Logan Tailstock Turret question

T. J.

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There is a tailstock turret off of an 11" Logan lathe for sale locally for a decent price. Does anyone know if it would be possible to adapt this turret to a 10" lathe? I'm thinking it might be possible to machine some off of the top of the base to account for the difference in center height. I may be making this sound simpler than it really is though...
 
I got a turret tailstock from a guy that had it on a 10” Logan, it was made for a 11” and he machined the bottom off to fit the 10”. I made it fit a 12” craftsman with an aluminum plate bolted to it , I used a 5/8”dowel in the turret and a 5/8” er40 collet for alignment, I no longer have the lathe but kept the turret.
2AAB5E35-4EEC-45C8-9F6B-8096C48A3FBA.jpeg
Dose it resemble this one
Here is the base as I got it , just happened to have some aluminum thick enough to raise it .
4451E7AF-99E6-4FEB-BB62-5B604DEBC3BF.jpeg
 
I have seen guys plug the holes in the turret then drill and rebore them on the new lathe. When supplied from Logan I think they wanted them to be bored on lathe that they would be used on.
 
I'm not personally familiar with Logan equipment but there are generically two types of turrets, tailstock turrets and bed turrets. I haven't checked vintage Logan catalogs to see whether or not they made both types, but basically a tailstock turret looks like a typical tailstock except that the ram is replaced by a tool-holding turret. The typical tailstock turret has the same back-set adjustment feature as a normal tailstock does. A bed turret does not look like a tailstock, and usually has no means of adjustment for backset. You said that you were looking at a tailstock turret, but the photos that dlane (Derrick) posted are of a bed turret.

On the Atlas or Craftsman tailstock turrets for 10" or 12", the upper primary part was the same and the base or shoe was either 1.000" or 2.000" tall. And it was fairly simple to make a riser that would also convert the 10" to a 12", But on their bed turrets, although many parts interchange, it would have been much more time consuming and ticklish to make a spacer to convert the 10" to a 12". And converting the 12" to a 10" would have taken a fair amount of accurate machining on the base, and the conversion would have been permanent.

So the answer to your question depends upon whether what you are looking at is actually a tailstock turret or not. Best thing to do is to post some photos.
 
Thanks. I haven't gone to look at the turret yet, but I am assuming that it's a bed turret.
 
I suspect that you are right, Although I didn't pay any particular attention to them, I know that I have seen bed turrets in Logan catalogs. But I don't actually recall ever seeing a tailstock turret in one.
 
Agree with Jim, figure out how to plug the holes and then bore for the size of your tooling.
 
The more I think about this the more I would agree with someone else's post. I have a turret tail stock, seen in my avatar photo... but the bore is not aligned properly. I do drilling only at this time but it would be wonderful to have it aligned properly. It currently holds 1 inch shank but I could easily modify it to hold something different and it would be lovely for it to be actually true to the bore of my lathe. I guess it is time to get to work huh...LOL
 
FYI -- Unless you make multiples of pieces, a turret is nice but not practical. Set up for one piece may take two or three to get it right. I have an Ames turret lathe, wouldn't be without it for what I do, but you can't face with it, can't thread. I've adapted mine for cut off and chamfer, but that requires a saddle in addition to the turret. You could thread if you had the proper tooling but that may only be available for larger lathes.
 
I use mine to drill 9/16 to 3/4 inch holes thru nearly 2 inches of aluminum bar stock. The turret gives me much better force to get thru quickly vs the small hand wheel of the stock tail stock, with much much less effort.
 
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