New Enco 12 x36

[Falcon67]

Ahh, you'll probably be back out there by the half. Brees is gonna light 'em up. Carolina's D has gone downhill this season.

BTW, good job on getting your RO down to spindle specs.

LOL - the game is 8th grade football. Merkel Badgers vs Jim Ned Indians

 

[Falcon67]

I finally got the three jaw to talk right, after a bit of work. I mounted the chuck, then tweaked it a bit using an indicator on the OD. When I got that close, I put the test bar in the jaws. I had to run the jaws around again to find the best TIR. Once I got that, I tweaked the chuck on the plate using the indicator on the test bar and the tip up next to the jaws. Best I could get was .002 TIR at the jaws, .0035 4" out. At that point I center punched dots on the jaws and chuck in the channels. I went around the chuck and used each scroll screw until I found the one that repeated the TIR. Gave that one a punch mark. Calling it "good 'nuff".

Now for the 4 jaw. The plate doesn't want to pull up to the spindle face evenly in any position, so I'm using a marker to find any tight spots on the taper and massaging the taper slowly with 320 grit/WD-40. I got it to go .003 once, but could not get the cams to repeat at any torque. It looks like a swash plate in all three positions using a breaker bar on the cams. I'll either sneak up on it or have to get another plate. It stands about .003~.004 proud before pull it in with the cams. No matter how may time I go around, there is a spot that won't pull up tight. Ran out of time to mess with it, so more on that later.

 

[Falcon67]

Pretty sure now I have a "bad" chuck plate. It seems to be a problem with the pins.

Lower pin looks off a bit, but they all seem to be too close to the bore


Plate will not sit flush with pins and it will only pull up tight to the spindle on two pins


No pins - fits good and does not rock.

 

[JimDawson]

It looks like your pins need to be adjusted. Try removing the set screw and screw the pin(s) in another turn, then try it. It could be that the pin holes were not machined concentric to the bore, in that case I would send it back if possible. You also could re-drill the holes in the proper location.

I can't see the mark on the cam, but when the pins are properly adjusted, the mark should be between the ''V''s when the chuck is tight.

 

[Falcon67]

I've had the pins in and out several times, and set to several different heights with a caliper. They only work - pull up/mate to the spindle cams- when the height is in the 1.27 ~ 1.29 range.

 

[Falcon67]

Sorry it's been a while since I updated this thread. Not much doing with the lathe lately. However, I got tired of messing with the supplied 6" 3 jaw and the plate. I did get it mounted more or less by heating the plate which allowed it to mount flush to the spindle. As you'd expect, if I wanted to change the chuck that required beating it off with a rubber mallet. Best I got was around .010 and some of that is in the back plate. The worse part is that the error got worse the farther out from the chuck you went. I read up on grinding the chuck jaws and such. Then a better idea came along - 20% coupon from Enco, a web sale price and a code for free shipping bought a nice 6" two piece 3 jaw direct mount unit that checks out at under .002 TIR. Under $200 delivered. Happy now.

The other 6" will work nice on a rotab on the mill.



If you look at the very bottom of the pic, there is a "chip pan". That's a half sheet aluminum baking pan. I stole that one from the kitchen but they have them in two packs at Sams and as I recall they are pretty cheap. It fits under the lathe like it was made for it. An inspiration formed while washing the pan at the sink.

 

[zmotorsports]

Nice looking machine Chris. I too bought one of those 6" 3-jaws on sale for my rotary table that I finally got around to machining a backing plate for and mounting up.

Mike.

 

[Hotbluechips]

Falcon
When I was young, Abilene Dragstrip was at the end of north first street.
Cooldown was at the sonic. I have a belt drive Enco lathe, Good little lathe for home.

 

[mike95376]

I have this lathe too. Mine is the older version that is shown in the Enco catalog picture.
It works pretty well.