Reply To: Mini Lathe ~ best modifications?

[Ex contributorParticipant @mgnbuk]

Watching TouTube mini lathe improvement videos (amongst others) while recovering from recent hand surgery – preferable to day-time TV ! – has motivated me to do some "upgrades" to a Chester Conquest. I got this (complete mechanically but no electrics other than the motor) from a Chester open day many years ago with a view to using it a a basis for a CNC conversion, but have decided to use it as-is with some of the "improvements" detailed on the likes of "We can do that better" , "Artisan Makes" , "Hammerland" and others.

My modified thumb is sort-of working again, so parts have been ordered & started to arrive – taper roller bearings, steel headstock gears, aluminium timing belt pulleys & some electrical components so far. Modified cross & compound slide gibs, saddle keep strips, feed screw thrust bearings & some form of rigid base (I am thinking of using a 50mm thick pressed concrete paving slab) are all on the "to do" list. Also have ideas to replace the permenant magnet DC motor (not a great solution for this application IMO) with a multi-step pulley & AC motor arrangement to get more torque at lower speeds than the DC arrangement can provide – but that is a way off.

I'm under no illusions that this will produce a "Myford or Boxford beater", but I spent a large part of my working life modifying and upgrading machine tools & would prefer to play along those lines now I have retired, rather than get involved with more traditional model engineering subjects. Well to start with anyway.

I can't say I am surprised that a 40kg-ish small lathe not bolted to a rigid base shows signs of deflection at low force inputs & improves noticably with a foundation – full size machine tools do so also & the manufacturers recommendation for all I have been involved with is to bolt them to a substantial concrete foundation. Some need this more than others, being little more than a hard facing that get most of their rigidity from the foundations (Binns & Berry lathes & Butler Elagmills come to mind here) & others (like Asquith gantry machining centres) rely upon the foundations to hold several separate machine elements in the correct location relative to each other – there is no machine without the foundation.

Nigel B.

Nigel B.