New 5c Collet Chuck and Collets! :)

wrmiller

wrmiller

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A very generous friend took pity on me and bought me a TMX set-tru 5c collet chuck, and a set of 35 collets (1/16" spacing?). To say that I'm grateful doesn't come close, and I'm a bit embarrassed by all this, but I'll get over it. :)

The chuck is a TMX. I'd never heard of them, but when the chuck arrived it is stamped 'Made in Poland' and looks suspiciously like a Bison. My friend says they are identical, so maybe they come from the same factory?

The collet set is from Precision Matthews. I want to be able to grab pretty much any diameter, and this should do the trick. I read somewhere that there are sets with 1/64" spacing, but that they are very costly. Anyway...

I mounted the backing plate and checked TIR. I was reading about .0005", so marked the current indexing and gave it a 'fuzz pass'. Checked again and I can't measure the runout. Cool. Mounted the chuck to the backing plate, put a dti on the shoulder inside the nose and adjusted the chuck. Then I put a 0.5 gauge pin in the 1/2" collet and put that in the chuck. Saw about .0005" TIR on the outside of the gauge pin about 1" from the nose of the chuck. Proceeded to chuck up a piece of 1" 7075 and made a couple of cleanup passes. Pulled the piece out and measured a diameter variation of .0002" across 2.7" of length.

I've never owned or used a 5c collet chuck, so did I do this right? If so, I'll attribute the .0002" of taper to part flex and leave well enough alone. :D

Some pics:
IMG_0977.jpg
IMG_0979.jpg
IMG_0982.jpg

It's such a cute little chuck, compared to my 8.5" PBA. :)
 
TMX is Bison, I believe TMX (Toolmex) is the US distributor. Top notch chucks, you will really enjoy using the 5C collets for smaller work. Also saves the fingers when working close to the chuck ......:eek 2:
Mark
 
I have been doing mostly smaller stuff of late, so this will work well. It also is a bit narrower than the PBA, so turning radius' and balls should be a bit easier.

Wish I'd had this chuck when I had to make that firing pin for a friend's hundred and thirty year old rifle. It would have been a lot less scary. :)
 
Congrats Bill, what a fantastic gift!

Mark is correct, the Toolmex TMX Tru Set 5C is made in the Bison factory. Sometime back Toolmex tried getting these made in Asia, was unhappy with the outcome, and fairly quickly changed to the Bison manufacturing in Poland. These are very nice chucks.

The 5C setup with your PM1340GT is going to be a game changer for you. For example, chucking threads and not damaging them is made easy with this collet chuck.

With some help from Mark and others, I researched this chuck early last year and found it can be an attractively priced competitor to the Bison version. My research also convinced me that it is likely an equal performer to the Bison branded chuck. By the way, I bought one through Precision Matthews. Turns out that Matt can get these for you at a very competitive price.

Here's your chuck zoomed in a bit to flag the "made in Poland" badge:

TMX.jpg
 
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5C collet chuck. -Absolutely indispensable!

You'll be making free parts for your friend for quite some time.

Ray
 
Ray C said:
5C collet chuck. -Absolutely indispensable!

You'll be making free parts for your friend for quite some time.

Ray
Click to expand...

He said these were for 'services rendered' as I have been helping him out a bit. Not sure I did enough to warrant these, but I'll take 'em. :)

The PM collet set appears to be pretty darn accurate. When I unpacked each collet, I did a quick debur on a hard 3M wheel, and then did a light pass over the threads on a scotchbright (the maroon one) wheel. They cleaned up real nice.
 
Alan H said:
The 5C setup with your PM1340GT is going to be a game changer for you. For example, chucking threads and not damaging them is made easy with this collet chuck.
Click to expand...

I like the idea of being able to grab the outside of a 1911 barrel without damaging it. :)
 
Like others have mentioned, The 5C scroll chuck is an invaluable addition to any lathe work. Your abilities to quickly change out collets from 1.125" and down will be a time saver in the long run with very precise holding especially for your gunsmithing.

You have a special friend Bill, obviously your special to him/her. We're fortunate to have friend/s like this. I too have been blessed with a special friend made only possible by this site.
Congratulations on your 5C system.
Paco
 
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