Steady Rest Finger Material?

[cdhknives]

I have an original Atlas steady rest for my 10F. I was wanting to build roller fingers for it to work some aluminum rod, as I figure the standard solid fingers would be too hard on aluminum...and it would be a good learning project. In the interest of ease of machining and lack of rigidity on my milling attachment, my goal was to use aluminum barstock and small sealed bearings for rollers. This is a rare use item, so longevity is not a major concern. Is aluminum (probably 6061T6 due to ready availability) going to be strong enough? The pin for the bearing support would be steel, just the body would be aluminum...3/8" square IIRC, which gives slightly less than 1/8" on each side of a 1/8" bearing.

 

[tomh]

You will have 3 points of contact so The aluminum will be fine. Any stress will be divided by 3 and you will not be pushing it to the max limits. I say go for it
On the lite side, if you still have doubts I suggest you slip out one night and slice a slab off your neighbors military grade ford PU

 

[David S]

CD I have a steady rest for my 618. It uses brass "fingers". They were long enough that I used them and turned them end for end and put the small bearings on the end opposite the normal running end.

David

 

[Rob]

When I made roller fingers for my lathe I used 3/8 key stock. No machining judged drill and taped for the roller and a file on the one edge so it fit nicely.

 

[cdhknives]

When I made roller fingers for my lathe I used 3/8 key stock. No machining judged drill and taped for the roller and a file on the one edge so it fit nicely.

So your roller was offset to the side of the stock, not riding in a slot? I didn't expect the Atlas steady rest to support much torque on those fingers...???

 

[Tony Wells]

You might want to look into cam followers and just drill and tap your existing fingers and put them in place only when you need the rollers. If you put the tapped holes in the correct place they will allow the bearings to make contact before the brass tips. It might be worth looking at, anyway. If you can't find cam followers with a large enough bearing diameter for the size limits you face on tapping the holes, you could make some "tires" and press them on over the bearings. And they of course, could be of any material you choose, from plastic to harder materials.

 

[chips&more]

If it’s rarely going to be used? Maybe forget the bearings and just make solid fingers out of Delrin.

I made a set of Delrin fingers for my Levin steady rest. At the time I was thinking they would just be good for a few jobs before wearing out. It’s been many years now and they are still good! Mind you, they probably see higher rpm’s but not as heavy loads…Dave.

 

[Rob]

Yes the roller was offset. Didn't seem to have a problem with having it offset. I used it to bore out a 1 1/2" alunimum pipe that was about 30" long.

 

[wa5cab]

6061T6 should be OK for light or occasional use.

 

[Steve_Cole]

My Colchester triumph came with delrin fingers in the steady rest and have lasted well. One thing to consider is that bearings will tend to press any chips into the work whereas a wiping contact will brush the chips away.

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