Truing up Back Plate and Cup Chuck on a Mini Wood Lathe

Project:
Installing an aluminum cup chuck on a mini lathe

Difficulty Level (Easy, Medium, Hard, Insane):
Easy

Process:
A little while ago I made a Cup Chuck for a local bag pipe business owner. However, because of a fairly significant wobble in his lathe spindle, the chuck (mounted to his back plate) was wobbling quite a bit so he brought the lathe, the back plate and the cup chuck for me to see if I could fix the wobble.

Once I got the mini lathe, I indicated the spindle and it didn't seem too bad (out 0.002") but the real issue was the back plate. There was a good 0.020" wobble in it so I took it off, cleaned the thread really well, put some blue loctite on the thread and twisted the back plate onto the spindle thread.

The owner told me that he was not planning on ever taking the cup chuck off that lathe so I figured using loctite would be a good way to keep the face plate from miss-aligning itself again in the future.

Once the back plate was (semi-) permanently fastened to the spindle, I started the process of truing up the back plate. However, because the lathe was actually a wood lathe, it did not have any mechanism to accurately turn the metal back plate so I removed the cross slide with the mounted compound slide from my metal lathe, clamped it down to the wood lathe with 3 c-clamps, aligned the angle with the compound slide and then turned the face plate right on the spindle.

I turned a recess into the back plate, then indicated the cup chuck on my regular lathe and turned the matching recess into the cup chuck. All that was left to do after was mount the cup chuck back on the (now trued up) back plate with some loctite and the job was done.

Pictures:

The Cross slide clamped to the bed of the wood lathe

Another view

View from the head stock side

Close-up of the profile I cut into the back plate

Another view

Chamfering the edges

The mounted cup chuck with a piece of black acetal

Another view

Tools:
Metal lathe & accessories
Cordless drill
C-clamps
Scrap metal for shimming

Materials:
Blue loctite

Time:
3 hrs

Conclusion:
There's still a little wobble for smaller diameter acetal but only around 0.001" for medium and bigger sized stock.

Fixing My 20 Gallon Air Compressor

Project:
Replacing a bearing on my air compressor motor

Difficulty Level (Easy, Medium, Hard, Insane):
Easy

Process:
I was working away in my shop the other day when my air compressor started to sound really bad. It sounded like something was rattling. At first I thought it might have been a loose pipe, but upon further inspection it turned out to be a bad bearing in the motor.

I've never actually seen a bearing that bad; the ring that separates the actual balls inside of the races was literally ripped apart and sticking out.

The original bearing was a 6203 LB (NTN) but all the bearing places were closed on the weekend so I bought a cheap 6203 RS replacement bearing at princess auto for $5 bucks and started putting it in.

Pulling the inner race off the shaft was pretty hard. I ended up having to use one of my diy lathe dog and a 3-prong bearing puller to get it off. The outer race was equally difficult so I had to turn a piece of 1.500" steel down to the proper size so I could hammer the outer race out of the aluminum housing.

Once the old bearing was off, I had to make another custom piece on my lathe to press/hammer the new bearing back on the shaft. Lastly, I used my oxy/acetylene torch to heat up the aluminum housing and lightly tapped the bearing into the housing. After putting it all back together it was back to running like it should.

Pictures:

The compressor without the protective cover

The bearing cage sticking out

The dust shield floating

The damaged bearing cage with the dust shield off

Another view

This motor has seen some dust

The inner race still on the rotor

Pulling the inner race off with a home-made lathe dog and a 3-jaw pulley puller

The outer race still in the aluminum housing

Another view

Getting ready to turn a piece of metal to the proper size

Knocking the outer bearing race out of the aluminum housing

All the parts of the motor

The not so good looking old bearing

The new bearing (6203 RS from Princess Auto)

Turning another piece of metal to hammer the new bearing back on the rotor shaft

The hole allows for the rotor shaft to protrude past the bearing

The rotor back in the motor housing

Pressing the new bearing back into the aluminum housing

Another view

Close-up of the new bearing

The aluminum housing back on the motor

The fixed compressor motor

Tools:
3-prong pulley puller
Socket set
Oxy/Acetylene torch
Hammer
Rubber mallet
Metal lathe & accessories
Torx screwdriver
Cordless drill

Materials:
6203 RS bearing

Cost:
$5.00

Time:
2 hrs

Savings:
At least $125 bucks

Conclusion:
Works like a charm

Making My Own Kool Mist System For Lathe And Mill

Project:
Making a cooling system for my metal lathe and mill

Difficulty Level (Easy, Medium, Hard, Insane):
Medium

Process:
As I've been turning some more substantial projects lately I've often had to resort to cooling down my work piece with compressed air before taking proper measurements. Also, the use of cutting oil - although it works great - created quite a bit of smoke in the shop so I wanted to switch to an alternate means of cooling/lubricating my work piece and tooling.

After doing some research I found a bunch of people who used the misting type cooling system (as opposed to the flood coolant). Since my shop usually is below 0 in the winter when I'm not using it I wanted to stay away from the flood coolant so I decided to us a $15 all-house water filter housing that I found on kijiji as a starting point.

Also, I had picked up a whole bunch of different industrial parts at an auction a few months ago, one of which was a fluid level gauge which, mounted to the filter housing, would give me a quick and easy way to see how much coolant I had left.

The first thing I did after ordering a bunch of 1/4" quick connectors on ebay was to clamp the filter housing on my milling table and mill a nice and straight/flat piece down alongside the filter housing so I could mount the fluid level gauge. Then I drilled some holes and mounted the gauge.

Next thing I had to tap a thread on the inside of the lid to mount a quick connector and then a 8" piece of 1/4" vinyl hose as the fluid sucker-upper.

After that came a chunk of 1" teflon I cut, drilled and tapped as a sort of pneumatic manifold to direct one part into the filter housing to pressurize it and another part to the supply line for the actual air nozzle.

After that came a few adapters here and there and then all that was left was assembling it.

Videos:

 
Pictures:

 
Tools:
Metal lathe & accessories
Tap & die set
Table saw
Drill press
Wrenches

Materials:
Engineer's blue
Whole-house filter
Fluid level gauge
1/4" quick connectors
3/4" NPT plugs
4" by 4" by 1" teflon
1/4" vinyl hose
Kool mist type misting system
1" of 1" diameter brass
1" of 1/2" diameter brass
Magnetic base

Cost:
$40.00

Time:
5 hrs

Savings:
$125.00

Conclusion:
It works great.