Milling spindle

[Mark BParticipant @markb43031]

I am wanting to improve the general accuracy of my wheel cutting (gears) for clocks. At the moment I'm turning blanks on the lathe and then transferring the blank to a dividing head mounted on a milling machine which I use for cutting the teeth. This works fine, but you lose a bit of centre accuracy moving from one machine to another.

The answer is to cut the teeth whilst the blank is still on the lathe. I'm wanting to use my Myford ML7 which you can easily connect a dividing head to the head stock. So I need a milling spindle to mount on by vertical slide to hold my wheel cutter! Typically these are driven from a belt drive from a separate motor.

Sadly you can't just buy these and whenever they come up for sale they command silly prices. So I'm wondering if anyone has a suggested design or knows of a fairly priced kit or even ready made item I can purchase for this?

[Mark BParticipant @markb43031]

[Boiler BriParticipant @boilerbri]

Hi Mark. There is currently a milling spindle for sale on eBay. Search Boxford lathe and I am sure you will find it.

Bri

[Paul LousickParticipant @paullousick59116]

My lathe and rotary table both have a 3MT spindle and I hold the work in a collet holder which can be transfered from one machine to the other and maintain concentricity.

Paul

[Paul LousickParticipant @paullousick59116]

My lathe and rotary table both have a 3MT spindle and I hold the work in a collet holder which can be transfered from one machine to the other and maintain concentricity.

Paul

[Nick WheelerParticipant @nickwheeler]

It's not a Myford, but the principle is the same: ER11 Collet motor, clamp, adjustable power supply and collets which cost £90 from Ebay. I already had the mini-lathe vertical slide, and I spent about an hour replicating the mount to attach it to my WM250. The motor bracket is bolted directly to slide into tapped holes. It quite happily mills steel with a 6mm ball cutter.

[IanTParticipant @iant]

Some years ago I made an adaptor to fit my Chinese vertical slide (which also fits on my Super 7 cross-slide) to one end of my EW lathe bed. I mounted a Taig ER16 milling spindle to the vertical slide and I was then able to vertical mill on the EW's boring table – which is very useful for some small jobs.

So in theory – you can mount a Taig head on a Myford vertical slide and use it to machine work mounted in the headstock – however, I've not actually done it (as I also have several milling machines these days) – so I'm not sure what the clearances etc would be in practice. I'd normally take my Taig set-up down the shed and try it for you but I'm not able to do so at the moment I'm afraid.

However, the Taig head (used to) cost about £80 and is very good value at the price – so worth considering…just needs an adaptor block and a small motor. The photo of the EW set-up should give you some idea of it – but on the S7 the vertical slide would be on the cross-slide of course…

Regards,

IanT

[Mark BParticipant @markb43031]

Thanks for the ideas. I like the ER collet motor, but having looked at it, the spindle speed is a little too fast for cutting pinions. The recommended speed is 300-400 RPM.

The Taig head is another great idea and it is available from Peatol who supply all of the spare parts including the head. I've emailed them for more details…

[BazyleParticipant @bazyle]

For clock wheels isn't a traditional cutter frame (U shape on a stick) with a sewing machine motor enough?

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