After ruining another block because of a misaligned draught/chamber junction, I am putting this block down and am going to try and focus on making this lathe work. After this mis-drill I had since shimmed the feet on my lathe. It took out a lot of play to the point where, if my block was chucked up vertical, with most of it's mass at the outside of the chuck, there was very little vibration. Using Tyler's suggestion of tapping the bit against the wood and allowing it to center itself, I was able to create some pretty clean holes. I am hesitant, however, to draw on another block until I have this lathe as stable as I can. I've attached some pictures to show a bit of what it looks like and the bench I've made for my Taig and this wood lathe. I've also shimmed the tailstock so that it perfectly aligns with the live center in the headstock. Any tips on how I can get the most stability out of this thing? I have enough botched ebauchon's for a small fire now...
:0)
Mark
Wood Lathe from Busy Bee Tools. I've made a bench from 2x4's and 3/4" MDF.
Another angle...
Lathe feet...
Lathe shimmed with 1/8" cardboard...
The lathe probably weighs or the order of 60 to 70 pounds, so bolting it down should not be necessary, although not a bad idea at all.
It looks like you shimmed the feet under the tailstock and not the tailstock itself. Shimming the feet will not effect the alignment at all.
What you need to do is understand where the "play" is in your lathe and how to get it as centered as possible.
Put a drive spur in the headstock and a live center in the tailstock and bring the two together by moving the tailstock up.
Look at the alignment of the two points on both the vertical and horizontal plane. This, I believe, is the source of your problem. Your tailstock will likely have play in the horizontal direction and you will need to learn where in that play your center is.
This, in my opinion, is the major problem with using a wood lathe for pipes. They are just not designed to have the kind of precision that pipe makers need. However, if you take the time to learn the little idiosyncrasies of your lather you can learn to work around them.
Thanks. Well, I believe I'll attempt to bolt it into the table top and maybe secure the bench to a couple studs in the wall. Hopefully that will achieve a little stability.
Todd, I actually did shim the tailstock itself with several pieces of metal tape between the bed and tailstock base. The live center in the headstock lines up good with a 1/16" bit in the tailstock. I will keep plugging away with the lathe an maybe save for a metal lathe eventually. What is your method for drilling?
I hate to say it, but I'll bet the problem is the operator, not the tool. I've been using a wood lathe for about a decade to drill and shape my pipes, and the only time I have a problem with the draught hole not hitting the tobacco chamber correctly is when I fail to make sure everything is lined up. The use of a metal lathe won't solve this problem - it will just make it more expensive.
You will get a lot of advice in this regard - square the blocks, use better jaws, get a metal lathe, wear hot pink underwear, etc. The thing is, none of this can fix the problem if you're not also being pedantic about lining up the bit with the intended target. My setup is nearly identical to yours, I don't square my blocks, my underwear is steel blue, and I hit the mark every time.
One very important part of this process is making sure that you don't force the draught hole bit while drilling. If you force it, it will flex, and then it wander off course. Don't try to drill any faster than the drill bit wants to. Also, make sure it's sharp. I also like to clear the flutes of chips often - that way the drill won't get bound in the hole and possibly wander do to lateral force applied by buildup of hot and expanding wood chips.
Stabilizing your lathe may have some positive effect, but again it won't solve the misalignment problem. The only thing it will really solve is the vibration. However, if you're drilling at a low enough speed that really should be a big issue. You can solve it though, just by bolting some random bit of metal opposite the side that's off center. In the pics above, I would probably use a standard #2 jaw bolted to the chuck on the opposite side of the shank of the block. But I would only worry about it when I get up to the 1200 RPM range or higher.
Does your tobacco chamber bit flex at all while drilling?
I was getting some vibration on my old wood lathe until I bolted it to the table, definately worth a try especially if you want to turn a bigger block of wood thats off balanced. after bolting it down there was still some vibration in the table and I smoothed it out 100% by adding some weight, I clamped a length of heavy steel under the table right under the lathe. If you have a fancy new lathe on a heavy stand its probably not an issue, mine had some wear on it..
this is probably a newbie thing but I find 1/8th bits bend and wander around a lot more than 5/32
Can you get 'Steel Blue' underwear at a common tool shop? Seems like a cheap fix. :0) I will agree that this is 'operator error' as, like you mentioned, have the same setup and can successfully drill a block. After considering your answer, I believe I've found the problem. I lay out my lines after squaring my block. When I chuck my block in and try to line my bit up with the guide lines I've drawn on, I sometime cannot get them to line up in a straight line. Maybe my guide lines are, say, 1mm off. What I was doing is re-positioning the block in a way where my bit would hit the mark on the front. What this was doing was creating an off-center draught hole. Do you follow?
Also, my spade bit doesnt flex a whole lot. It's rather stable. I may try and reduce it's length by half so I can chuck it up a bit shorter. That may help with any flex it may have.
you got the right idea, cut the stock on the spade bit down.. I'm just guessing here, but i have about 1.5 inches that I leave for putting in the chuck.. it cuts down warble
--------------------|--- Normal Spade bit
---|--- My adjussted bit
2. Sharp tooling, clean cuts, clear your chips or bits will wander.
As Kurt says, this is somehow operator error rather than just the machine. I finish all my airways by hand because I can visually align/correct them better that way. Then I drill the chamber to completion on the drill press, after starting the chamber on the lathe.
KurtHuhn wrote:You can solve it though, just by bolting some random bit of metal opposite the side that's off center. In the pics above, I would probably use a standard #2 jaw bolted to the chuck on the opposite side of the shank of the block.
+1. This resolved quite a bit of my vibration issue. Very neat trick. Thanks.
KurtHuhn wrote:Stabilizing your lathe may have some positive effect, but again it won't solve the misalignment problem. The only thing it will really solve is the vibration.
+1. Kurt was right. Aside from helping with alignment, this did help with vibration. I simply used the rubber feet and bolts for the feet that came with the lathe and threaded them through the table and into the base of the lathe. This resolved almost all of the vibration that I was getting. Now I can drill my mortise and counter sink it without being out of center.
Sasquatch wrote:
1. Screw the lathe down.
2. Sharp tooling, clean cuts, clear your chips or bits will wander.
+1, +1. This wasn't mentioned previously in this thread, but I thought I would take a day to simply fine tune my equipment ( to the best of my knowledge ). Spending 30 minutes researching how to sharpen tool bits for my Taig was worth it.
After apply all of the suggestions in this thread, I was able to solve all of my stability issues with my wood lathe. Bolted it to my table, used an extra jaw as a country balance while turning the bowl, shortened chamber bit and sharpened my tools. I'd you're concerned about stability, as I was, try these suggestions.
I've been a woodturner for some time now, and I've turned some very large chunks of wood (80+lbs) on my custom built pedestal bowl lathe (my own design). I've also made some additions to my 12"x36" swivel head lathe to make it more stable while turning heavy materials.
One thing I've found is that while you want the lathe to be very mounted in a very solid fashion, you also want to maintain some vibration damping properties. I learned this with my pedestal lathe.
Weight is your friend with a lathe. I have 450lbs of sand on the base of my 12"x36" lathe, and it was the best thing I ever did for it. I have found, however, that sand is one of the better ways of weighting a lathe, as it's loose, granular structure will actually help absorb some harmonic vibration, where as a solid weight, like granite, steel, etc, will at times magnify the harmonic vibrations.
Think of it this way, if you whack a large piece of steel with a hammer, it will ring, hence you have created vibration. If you do the same to a bag of sand, you get a dull thud with little to no vibration.
Same concept when you add weight to a lathe. You want something that will absorb vibration.
Another HUGE help is making sure that when you have the lathe mounted to it's stand or whatever, that the bed is dead flat and level, as you can twist a lathe when bolting it to a stand or a bench, especially a mini-lathe or a long-bed lathe that doesn't have a really beefy bed (like my 12"x36").
Take the extra time and effort to make sure your lathe's bed is dead flat and level when you bolt it down, it will reward you later with improved performance.
Also, aligning your headstock and tailstock is very important! But, I've seen some people who don't check the alignment properly, and can in fact make their issues worse.
One important thing to remember is you want the tailstock and it's quill to be 100% parallel to the lathe bed, so that as you extend the quill it stays the exact same distance from the surface of the bed. You can measure this with a dial indicator and a magnetic base.
Or you can install a dead center into both the headstock and tailstock, move the tail up so the centers touch with the quill in the tail retracted, now move the tail back and extend the quill and see if the centers still line up. They should line up exactly in both positions. If not, either your bed isn't flat or the tail isn't parallel with the bed. In either instance, this will cause issues while drilling.
You should also check this alignment if you shim your tailstock.
Measuring to be sure your headstock is pointing straight down the lathe's bed is another thing you should do, as this can also cause issues. I made myself a special tool to do this using a laser bore-sighter that I adapted to fit into a morse taper. (my father machined the adapter for me) I'm sure others can do the same with just a bit of ingenuity.
Just because you bought a nice wood-lathe doesn't mean it came aligned dead perfect. Take some time and check for yourself, and spend the time to properly set it up. The more careful you are in the set-up, the more accuracy your lathe will reward you with.
And just like Kurt Huhn often says, you don't need a metal lathe to cut pipes, and a wood lathe can be plenty accurate. But even the most accurate machine in the world is only as accurate as the human who is setting it up and operating it!
