathe directly to the mill and using the Square of Hex collet blocks, quickly index a part to mill 1,2,3,4 or 6 faces on it. A 5C quick change tool post holder is on wish list.

Example, I used 5/16 square key stock, milled it in Square Holder on all four sides to end up with a 0.300" x 0.300" square stock, then transfered to lathe and turned a 0.256" spigot on the end, 3/16" long and parted the piece off. This part was then pressed into a 2" diameter washer that was cut from 1/4" plate with a 2-1/4" holes saw and cleaned up on a mandrel using the 1/4" diameter hole that was left from the holesaw. The square stock was then pressed into the washer with the arbor press and the back side was TIG welded to prevent the square bar from coming loose.

I have two MT3 to ER40 collet holder and sometimes use a collet chuck in the tailstock instead of the drill chuck. This gives a more solid grip to the shank than the drill chuck does. The other MT3 to ER40 holder has a drawbar so that it can be held in the headstock of the lathe. This gives good accuracy, but prevents holding long stock as the collet chuck gets in the way. The ER40 Collet chuck mounted to a backing plate, D1-4 is used most of the time when ER40 collets are needed for the lathe to hold odd sizes that I do not have 5C Collets for.

Milling machine, Bridgeport Clone mostly R8 as that is what the mill has, but I do have a R8 to ER40 Collet chuck if extra length is required or I need an oddball size.

My B&S #13 uses B&S #7 collets but I do not use them much.

The Darex XT3000 Drill sharpener uses DA180 collets in the countersink sharpener and have a few collets for it, 1/4, 3/8, 1/2 and at least one metric depends on what has needed to be sharpened.

Here is a site with listing of the common collets, their dimensions and the machines that use them.

http://shopswarf.orconhosting.net.nz/sindex.html

I also Have a small collection of Rivett 2S (Seneca No. 2) and South Bend 3C collets although I do not have anything that uses them.

Walter

 

[Dave Smith]

thanks Walter--you had a lot of info and a good link for a lot of collet IDs. Dave

 

[Tug]

I just picked up an ETM NMTB ER30 Chuck and collet set for my mill. I had a full range of individual tool holders, but felt the tool changes would be far too slow that way. Good ol' eBay had the set, and I emailed the guy a bid, which he accepted, for 1/3 of new. I'm happy.

 

[Starlight Tools]

http://www.hobby-machinist.com/downloads.php?do=file&id=799

Just uploaded a Hardinge Lathe brochure to the downloads section.

See pages 12 to 15 for a good listing of 5C collets.

PHugu

Hope the ER30 collets work well for you, I find that the extra length of the collet holders goggles up the Z axis to quickly and only use them sparingly on my mill. Most times I use the R8 collets as they are much closer to the spindle.

Walter