Vertex 8" Rotory Table Help

grover

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I just purchased a Vertex 8" rotary table from Amazon. Seemed to be a good price and free shipping. About 1 hour later I was looking at the listing to see if maybe I had screwed up buying it as I know nothing about rotary tables and have not yet seen the mill it will sit upon! PM940 on back order. The price had jumped $25 and now the shipping was $68! Even if I did make a mistake at least I got a good deal. Ha.
I am watching a lot of you tube videos on selecting the right one and proper setup ect. There is a guy named Joe Pieczynski who has a good tutorial,explains things well. I will post a link to the video, watch from the 10 minute mark. He focuses on the dialing in of the handle and scale. The table I received has markings that are finer graduations on the rotating scale than on the stationary scale (0-60 minutes fine tune). The Phase II that he is using has the same width graduations on each scale. It makes sense when he explains using his dial but mine does not seem to jive. Also there is a gap of about .1" between the scales. The outer handle will not slide on far enough it seems. The pocket on the inside of the outer handle is 1.037" and the internal components on the shaft project 1.3". Any body have any comments on this? I also purchased the Vertex dividing plate set which hasn't shipped yet. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks

These pictures show mine with the gap and the pictures off of Amazon. Mine is a 3 slot....it seems they all are coming through like that. Even the ones showing 4 slots are getting comments that people are receiving 3 slot tables. I was under the assumption that Vertex was a good name. It has all the Vertex paperwork. States on table it is made in Taiwan with 1 year warranty.
 

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I would read the instructions. The gap in the dial maybe that the drive is not engaged, there is the black T knob which you need to loosens and you turn the back part of the dial to either engage the handle drive or disengage it. It moves in and out as the arrows on mine show. There may be some other adjustment on yours. The gradations are different on the dial via reading the minutes, So mine is showing 10 seconds before 0. The number of slots varies with the size of the rotary table, typically the smaller ones have 3 slots. Vertex are good rotary tables, it looks authentic.

Rotary Table Dial.jpg

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Stefan Gotteswinter on youtube has a great series where he made his Vertex table into an ultra-precise one. Well worth the watch.
 
Generally Vertex is a good quality brand. I used to have a 6" Rutland made by Vertex & currently an 8" by Vertex, never had any issues with either of them.

My 8" Vertex RT has 4 slots. On Vertex's website they list the 4", 6", & 8" as having 3 slots but I have seen the 8" come both ways from various vendors. Only the 10" & larger come with 6 slots. I do prefer the 4 slots over 3. I got mine as a gift from Matt QMT/PM, although not listed on his website I know he does sell them (not sure if that has changed).

Mine does not have a big gap between the dials like yours. Since you say you can't adjust the placement of handwheel any further, IIRC that fixed graduated ring is held on with a set screw, maybe it was not assembled correctly & can be adjusted. I'm surprised yours came that way from the Vertex factory but mistakes do happen even from reputable manufacturers.

Img_0849.jpg
 
Here's another pic showing how big, or should I say little, the gap is on my 8". The gap does not change whatsoever when rotating the handwheel assy to disengage/engage the worm on mine. Sorry, my aching back doesn't feel like pulling the thing out of the drawer right now to take a proper pic. :)

proxy-4.jpg
 
both my 6" and my 8" vertex have 4 slots at 90 degrees.
 
One advantage of the 3 slots is that it makes it very easy to mount a 3-jaw chuck if you get a front mount chuck. No adapter plate needed & you can run the same size chuck as the table. No need to step down the chuck size like mine shown above. Still, I prefer to have a chuck mounted on an adapter anyway for another reason.
 
I would read the instructions. The gap in the dial maybe that the drive is not engaged, there is the black T knob which you need to loosens and you turn the back part of the dial to either engage the handle drive or disengage it. It moves in and out as the arrows on mine show. There may be some other adjustment on yours. The gradations are different on the dial via reading the minutes, So mine is showing 10 seconds before 0. The number of slots varies with the size of the rotary table, typically the smaller ones have 3 slots. Vertex are good rotary tables, it looks authentic.

View attachment 369837

View attachment 369838
I did read the manual. When you loosen the black T knob it allows you to rotate the shaft towards or away from the gear on the table and you can then rotate the table without the hand wheel shaft rotating.Engage /disengage by moving the worm gear away. The shaft moves side ways not in and out. Look at what happens when you rotate your shaft. The gap between your scales does not change.

Bingo! There is a setscrew on the "micro collar" (vernier ring on the hand wheel) When loosened it allows you to slide the ring forward to close the gap between the two rings. No mention that this might need to be done in the manual. This is located right at the "0" mark. Loosen setscrew-move collar forward-tighten setscrew!

Darkzero your post was not yet visible to me when I posted this. Thank you for coming up with the answer! Really glad I won't have to send this back when nothing was really wrong with it!
 

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I did read the manual. When you loosen the black T knob it allows you to rotate the shaft towards or away from the gear on the table and you can then rotate the table without the hand wheel shaft rotating.Engage /disengage by moving the worm gear away. The shaft moves side ways not in and out. Look at what happens when you rotate your shaft. The gap between your scales does not change.

Bingo! There is a setscrew on the "micro collar" (vernier ring on the hand wheel) When loosened it allows you to slide the ring forward to close the gap between the two rings. No mention that this might need to be done in the manual. This is located right at the "0" mark. Loosen setscrew-move collar forward-tighten setscrew!
Notice how the gap was moved forward!
 

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Generally Vertex is a good quality brand. I used to have a 6" Rutland made by Vertex & currently an 8" by Vertex, never had any issues with either of them.

My 8" Vertex RT has 4 slots. On Vertex's website they list the 4", 6", & 8" as having 3 slots but I have seen the 8" come both ways from various vendors. Only the 10" & larger come with 6 slots. I do prefer the 4 slots over 3. I got mine as a gift from Matt QMT/PM, although not listed on his website I know he does sell them (not sure if that has changed).

Mine does not have a big gap between the dials like yours. Since you say you can't adjust the placement of handwheel any further, IIRC that fixed graduated ring is held on with a set screw, maybe it was not assembled correctly & can be adjusted. I'm surprised yours came that way from the Vertex factory but mistakes do happen even from reputable manufacturers.

View attachment 369846
Seeing as the handwheel was shipped separately in it's own little sealed box I can see that happening. They should just send documentation and the end consumer will know how to close that gap.
 
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