Home | Contact Us | FAQ | Search & Site Map | Link to Us
Sign In | Join | Other 45 Sites in Network
Home
Discussion Groups
General
ModelsRailroadsRockets
Radio Controlled
Air ModelsHelicoptersLand ModelsWater Models
ModelGeeks.com
Contact UsLink To UsSearch & Site Map

Model Forum / General / Models / December 2006



Tip: Looking for answers? Try searching our database.

Does it exist?

Thread view: 
Enable EMail Alerts  Start New Thread
Thread rating: 
John Ambler - 03 Dec 2006 14:15 GMT
Is there a metalworkers equivalent of the woodworkers bowl lathe i.e.
large swing, but short bed?

My need is to turn flywheels for model steam and i.c. engines, but
don't have room for a large footprint ex-industrial lathe - large
swing seems to usually come with long bed and large footprint.

Thanks....
John Ambler
Sussex, UK
Return E-mails to john@skiprat.net
http://www.skiprat.net
Andrew Mawson - 03 Dec 2006 14:33 GMT
> Is there a metalworkers equivalent of the woodworkers bowl lathe i.e.
> large swing, but short bed?
[quoted text clipped - 8 lines]
> Return E-mails to john@skiprat.net
> http://www.skiprat.net

Well there are lathes intended for turning full size loco wheels but I
suspect they won't squeeze in either <G>

AWEM
Tim Leech - 03 Dec 2006 14:42 GMT
>Is there a metalworkers equivalent of the woodworkers bowl lathe i.e.
>large swing, but short bed?
>
>My need is to turn flywheels for model steam and i.c. engines, but
>don't have room for a large footprint ex-industrial lathe - large
>swing seems to usually come with long bed and large footprint.

There are specialist things like brake lathes, for refacing automotive
discs & drums, but I don't know whether they would be viable for your
sort of job.

Gap bed Colchester Students - at least the older L0 spindle verisions,
don't know about the newer ones - can turn over 18" dia in the gap, &
they're not a huge machine. I suppose it all depends on your idea of
'large'.

Cheers
Tim

Dutton Dry-Dock
Traditional & Modern canal craft repairs
Vintage diesel engine service
Dave Baker - 03 Dec 2006 15:01 GMT
> Is there a metalworkers equivalent of the woodworkers bowl lathe i.e.
> large swing, but short bed?
>
> My need is to turn flywheels for model steam and i.c. engines, but
> don't have room for a large footprint ex-industrial lathe - large
> swing seems to usually come with long bed and large footprint.

What diameter are you actually talking about here by 'large swing'? Your
large might be my small.
--
Dave Baker
Puma Race Engines
www.pumaracing.co.uk
Camp USA engineer minces about for high performance specialist (4,4,7)
John Ambler - 04 Dec 2006 22:31 GMT
Good point everything is relative - for me, who has a Myford and
wishes to make models such as those from Alyn Foundry, large is 10" -
12", but the workshop space would struggle to accept something more
than 3ft long.

Thanks for the input so far....

>What diameter are you actually talking about here by 'large swing'? Your
>large might be my small.
John Ambler
Sussex, UK
Return E-mails to john@skiprat.net
http://www.skiprat.net
Adrian Hodgson - 03 Dec 2006 15:50 GMT
> Is there a metalworkers equivalent of the woodworkers bowl lathe i.e.
> large swing, but short bed?

Do you  have a horisontal mill?

See if you can fashion a type of chock or holder to go into the spindle
bore and then removing the over arm and depending on what you can get
between the knee and bed use a cutting tool fastened to the bed to do you
cutting.

I have managed 2 ft dia with this on a Harrison mill.

Adrian
mark@ems-fife.co.uk - 03 Dec 2006 15:58 GMT
> Is there a metalworkers equivalent of the woodworkers bowl lathe i.e.
> large swing, but short bed?
>
> My need is to turn flywheels for model steam and i.c. engines, but
> don't have room for a large footprint ex-industrial lathe - large
> swing seems to usually come with long bed and large footprint.

A Willson slant bed lathe may do what you want.Due to the slant it
makes the swing a lot bigger than normal for that size of machine.It so
happens I know of one for sale which could be measured.Footprint the
same or smaller than a Student and a better machine.
Mark.
Charles Ping - 03 Dec 2006 16:51 GMT
> Is there a metalworkers equivalent of the woodworkers bowl lathe i.e.
> large swing, but short bed?
>
> My need is to turn flywheels for model steam and i.c. engines, but
> don't have room for a large footprint ex-industrial lathe - large
> swing seems to usually come with long bed and large footprint.

As has been said it depends on the meaning of *big*.

Starting at the small options you used to be able to get an attachment
for a Myford to raise the spindle. A few designs were made, one no
suprisingly called "big turn". I think that Hemingway did a kit aswell.

Bigger gap bed lathes don't have to be huge. My Kerry will swing
something 17" x 3" in the face plate and that's just a 5.5" x 24"
lathe. Not a big footprint.

Colchester did make a "short bed" version of the round head Triumph
which must swing 23-24" in the gap.

Or do you need bigger than those?

Charles
Kevin Steele - 03 Dec 2006 20:31 GMT
>Is there a metalworkers equivalent of the woodworkers bowl lathe i.e.
>large swing, but short bed?

How about a Raglan Loughborough training lathe. Tthe same capacity as
the 5" but much shorter bed, and no screwcutting.  They don't seem to
fetch very much either, seen a couple on ebay.  there's a picture and
description here;

http://www.lathes.co.uk/raglan/page13.html

Regards
Kevin
richard@integerspin.co.uk - 04 Dec 2006 06:09 GMT
> >Is there a metalworkers equivalent of the woodworkers bowl lathe i.e.
> >large swing, but short bed?
There was a facing lathe, or whatever they call them, on one of the toy
shop sites a year ago, it had been there a few years so it's probably
still there; no I can't be more helpful than that, I came across the
site quite a few times from google searches though.The lathe had
something like a foot of bed and a 3ft or so swing..
John Ambler - 09 Dec 2006 12:01 GMT
Sounds interesting - thanks to everybody who gave so much food for
thought - sorry also for the slow response - I haven't been able to
connect to my normal News server (Tiscali) since the 3rd.

I have a Warco miller (VMC), so the suggestions centring on the
vertical lathe are also worth a try - I have a Myford chuck adaptor
for it so mounting a 9" faceplate is possible. Any thoughts on whether
a support bearing on the table would be benefcial for turning the
outer face of the rim (equivalent to tailstock support) ?

>> >Is there a metalworkers equivalent of the woodworkers bowl lathe i.e.
>> >large swing, but short bed?
[quoted text clipped - 3 lines]
>site quite a few times from google searches though.The lathe had
>something like a foot of bed and a 3ft or so swing..
John Ambler
Sussex, UK
Return E-mails to john@skiprat.net
http://www.skiprat.net
Nick Mueller - 04 Dec 2006 09:00 GMT
> My need is to turn flywheels for model steam and i.c. engines, but
> don't have room for a large footprint ex-industrial lathe - large
> swing seems to usually come with long bed and large footprint.

Depending on how big your mill (yes, mill) is, you can use it as
an "inverted" lathe.
Clamp the flywheel onto the spindle, clamp a lathe bit into the vice and you
have a not-so-handy lathe.
I had the same problem and it worked really well on the mill.

Nick
Signature

***********************************
*** Available now in NZ and AUS ***
***********************************
       <http://www.yadro.de>

Andrew Mawson - 04 Dec 2006 09:30 GMT
> > My need is to turn flywheels for model steam and i.c. engines, but
> > don't have room for a large footprint ex-industrial lathe - large
[quoted text clipped - 7 lines]
>
> Nick

Or alternatively set the flywheel up on a rotary table on the mill
table and mill the features that you would have turned. This is rather
more stable (if it is a big flywheel) than trying to hold it in the
spindle, and has the big advantage that the cutting action is on the
upper surface that you can see rather than underneith.

AWEM
Nick Mueller - 04 Dec 2006 10:28 GMT
> Or alternatively set the flywheel up on a rotary table on the mill
> table and mill the features that you would have turned. This is rather
> more stable (if it is a big flywheel) than trying to hold it in the
> spindle, and has the big advantage that the cutting action is on the
> upper surface that you can see rather than underneith.

I made that before. You don't get that "it-was-turned finish" a flywheel
asks for.
Also tried it with a big boring-head (planning and boring head with feed in
the diameter) and wasn't happy either.

Vision is an issue with the setup I described, no doubt!
But on my Deckel I could turn diameters of 1m with the horizontal spindle.
No, the RPM would be way to high and the setup _much_ to risky. I made
300mm diameter on the vertical spindle and will do it again without doubt
and fear.

Nick
Signature

***********************************
*** Available now in NZ and AUS ***
***********************************
     <http://www.yadro.de>

Trevor Jones - 04 Dec 2006 14:04 GMT
> Is there a metalworkers equivalent of the woodworkers bowl lathe i.e.
> large swing, but short bed?
[quoted text clipped - 8 lines]
> Return E-mails to john@skiprat.net
> http://www.skiprat.net

 Yup! A 3 in 1 machine tool with the mill removed. Massive swing for
the size of the machine.

 Cheers
  Trevor Jones
andre_54005@yahoo.com - 06 Dec 2006 15:56 GMT
> Is there a metalworkers equivalent of the woodworkers bowl lathe i.e.
> large swing, but short bed?
[quoted text clipped - 8 lines]
> Return E-mails to john@skiprat.net
> http://www.skiprat.net

I got an old book describing various repairs on large steam engines and
the like.

One was an engine with a damaged low pressure cylinder piston of 86"
diameter.  Would have taken 3 weeks to get a new one and they did not
want to wait, the largest available lathe was only like a 24" swing.
They ended up building up a framework of I beams bolted to the floor
and some pillow block bearings on top for a spare piston rod which was
used as a spindle to spin the piston.  An old gearbox was connected up
between a motor and the shaft to turn it slow.  A lathe a smaller one
not the 24" was bolted to the floor in front of the spinning piston.
The lathe had a spot on the back side of the cross slide for mounting
an inverted cutoff tool, this was used to mount a turning tool pointing
out the back of the lathe.
The repair to the piston was to cut some dovetail groves to hold some
babbitt to build up the diameter of the piston.  And then after the
babbitt was poured and hammered well into the groves the OD and ring
grooves were cleaned up to size on the same setup.

You could maybe do something similar.
_____________
Andre' B.
 
Sign In
Join
My Latest Posts
My Monitored Threads
My Blog
My Photo Gallery
My Profile
My Homepage

Start New Thread
Enable EMail Alerts
Rate this Thread



©2012 Advenet LLC   Privacy Policy - Terms of Use
This website includes both content owned or controlled by Advenet as well as content owned or controlled by third parties.