my new lathe ... Precision Matthews 12x36 ...

[Anglepoise]

Man, the level is so sensitive that it takes a LONG FREAKING time to get things aligned!.

Will

We should have warned you about that <g>.

Even resting on the neoprene feet, you will get a bubble movement on the level when you lean very heavily on the lathe. But once its all settled and been re leveled a couple of times you will be fine. Try and get even weight on all 8 feet so the steel cabinet wont distort over time. Get your cabinet set and correct for height and then progress upwards from there.

Looks great.........

 

[precisionworks]

Try and get even weight on all 8 feet ...

David makes a good point, one which I've been thinking about. If that were my machine, I'd consider expanding the footprint of both bases (which was done on the South Bend in my shop). The easiest way to do this is to use heavy wall square tubes that extend slightly beyond the factory bases.

If you go this route, Will, be careful that you don't go too far on the side where you stand ... you can easily go farther on the back side. If you extend too far on the working side, it's easy to create a trip hazard ... don't ask how I know:sigh:

An even cleaner approach is to have two plates cut, same width as the bases but longer front to back. Somewhere in the 1" thickness range would be nice, and add weight down low where it really helps. If there's a heavy fab shop in your city, they'll stock plate like that, and have either a CNC oxy-fuel table, or a CNC waterjet that can quickly & easily cut the plates to shape, including a nice radius on all the corners.

There's a local shop that does this, and I'd be glad to have it cut for you, but freight would probably be $100 from here to Texas.

 

[wquiles]

KC2IXE, Mirage_Man, TB, Anglepoise, precisionworks - thanks much for the feedback on the base. I did my best in keeping all 8 feet balanced weight-wise - actually each set of 4, since the spindle side is much heaver than the tailstock side. I will keep these feet for now, wait a couple of days for them to settle, and re-check the twist on the ways next weekend.

precisionworks - Long term, I do like what you suggest. I would definitely like a wider stance, and adding weight down below on a base similar to your SB sounds like a good idea. If I understood you right, I would bolt the new 1" thick plate to the bottom of each base, and then on the front/back "extensions" re-mount the leveling feet. Is that what you had in mind? The only problem I would have would be how to "swap" these without needing an engine hoist again. Right now I could change them in pairs without a hoist, but not all 4 of them 🙁



With feedback from you guys, I re-wired the electrical box and now have a proper 4-conductor wire going from the lathe's electrical box to my temporary female 220 outlet:

Here you can see the new earth ground connection:

and although crowded, here is the new black/red wires connected to the electrical strip (lowest, leftmost two positions), and the white terminal connection which goes to the PE or metal ground of the machine (that copper/bronze plate leftmost in the pic):

Here is a full view of all of the connections, relays, etc.. The transformer above is wired to take 220V and give out 24V:

here is the circuit diagram of the lathe and accessories. Note how the return wire (white) is directly wired to the PE ground of the lathe. I did use my voltmeter to verify this - all the metal in the machine, including the outer casing for the motor is shorted to this PE plate:

Now that I have the lathe aligned and balanced, I went ahead and place the back splash cover, so now we can look at the fully operational lathe. If you compare to my first set of pics, you will see that the lathe sits now lower than before:

Will

 

[cmacclel]

Will why is there still 4 wires in the mix when you only need 3??

You should use a 20amp 2-pole breaker with 12ga wire, 12/2 in Romex or 12/3 in WO style wire. One wire each to the breaker and then the other to the Green side (equipment ground) of the panel buss bar.

Looking good 🙂

Mac

 

[precisionworks]

I would bolt the new 1" thick plate to the bottom of each base, and then on the front/back "extensions" re-mount the leveling feet.

Exactly!

As you said, you'll again need a lift of some type. One of the handiest things I've ever built is an A-frame gantry crane:

It's built so that there's a full half inch clearance above the I-beam when the garage door is up. It's most often used to load & unload the portable welder, but it's also handy whenever anything heavy needs lifting (the chain hoist is 2000# rated):

If you have room, a gantry is a nice addition to any shop. You might also consider mounting a fixed position I-beam, with stationary supports on the ends, if all your heavy machine tools are in a straight line.

 

[wquiles]

Will why is there still 4 wires in the mix when you only need 3??

Mac, you are right, I only need 3 wires (two hots and the return). I added the 4th wire (which is the green, earth ground) just for additional safety 😉

Will

 

[cmacclel]

Mac, you are right, I only need 3 wires (two hots and the return). I added the 4th wire (which is the green, earth ground) just for additional safety 😉

Will

No No No.....🙂

There is no return.....You should have 2 hots and earth gound only. Earth ground and equipment ground are the same. You should not have a neutral over to the machine.

The only place, within a residence, where Neutral and ground should meet up is the main panel box. Neutral and Ground are bonded together there.


Mac

 

[wquiles]

Exactly!

As you said, you'll again need a lift of some type. One of the handiest things I've ever built is an A-frame gantry crane:

(snip)

It's built so that there's a full half inch clearance above the I-beam when the garage door is up. It's most often used to load & unload the portable welder, but it's also handy whenever anything heavy needs lifting (the chain hoist is 2000# rated):

(snip)

If you have room, a gantry is a nice addition to any shop. You might also consider mounting a fixed position I-beam, with stationary supports on the ends, if all your heavy machine tools are in a straight line.

That is the problem - I don't have the room for one 🙁

Still, I know I will come up with a way to have a wider base at some point 😉

Will

 

[wquiles]

Already my first "mod" on the new lathe. The chuck adapter for MT3 is too long for my tailstock:

so this extra at the end has to go:

but that was not enough, so I had to cut another piece:

Now it fits great, allows full travel (4" which is great compared to the 2 and 1/2" travel of the 8x machine), and I still have about an 1/8" travel to push the piece out 😉

Will

 

[Alan B]

No No No.....🙂

There is no return.....You should have 2 hots and earth gound only. Earth ground and equipment ground are the same. You should not have a neutral over to the machine.

The only place, within a residence, where Neutral and ground should meet up is the main panel box. Neutral and Ground are bonded together there.


Mac

Now that makes more sense. The machine 'white' is not a neutral at all, but an earth ground mis-colorcoded...?? There should be no 120V loads at all then, to insure that no return current flows in the safety ground.

I will check with some members of my workplace's electrical safety committee to learn more about this type of wiring setup and what they recommend.

-- Alan

 

[wquiles]

No No No.....🙂

There is no return.....You should have 2 hots and earth gound only. Earth ground and equipment ground are the same. You should not have a neutral over to the machine.

The only place, within a residence, where Neutral and ground should meet up is the main panel box. Neutral and Ground are bonded together there.


Mac

Now that makes more sense. The machine 'white' is not a neutral at all, but an earth ground mis-colorcoded...?? There should be no 120V loads at all then, to insure that no return current flows in the safety ground.

I will check with some members of my workplace's electrical safety committee to learn more about this type of wiring setup and what they recommend.

-- Alan

That could be the case indeed, with improper color codes. I know that the DRO is wired for 220V (I already checked that), so I will check tomorrow to see how the lamp is connected, as well as the coolant pump - I wonder if any of these two are wired for 120V using the white/return as reference?

Alan - share with them the circuit diagram that I posted above - maybe that will help (that is, assuming that diagram is even accurate to how the machine is actually wired!).

Will

 

[cmacclel]

Will I would have left the tang on the tailstock arbor if you could have. My Grizzly fit that same arbor no problem. All it takes it one chip or piece of debris in the taper and if it spins in the taper it's downhill from there. My original lathe tailstock spun a few times and it damaged it.

Mac

 

[Alan B]

That is the problem - I don't have the room for one 🙁

Still, I know I will come up with a way to have a wider base at some point 😉

Will

Maybe you can design the gantry to sit over the car when it is parked in there, so it doesn't take up much 'room'.

I would think fewer support points would be better than the current eight. Getting the tension even with so many is impossible.

All our critical equipment at work is aligned and grouted.

Sure looks like a nice machine, Will!

-- Alan

 

[Alan B]

Will I would have left the tang on the tailstock arbor if you could have. My Grizzly fit that same arbor no problem. All it takes it one chip or piece of debris in the taper and if it spins in the taper it's downhill from there. My original lathe tailstock spun a few times and it damaged it.

Mac

Is there a slot in there to take the tang and prevent spinning? I don't think my lathe has that. Neat idea, though. I've had that problem when drilling brass or enlarging existing holes... Had to resort to a chuck key in the chuck against the cross slide...

-- Alan

 

[wquiles]

Will I would have left the tang on the tailstock arbor if you could have. My Grizzly fit that same arbor no problem. All it takes it one chip or piece of debris in the taper and if it spins in the taper it's downhill from there. My original lathe tailstock spun a few times and it damaged it.

Mac

Ahh - I did not think about that. Thanks for the heads-up 😉 . The big problem for me is that it was robing me from a full 1" of travel 🙁

At least the adapter was only like $10 bucks - I can always buy another one, on my next Enco/MSC order 😉

Will

 

[Anglepoise]

Some of the new 4 conductor hook ups for dryer and stove are a little different than the 2 hot's and a ground we normally associate with 220/240 volts.

When in doubt don't take my advice as I am not an electrical engineer but I think the photo below is correct if you are going to use 4 conductor plugs and sockets

 

[Alan B]

Some of the new 4 conductor hook ups for dryer and stove are a little different than the 2 hot's and a ground we normally associate with 220/240 volts.

When in doubt don't take my advice as I am not an electrical engineer but I think the photo below is correct if you are going to use 4 conductor plugs and sockets

That is consistent with my understanding. Note that it also shows an independent ground connection to the equipment, as well as one through the plug. I've heard this is the new approach, since the safety ground is important and a failure in it won't normally be noticed, the redundant ground insures that such a failure is far less likely, and the equipment remains grounded even when unplugged which can offer protection against some other types of faults.

-- Alan

 

[StrikerDown]

Are there 3 conductors coming from the new machine or 4?

The neutral (white) should not be connected to the ground (green) at the machine or any where outside of the power panel on the side of the house.

If there are 4 conductors coming from the lathe then the white should only be connected to white all the way back to the power panel. The green should only be connected to green all the way back to the power panel. The hot leads connected to hot leads all the way back to the power panel.

What you want to avoid is connecting the white and green outside of the panel. It is a safety issue should you ever get the wrong combination of loose connections it could be a killer. This is not very likely but using an extension cord does increase the risk.

If you had hard wired from the panel to the machine then it would not matter what the color of the hot wires you just can't use white or green.

If your lathe has only three conductors 2 Hot and a Neutral (wh) you should probably change out the lead to 3 conductor with ground and connect the ground to a substantial chassis ground in the machine.

If it has 3 conductors 2 hot and a ground (gr) then the machine either completely runs on 220V or uses an internal stepdown transformer for any 110V requirements like the work light or electronics. In this case you don't need the neutral conductor at all. Just don't jumper between the neutral and ground connections in the male connector.

I never would have gussed the WHite wire FROM A FACTORY was really GRound, even if they are Chinese!

Now that we have determined your machine has no neutral, I'm going to guess that your worklight is a halogen 24V and the coolant pump is 24V too instead of 110V. I'm guessing they use 24V (low Voltage) for safety around cooling fluids.

As I said yesterday the WH and GR wires should not be connected together outside of the panel on the side of the house.

 

[Alan B]

Once you get these new lathes fired up, I have an interesting little project that perhaps one of you would like to make a few of. Start with a tail end scrap from a cut-down M@g job. Thread the cut end of this piece to make an "extender", but inside mount a fake cell that brings the leads out through a hole in the side of this adapter so we can measure in-situ current on a completed M@g project.

Perhaps this has already been done, in any case it would be a useful piece of test equipment. I could build the rest if I just had an extension tube to start with, and it doesn't have to be any particular length (probably best if shorter than a cell anyhow).

-- Alan

 

[precisionworks]

All it takes it one chip or piece of debris in the taper and if it spins in the taper it's downhill from there.

An old machinist taught me to use a 5# copper hammer to seat the drill chuck - retract the jaws first, then give it three or four solid whacks. Before doing that, my chuck had spun, which meant buying a finish reamer and reaming the tailstock bore ... not bad if you go slowly, turn the reamer only by hand, use lots of TapMagic, etc. Then you either have to stone the male taper or replace the male taper.

The solid copper hammer is the best solution I've found.